Monthly Archives: August 2015

Whispering Sol LeWitt’s Sentences on conceptual art.

Posted on by

Throughout the Gossip and Nonsense project Emily and I have been using Sol LeWitt’s sentences on conceptual art as phrases to ‘chinese whisper’. Written in 1969 these were first published in the magazine 0-9 in New York, and in Art-Language in London (both 1969). I’ve gradually been setting the resulting ‘translated’ sentences using metal letterpress type.

IMG_20141021_173739873

Possibly the most laborious way to produce a printed page, letterpress appeals to me because of the amount of care that it requires; the decision making and accuracy; and the physicality of the heavy-weight cubes of metal; the sound of the sticky ink; the smell of news print; and the effort required to pull the press.

IMG_20141021_175233227_HDR

To date (August 2015) the following sentences have been whispered and printed in an edition of 30, on newsprint.

1. Conceptual art are eternal optimists.

(whispered by London Met staff Cat Jeffcock, Aimee McWilliams, Charlotte Worthington and Marianne Forest in English)

12. For each work of art that comes from a circle there are many variations

(whispered by artists group members: Rebecca French, Agnieszka Gratza, Karen Christopher, Sheila Ghelani, Clare Qualmann in English)

14. The words of one artist to another might induce an idea strain.

(whispered by artists group members: Rebecca French, Agnieszka Gratza, Karen Christopher, Sheila Ghelani, Clare Qualmann in English)

15. Art can take whatever form it likes, warts are another matter

(whispered by participants in the Gossip and Nonsense symposium, Exeter, June 2013, in English and French)

16. If words come first of all it’s because of art, not literature.

(whispered by participants in the Gossip and Nonsense symposium, Exeter, June 2013, in English and French)

20. Successful art challenges our perceptions by changing our understanding.

(whispered by participants in the Renaissance Rumours event at Inside Out, King’s, October 2014, in English and French)

26. The artist makes the seed, but others do their own.

(whispered by London Met Fine Art students, May 2015, in English)

27. The concept of a work of art may involve the people.

(whispered by artists group members: Rebecca French, Agnieszka Gratza, Karen Christopher, Sheila Ghelani, Clare Qualmann in English)

34. When an artist makes his scene he makes his scene well.

(whispered by London Met Fine Art students, May 2015, in English)

You can compare the original sentences here.

Dominic Hills’s prints for sale

Posted on by

In the early seventeenth century, a highly successful comic anthology written in Latin appeared for the delight of students and other citizens of the Republic of Letters who would have known their classics: the Nugæ Venales, Thesaurus ridendi & jocandi ad gravissimos serverissimosque viros […] (Prostant apud Neminem: sed tamen Uibque, 1642), that is to say Trifles for sale, or thesaurus of laughter and jolliness, addressed to the most serious and severe men […] (To be sold at nobody’s address yet everywhere, 1642).

Among other things, as Annette Tomarken discovered, this collection features numerous passages translating bits of the French comedian known as Bruscambille into Latin, which means that his jokes, including mock learned discussions of farts and how these are good and spiritual, had an unexpected afterlife.

As followers of this blog will know, Bruscambille’s jokes have continued to resonate in the form of Dominic Hills’s prints, and these nugae are themselves for sale through Robert Eagle Fine Art (an online gallery, so truly Prostant apud Neminem: sed tamen Uibque).