Fertile GroundNorth Light Arts, Dunbar, Scotland

25-26 October, 2014

Introduction to the Conference: “When I'm writing, I'm thinking...”

Chris Fremantle

Aristotle's Poetics

There is another art which imitates by means of language alone, and that either in prose or verse--which, verse, again, may either combine different metres or consist of but one kind – but this has hitherto been without a name.

Nicholas Bourriaud (2008)

...it seems that it was one of those moments when an emerging aesthetic paradigm took form and became visible, when an artistic generation was shaped.

Helen Molesworth (1996)

What I desire most from criticism, and is often the hardest thing to find, is writing that is highly tuned to the problematics of the relational. … In other words, work that pays close attention to what happens when you put something called theory or history next to something called an art object.

Grant Kester (2014)

...these projects confront the critic with a very different set of questions. When does the work “begin” and when does it “end”? What are the boundaries of the field within which it operates, and how were they determined? At the most basic level, can we even agree as to what constitutes the object of criticism?

Grant Kester (2011)

In the most successful collaborative projects we encounter instead a pragmatic openness to site and situation, a willingness to engage with specific cultures and communities in a creative and improvisational manner … , a concern with non-hierarchical and participatory processes, and a critical and self-reflexive relationship to practice itself. Another important component is the desire to cultivate and enhance forms of solidarity... .

Grant Kester (2014)

I do think there is a paradigm shift occurring, specifically in the way in which we understand aesthetic autonomy. This isn’t simply a shift in the content of work, but in the underlying formal organization of artistic production. … These changes aren’t occurring simply because artists are asking different questions about their own creative practice. Rather, they reflect a broader, trans-disciplinary interest in collective knowledge production.

John Thackara

drivers for change(gloomy)

signals of transformation(seedlings)

leaving things better(not just doing less harm)

Basarab Nicolescu

Collaboration?

Knowledge and practice?

Multi-disciplinary

Inter-disciplinary

Trans-disciplinary

Basarab Nicolescu

Collaboration?

Knowledge and practice?

Multi-disciplinary

Inter-disciplinary

Trans-disciplinary