GAP – Global Art Project
Carl Heyward (USA), Joan Stennick (USA), Vered Gersztenkorn (Israel), Lorna Crane (Australia), Akiko Suzuki (Japan), Chaewon Laura Oh (Korea)
Protagonisti all’ultima Biennale del Salento, gli artisti del GAP, Global Art Project, hanno portato nelle sale di Palazzo Vernazza, a Lecce, un intreccio di linguaggi in combustione, di parole e segni accartocciati ed esplicati nell’accumulo come nella sottrazione. Elementi dominanti, la divaricazione mediale, l’aumento della pervasività simbolica che appare negli sviluppi segnici dei membri del gruppo. Il segno, i segni, si moltiplicano e sottraggono a vicenda. Lo spazio dell’opera è territorio di rappresaglia. Accerchiamenti agguerriti, assalti, non lasciano il tempo di posare lo sguardo che già si è tentati di distoglierlo e puntarlo su di un nuovo particolare, scoprendo nuove dimensioni che popolano l’opera. La sorpresa è attrattiva costante. Messaggi emergono e tentano la critica, l’imboscata al luogo comune, al pensiero già dato.
#3 CARL HEYWARD detail…language
#8 GAP COLLABORATIVE ARTIST’S BOOK
#9 Carl Heyward and Vered Gersztenkorn row four:
#10 Carl Heyward and Vered Gersztenkorn
GAP ( global art project)
Ron Shelton produces HAF ( HIGH ART FRIDAY’S which profiles contemporary arts and art activities on FACEBOOK)
this interview appeared August 7, 2014
https://www.facebook.com/groups/496221567165118/permalink/634060736714533/
Questions for Carl:
1) Carl, how did GAP 2014 Venice Workshop come to fruition?
The workshops specifically came into being after examining our presence in Italy for the exhibition at CaZanardi as well as the invitation to participate in the 3rd Lecce/Salento Biennale; I learned through a series of solo exhibitions last year in Ceglie Mesapica and Lecce that there is great interest in contemporary art practice especially the mixed-media process in the Belle Arte Academie settings, by the emerging artists who operate in an environment rich with antiquities and the whole history of Western art at their doorstep that is oddly bereft of a contextual format that seriously addresses many aspects of current practice. So we made ourselves available during the course of the exhibit, between our own studio time, to conduct sessions in drawing, art from nature, mixed-media, collage, contemporary quilt making and painting.
2) What criteria did you employ selecting the 6 artists?
I have known individuals in the group from a period ranging from two to six years; have collaborated extensively with all of them, especially Lorna Crane who has joined me in the KNEE (jerk) Fragmentation PROJECT since about 2011 involving more than 500 artists worldwide resulting in more than 3,000 A-5 (roughly 6 x 9 inch) sized pieces in a one-for-one art exchange between the participants. She immediately responded to the notion of “fragmentation”, salvaging refuse materials from the studio floor, the trash bin, the found scrap, the discarded gesture that contained a germ of salvageable intent that, combined with another “frag”might result in a whole new work risen from that heap …add that to the collected frags coming in from all over the world, re-combined and then cut up and re-distributed as fresh new works with the participation of involved creative people , well, all of this proved to be very rewarding and stimulating.
That community of artists continues to expand and the GAP core group came from those energies: Akiko Suzuki, Laura Oh, Joan Stennick (my partner) and Vered Gerszrenkorn.
We share a similar aesthetic, combine disparate elements in the creation of our work, but maintain individual and unique identities in the overall practice of each artist. We meet at the intersection of mixed-media yet maintain divergent philosophical paths that define each, perhaps, for who they/we are.
These are artists who do what I cannot do, do what has not occurred to me to do, create simple magic through dint of their dedication to the creative process. All are dedicated practitioners whose work I admire deeply.
And of course the sad “YES” !
3) How did the overall chemistry of the 6 artist impact the direction and outcome of the workshop?
We expected to have the jerk, the prima donna; to have drama and discord…”in the course of human events” and all that…it NEVER happened. We had the most incredible experience making art together, teaching, improvising, learning, traveling together, brainstorming …making it up as we went…incredible meals and conversations. We knew from the gate that this is/was and continues to be a unique and special experience. Add to that the phantasmagorical environment of living in a 15th century Palazzo in Venice, Italy..give me a break.
It was ” lemme pinch myself” every day for a month .
There exists a telepathy, an unspoken communication that I have only experienced an intimate or in improvisational musical jam sessions that is very high and very special;this is what the month of July was like; every moment an opportunity to completely be present, to create or impart some idea, to witness others grapple with challenges and aesthetic solutions, alternatives from the canvas to selecting the right route to Rialto Bridge to deciding the menu for dinner…serendipity and trust seemed to be the credo for the GAP experience overall.
With the addition of British artist John Crabtree and later the Italian Cinzio Cavallarin we were challenged and privilege to create fast-paced works at an incredible rate without thought or reservation which proved to be an invaluable stimulus to the group dynamic and informed the individual workshops that were more formal and structured.
We faced fifteen artists at Treviso’s Art In the Rotunda situated in a massive round of buildings traditionally used as an ancient market place converted into stall spaces for artists marketing their work. This proved to be an exhausting exercise in crowd-control and improv theater resulting in the bonding of the GAP unit into a “rise to the occasion” MASH unit of artists-paramedics.
4) What was the reaction of the community that took part in the workshop sessions?
Completely positive. Most acknowledged that they had never worked in within the formats or considered the suggestions that we made to loosen up and escape the tyranny of the precious object, make a mark and tear it up , combine with another. The notion that one wold create a masterpiece o rany completed work in these sessions went entirely out the window. Once participants accepted the premise that they could entirely free and responsible for the direction of the sessions you could see and feel the joy of that accepted liberation and the responsibility concomitant with freedom.
5) How did the artist’s collaboration in workshops impact the project?
This was a very important element of the GAP experience. We all witnessed the process of the other.Sometimes immediately, sometimes over a period of days. Handing a work in progress over to Akiko, for instance, I was amazed where she took things…she is a consummate “finisher” , I am a good instigator; Lorna is a masterful teacher; Vered is just magical to watch and all the more charming because she is so self-effacing; she has no clue just how valuable she is, and Laura is completely indispensable to the entire process, she is there with what you need before you realize that you need it.
I was puzzled as to just how to collaborate with her ( Laura); she, like Akiko, use fabric and exotic papers in her creations…nonetheless two of the most satisfying pieces created in the collaborative process came from my work with Laura and I am very very pleased.
Something arose from just jumping without knowing that the parachute would open and the experience remains amazing with very satisfying results. We are all gratified and I believe changed for the better. It remains to be seen how this experience will impact our individual practice.
6) What story did the Book Art collage collaborations convey of GAP Venice 2014?
This is the portable gallery. This is the act of being in the moment and synthesizing the immediate experience without fiction or editing. This is the crude unadulterated truth of our experience and is a shorthand of that experience put into visual poems.
7) What direction will future development go from the information collected through the GAP project?
We shall see. Certainly increased confidence in group and individual practice. GAP is/was an experience, a group for people who eschew the group idea…a social experience for hermits…an entirely unique and special experience. Will attempting to duplicate the experience fail? Possibly. But if there is one thing that we learned it is this:
A creative risk is a risk worth taking. Nothing compares to the process. Nothing compares to the result. Nothing.
GLOBAL ART PROJECT / GAP
Ron Shelton produces HAF ( HIGH ART FRIDAY’S which profiles contemporary arts and art activities on FACEBOOK)
this interview appeared August 7, 2014
https://www.facebook.com/groups/496221567165118/permalink/634060736714533/
Questions for Carl:
1) Carl, how did GAP 2014 Venice Workshop come to fruition?
The workshops specifically came into being after examining our presence in Italy for the exhibition at CaZanardi as well as the invitation to participate in the 3rd Lecce/Salento Biennale; I learned through a series of solo exhibitions last year in Ceglie Mesapica and Lecce that there is great interest in contemporary art practice especially the mixed-media process in the Belle Arte Academie settings, by the emerging artists who operate in an environment rich with antiquities and the whole history of Western art at their doorstep that is oddly bereft of a contextual format that seriously addresses many aspects of current practice. So we made ourselves available during the course of the exhibit, between our own studio time, to conduct sessions in drawing, art from nature, mixed-media, collage, contemporary quilt making and painting.
2) What criteria did you employ selecting the 6 artists?
I have known individuals in the group from a period ranging from two to six years; have collaborated extensively with all of them, especially Lorna Crane who has joined me in the KNEE (jerk) Fragmentation PROJECT since about 2011 involving more than 500 artists worldwide resulting in more than 3,000 A-5 (roughly 6 x 9 inch) sized pieces in a one-for-one art exchange between the participants. She immediately responded to the notion of “fragmentation”, salvaging refuse materials from the studio floor, the trash bin, the found scrap, the discarded gesture that contained a germ of salvageable intent that, combined with another “frag”might result in a whole new work risen from that heap …add that to the collected frags coming in from all over the world, re-combined and then cut up and re-distributed as fresh new works with the participation of involved creative people , well, all of this proved to be very rewarding and stimulating.
That community of artists continues to expand and the GAP core group came from those energies: Akiko Suzuki, Laura Oh, Joan Stennick (my partner) and Vered Gerszrenkorn.
We share a similar aesthetic, combine disparate elements in the creation of our work, but maintain individual and unique identities in the overall practice of each artist. We meet at the intersection of mixed-media yet maintain divergent philosophical paths that define each, perhaps, for who they/we are.
These are artists who do what I cannot do, do what has not occurred to me to do, create simple magic through dint of their dedication to the creative process. All are dedicated practitioners whose work I admire deeply.
And of course the sad “YES” !
3) How did the overall chemistry of the 6 artist impact the direction and outcome of the workshop?
We expected to have the jerk, the prima donna; to have drama and discord…”in the course of human events” and all that…it NEVER happened. We had the most incredible experience making art together, teaching, improvising, learning, traveling together, brainstorming …making it up as we went…incredible meals and conversations. We knew from the gate that this is/was and continues to be a unique and special experience. Add to that the phantasmagorical environment of living in a 15th century Palazzo in Venice, Italy..give me a break.
It was ” lemme pinch myself” every day for a month .
There exists a telepathy, an unspoken communication that I have only experienced an intimate or in improvisational musical jam sessions that is very high and very special;this is what the month of July was like; every moment an opportunity to completely be present, to create or impart some idea, to witness others grapple with challenges and aesthetic solutions, alternatives from the canvas to selecting the right route to Rialto Bridge to deciding the menu for dinner…serendipity and trust seemed to be the credo for the GAP experience overall.
With the addition of British artist John Crabtree and later the Italian Cinzio Cavallarin we were challenged and privilege to create fast-paced works at an incredible rate without thought or reservation which proved to be an invaluable stimulus to the group dynamic and informed the individual workshops that were more formal and structured.
We faced fifteen artists at Treviso’s Art In the Rotunda situated in a massive round of buildings traditionally used as an ancient market place converted into stall spaces for artists marketing their work. This proved to be an exhausting exercise in crowd-control and improv theater resulting in the bonding of the GAP unit into a “rise to the occasion” MASH unit of artists-paramedics.
4) What was the reaction of the community that took part in the workshop sessions?
Completely positive. Most acknowledged that they had never worked in within the formats or considered the suggestions that we made to loosen up and escape the tyranny of the precious object, make a mark and tear it up , combine with another. The notion that one wold create a masterpiece o rany completed work in these sessions went entirely out the window. Once participants accepted the premise that they could entirely free and responsible for the direction of the sessions you could see and feel the joy of that accepted liberation and the responsibility concomitant with freedom.
5) How did the artist’s collaboration in workshops impact the project?
This was a very important element of the GAP experience. We all witnessed the process of the other.Sometimes immediately, sometimes over a period of days. Handing a work in progress over to Akiko, for instance, I was amazed where she took things…she is a consummate “finisher” , I am a good instigator; Lorna is a masterful teacher; Vered is just magical to watch and all the more charming because she is so self-effacing; she has no clue just how valuable she is, and Laura is completely indispensable to the entire process, she is there with what you need before you realize that you need it.
I was puzzled as to just how to collaborate with her ( Laura); she, like Akiko, use fabric and exotic papers in her creations…nonetheless two of the most satisfying pieces created in the collaborative process came from my work with Laura and I am very very pleased.
Something arose from just jumping without knowing that the parachute would open and the experience remains amazing with very satisfying results. We are all gratified and I believe changed for the better. It remains to be seen how this experience will impact our individual practice.
6) What story did the Book Art collage collaborations convey of GAP Venice 2014?
This is the portable gallery. This is the act of being in the moment and synthesizing the immediate experience without fiction or editing. This is the crude unadulterated truth of our experience and is a shorthand of that experience put into visual poems.
7) What direction will future development go from the information collected through the GAP project?
We shall see. Certainly increased confidence in group and individual practice. GAP is/was an experience, a group for people who eschew the group idea…a social experience for hermits…an entirely unique and special experience. Will attempting to duplicate the experience fail? Possibly. But if there is one thing that we learned it is this:
A creative risk is a risk worth taking. Nothing compares to the process. Nothing compares to the result. Nothing.
GLOBA
GLOBAL ART PROJECT / GAP
http://spontaneouscombustionlanguageimagelab.wordpress.com/2014/02/05/global-art-project-g-a-p-art-workshops-venice-italy-july-2014/
maciej klauzner
superb !!
liz doyle
GAP VENICE 2014 was an amazing experience that has fed my creative explorations ever since. Knee Jerk was a fantastic liberation. Thank you to Carl and Lorna and all the GAP team. Wish I could be with you in Lecce, maybe next time 🙂