Yesterday morning, in bright and remarkably warm sunshine, I went down to St Thomas's Place and planted 12 tulip bulbs as a memorial to Shaquille Maitland-Smith's life.
This was not an artwork/intervention/performance; simply an attempt to mark a tragedy with a gesture and hopefully the growth of new life.
It helped fulfil the need to do something that I have been struggling with ever since hearing about Shaquille's death.
It will change little, but what is altered will matter.
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 30, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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Summary
Sick Note cUlture gives time - that most precious of commodities - back to the over-worked middle classes of modern urban society.
The project participants will be invited to register on the work's website through fliering in London's financial district. After enrolling for the work they will be contacted by Tim at a date some weeks hence. When this contact is made he will provide them with an appropriate excuse for cancelling all their engagements for the next day, thereby…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 29, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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I was asked the other day if I knew that all my blog posts were shown as being posted in September, even though the majority have been posted in October.
I did.
The confusing date arrangement has arisen because I've been changing the date on each text as it has been posted.
Why have I done this?
No reason really.
It's not very helpful I know, and does make it look my activity has been taking place in the more distant past than it actually has.
But I like it.
I want to have a September's worth…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 26, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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Since almost precisely three o'clock last Saturday afternoon, a particularly miserable cold has been bombarding my beleagured self with all manner of snotty laziness. Though today, I'm pleased to say, I won a minor victory in the ongoing war and was able to drag my snivelling soul down to see a piece of theatre that has grown out of a collaboration between Chris Goode, Jamie Wood, Cis O'Boyle and Jonny Liron.
At times I was moved to somewhere within the proximity of tears by the brutal honesty…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 25, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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Summary
A campaign is launched encouraging the public to support a move to swap the E8 and E9 postcodes, thereby confounding territorial claims on the neighbourhood.
Proposal
Abandoned Piece 2 addresses some of the problems present within
AP1, in particular the lack of direct engagement with those that the work addresses.
By canvassing people on the street, asking them to sign petitions or take fliers outlining the logic behind the campaign (and directing them to an…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 23, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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One thing more remained to do - say good-bye to my excellent aunt. I found her triumphant. I had a cup of tea - the last decent cup of tea for many days - and in a room that most soothingly looked just as you would expect a lady's drawing-room to look, we had a long quiet chat by the fireside. In the course of these confidences it became quite plain to me I had been represented to the wife of the high dignitary, and goodness knows to how many more people besides, as an exceptional and gifted cre…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 22, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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Summary
A series of announcements are made through fliering and postering along the border of the E9 and E8 postal districts in London that the two areas are to be swapped – that E9 will henceforth be known as E8 and E9 as E8.
Proposal
Exploring the sense of identity and geographical ownership inherent to much gang conflict in East London
Abandoned Piece 1 reveals the innate arbitrariness and ridiculous nature of these territorial claims.
By posting overnight some twenty po…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 21, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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I've been quiet on here of late - other projects, other work, sleep, the theatre, birthdays, food, pressure, the wire, talking and press-ups have all been taking a part of me.
It's been necessary.
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 20, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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It's not the focus of this residency, but the video is uploaded and so some acknowledgement of Grunts for the Arts should perhaps be made.
GFA was born in early 2007 when the UK government announced that there would be huge funding cuts to Arts Council England, Sport England and English Heritage in order to increase the funds available for the 2012 Olympics which London would be hosting.
Following this logic, we deemed it necessary for artists to retrain as sports people in order to keep acces…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 13, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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How could I be expected to handle school on a day like this? This is my ninth sick day. It's tough coming up with new illnesses. If I go for ten, I'll have to barf up a lung so I'd better make this one count. The key to faking out the parents is the clammy hands. It's a good non-specific symptom. I'm a big believer in it.
A lot of people will tell you to go for a phoney fever. But if you get a nervous mother, you could wind up in a doctor's office. You fake a stomach cramp, when you're bent ove…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 11, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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Hey Tim -
Here are you photos from yesterday:
I recorded a text of the watermelon reactions too (starting when you came out with the melon until she stopped eating):
3rd PLACE
- Oh my God.
- [Shit]
- I think I took...
- Can I get other tools?
- Yeah. If you go to the pile inside where the tools are, there should be a scalpel.
- Don't feel like smashing things today. Yesterday I would've.
- Can I start?
- No.
- I'm full.
- Enough?
_____________
Mark Caffrey
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 10, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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This Shaquille thing isn't going away.
And it's right that it's not going away. A fifteen year old boy has been killed because of the postal code area in which he lives.
I rode down St Thomas's Place this evening, past the house where Shaquille used to live, past the candle that has been lit in the alley ever since he was killled.
I've been wondering how long the candle will be kept alight for; and what the effect on his mother will be when they do finally let it be extinguished.
I want to do…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 9, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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I went to the launderette tonight to wash some underwear, bed linen, a couple of T-shirts and a sweater that I had borrowed from a friend.
Aside from the lady who works there and myself there was a man who was listening to his mp3 player and playing on his PSP games device with perhaps a little too much devotion.
There was also a young Turkish couple and their child, a small boy about two years in age.
As I sat waiting for my wash to complete, this small child wandered about the launderette, d…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 8, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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I was asked, when talking about this site the other day, what engaged art is (or at least what the term means to me).
I was a bit stuck for a succinct answer and so put forward three possibilities.
1) All art is engaged, it's just a question of degree. An artwork that does not attempt to engage it's audience / viewer is an oxymoron.
2) Engaged art is that which has a specific focus on the community, and especially minority/disadvantaged groups within that community. Arts funding - in both Eur…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 7, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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Earlier in the year, there was a three-pronged debate on the website of UK based New Work Network (http://www.newworknetwork.org.uk/modules/newbb/viewforum.php?forum=25) which culminated in a real world discussion at the Chelsea Theatre's Sacred festival (World's End Place, King's Road, London, SW10 0DR).
As a part of this, the artist and writer Sally O'Reilly wrote;
There is a genre of practice where participants are simply required to partake in a collective activity that is prescribed by…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 6, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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The photo I've just added I found on Flickr.
Apparently it's of "Savages in Formosa (Taiwan) c1900 - From the photos of Dr. John Abraham Otte, a medical missionary to Amoy, China, currently stored in the Holland City Archives"
On the website of Hope College, Michigan, there is a biography of Dr Otte which I have copied below.
John Abraham Otte was born on August 11, 1861, in Vlissengen, Netherlands. On February 22, 1867, the Otte family left the Netherlands for America. John Otte received…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 5, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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At the limit, the gift as gift ought not appear as gift: either to the donee or to the donor. It cannot be gift as gift except by not being present as gift … If the other perceives or receives it, if he or she keeps it as gift, the gift is annulled. But the one who gives it must not see it or know it either; otherwise he begins, at the threshold, as soon as he intends to give, to pay himself with a symbolic recognition, to praise himself, to approve of himself, to gratify himself, to congratu…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 4, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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I was extremely tired, and with that, and the Heat of the Weather, and about half a Pint of Brandy that I drank as I left the Ship, I found myself much inclined to sleep. I lay down on the Grass, which was very short and soft, where I slept sounder than ever I remember to have done in my Life, and, as I reckoned, above Nine Hours; for when I awakened, it was just Day-light. I attempted to rise, but was not able to stir: For as I happen'd to lye on my Back, I found my Arms and Legs were strongly…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 3, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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St Thomas’s Place is a path/alley a little under 100m long in London’s East End.
A terrace of houses runs along one side and on the other, in the shadow of a hunkering housing block, is an old cemetery.
This probably dates back to when St Thomas’s hospital owned much of the land in the area, and perhaps provided an outlet for those who weren’t fortunate enough to survive the 19th Century health service.
Today, this cemetery is a small area of parkland – local residents walk their dogs there, t…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 2, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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An idea for a performance piece.
Smiles.
Every day throughout September and October I will smile at someone I wouldn’t normally smile at. Someone on the street. Someone in a shop. Someone at a bus stop. I will be open to conversation, and will document the results of these actions in this blog.
An idea for life.
Smiles.
I will try to smile more at people that I wouldn’t normally smile at. Someone on the street. Someone in a shop. Someone at a bus stop. I will be open t…
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Added by TIm Jeeves on September 1, 2008 at 9:30pm —
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