COLLABORATE!

About

Thursday 23 April – Friday 19 June

Private View Thursday 23 April 6-8pm at Oriel Sycharth Gallery, followed by post-reception with performances at Undegun from 8pm

COLLABORATE! is an exhibition surveying recent collaborative art practice. Involving more than 20 International artists working across mediums ranging from painting to Skype, the exhibition urges us to consider the wide array of forms, approaches, and results of collaboration - physically and spiritually. Why do artists choose to co-create?

Artists exhibited:

Jeremy Bailey with Kristin Schaffer, Biters, Cornford & Cross, Judy Chicago, Phoebe Davis, Bernard Frize, Jesse Greenberg, Jeremy Hutchison, Helen Knowles, Ivan Liotchev, Lorna Mills, Dylan Miner, Sarah Pettitt & Robert Rivers, Jonathan Powell & nu-Sangha, Kezia Pritchard & Kristofer Henriksson, Nina Rodin & Rebecca Molloy, Tim Rollins and K.O.S., Nastja Säde Rönkkö & Ernest Truely, Jesse Stead & Raphael Lyon, Ryan Trecartin, Julia Vogl, Weast, Ann Liv Young.

Most artists in this exhibition have shown internationally, but never in Wales before. COLLABORATE! brings for the first time to Wales the groundbreaking participatory works of Tim Rollins and K.O.S. as well as Judy Chicago’s seminal Birth Project. Other artists showing in Wales for the first time include performance artist Ann Liv Young, Métis artist Dylan Miner, and Japanese duo WEAST. The exhibition is curated by Nicholas John Jones and Ivan Liotchev.

The exhibition at Oriel Sycharth Gallery will be part of a wider programme of exhibitions, performances, and workshops held between the Gallery, Glyndŵr University, and town centre venues Undegun and Galeri 3B, in partnership with THIS Project.

 
COLLABORATE! will host a pre-launch event as part of Focus Wales on 22 April, 6-8pm at Galeri 3B, which will include live performances by London-based duo Biters and New York City-based Ann Liv Young.

A special feature of the exhibition will be the first ever presentation in Wales of Ryan Trecartin's ambitious 3-channel movie Comma Boat. A unique vision of dictatorship, yet emblematic of Trecartin's hyper-collaborative style, the large-scale installation will be presented at Undegun in Wrexham town centre.

 
On the night of the opening at Oriel Sycharth Gallery (23 April, 6-8pm) artist Helen Knowles will premiere a new work, staging a performance to put an algorithm on trial. Bringing together real lawyers to prosecute and defend the algorithm in front of a judge, the work invites the opening night audience to collaborate by taking up jury service so that a verdict can be reached. Knowles' interest lies in "algorithms' capacity to self-educate, to learn and to modify their coding sequences independent of human oversight" (Susan Schulppi – Deadly Algorithms). Can an algorithm be culpable?

 
As part of Focus Wales’s regular programme, the post-event at Undegun on 23 April at 8pm is ticketed, but visitors to the opening at Oriel Sycharth Gallery will receive free passes to a special VIP zone.