SIMON POPE | et al

About

et al is Simon Pope’s third solo-exhibition at Danielle Arnaud, gathering together a series of participatory artworks produced between 2013 and 2016. As in A Common Third (2010) sociality, taking-part, and dialogue are recurrent themes; a further preoccupation being the human relation to the ‘more-than-human’, introduced in Join-up (2012). Here, emphasis is placed on the kinships and solidarities of more-than-human communities, made apparent through tracing the material relations of a coal-sample, tin deposits, a glacial erratic, a scrap of bronze-age linen, and the charred remains of a fibreglass sculpture. This new body of work promotes an 'ever closer union' and the possibility of politics between heterogenous participants, even in the face of increasing isolationism and withdrawal.

Work includes Forward Back Together (2013), Primary Agents Of A Social World (2014), A Song, A Dance, And A New Stannary Parliament (2014), The Outlier (2015), and The Gift (2016), presented here through video-documentation, transcripts, books, and song.

Simon Pope's recent art practice is preoccupied with participatory art's engagement with new materialism and concepts of the more-than-human, asking 'who else takes part?' This question formed the basis of his doctoral study at the Ruskin School of Art, University of Oxford (2012-2015). Formerly a member of the net.art group I/O/D, he represented Wales at the Venice Biennale in 2003. Pope was a NESTA Fellowship awardee (2002-05), a Reader in Fine Art (2005-10) and is currently an Associate Research Fellow of Queen Mary, University of London (2014-) and visiting faculty member and supervisor for Transart Institute's MFA & PhD programs in New York City and Berlin, where he convenes the Art After The Anthropocene seminar.