Say What?

This is potentially a 'thing'. A prototype, testing a dialogue with itself. Focused on form and intent, it becomes a denial of continuity and the expected 'final'. The sensual pursuit of a transitive and undefined action, whose aims are obscured by both grammar and syntax. They affect and follow us as direct complements, finishing our sentences and taking up all the space in our uncompliant and overcrowded vocabularies. They are objects filled with 'what for',** substitute materials with properties that only simulate the intended outcome, an amalgamation of shapes and morphology embellished with all the root words, affixes, intonations and stresses. Loops of pre-existing knowledge and thingstuff,*** circles of doom and semantics whose sole purpose is [to] object
to rant make a stink
rave to take on
to/spurn go one-on-one
squawk to to to to to to
to mix it ip sound off
tangle

* 'The Object is Poetics' by Francis Ponge.
** 'What for' is typically preceded by threatening gestures and followed by pain.
*** Used mostly in sentences containing possessive nouns, where an entity would have an intangible object whose intentions need to be explained, or in situations where several words would be needed to describe the object but where the speaker does not feel compelled enough or immediately able to finish the description.

'Say What?' brings together artists Kit Craig, Rowena Harris, Russell Hill, Alex Lawler, James Prevett, Fay Nicholson, Emily Rosamund, Lisa Selby and Madalina Zaharia in an attempt to scrutinize and question the elaborate relationship between materiality and language, as well as the narrative and syntactical potential of the 'thing'.

'You must answer in the form of a question!' is an afternoon of performances and hazardous dialogue involving a selection of the artists and curators around the 'Say what?' exhibition at ASC Gallery, London. The event will take the shape of a shifting and informal sequence of incidents, exploring the premises of the exhibition and articulating a very unsettled and performative conversation among the artists involved.