CONTROL: ISSUE NINETEEN

Softcover | 24.4 x 30.5 cm | 32 pp

Control Magazine | 2014

CONTROL Issue Nineteen presents a group of artists who are all developing a counter consciousness opposed to the possessive object, though in quite different ways, however they are all focussing their work on creating society between people. Here the artwork becomes a dynamic social process through a single event or a time-based series of events, which are even taken to the level of a simulation of a possible society or social state of affairs. As such the artists’ practices presented in this issue of  provide the reader with a contemporary counter view to the current art world culture of the deterministic, authoritative and possessive object.

Despite the overwhelming emphasis and preoccupation with the market in today’s visual culture, with its emulative icons of lifestyle art objects, the artists in Issue Nineteen have created a space in which they can operate and express the quite different values of community. In the present climate this has to be quite a significant achievement as all the validating reinforcements in the art environment are currently hugely biased towards art that is descriptive, that reinforces the beliefs, values and practices of the dominant culture.

Some of the artists here are in a network of mutual support that has aided and helped validate the approaches they have taken, and this is undoubtedly a significant action on their part, others have gone ahead with their projects in semi isolation from like minded colleagues; but in both cases this issue of CONTROL Magazine has brought together, in one overall statement, an access to some of the socially-founded art practices of the moment.

Contributors

• Christian Nyampeta: The Rest
• Rosalie Schweiker: Dilemmas in Art
• Ricardo Basbaum: re-projecting (London)
• Andrea Francke: On how art should help us imagine different futures and how art discourse could be stopping us from getting there
• Emma Smith: Rehearsal
• Stephen Willats: The Oxford Community Datastream
• Eva Weinmayr: Wear Your Heart On Your Sleeve
• Ross Taylor & Madalina Zaharia: Walls With Holes In
• Luke Cohen: Charivari
• Laura Wilson: 800 Lights in 177 Years

About CONTROL Magazine

Founded in 1965 by the British artist and conceptual designer, Stephen Willats (born 1943), CONTROL remains one of the few artists' publications from the 1960s thriving to this day. The magazine acts as a vehicle for proposals and explanations of art practice between artists seeking to create a meaningful engagement with contemporary society.

Published and edited by Stephen Willats, this pioneering magazine has documented the work of many artists, both from the UK and abroad and encouraged a wide discussion of artists’ practices. It has included contributions and original pieces from an extensive range of artists over its eighteen issues. Since 1965, the magazine has published work and writing by over 150 artists, including John Latham, Roy Ascot, Anthony Benjamin, Dan Graham, Mary Kelly, Helen Chadwick, Tony Cragg, Dennis Adams, Lawrence Weiner, Anish Kapoor, Martha Rosler, Jeremy Deller, alongside collectives and collaboratives such as Gallerie in Friedrichstrasse, Artists Placement Group and early producer’s galleries such as that of Dieter Hacker. Many of the artists have made artwork specially for the magazine.

CONTROL Magazine’s function has always been to provide a resource for artists to discuss their work and, in particular, to make connections with other disciplines such as social or computer sciences, technology etc. Its eighteen issues provide a unique record of a specific area of art practice over four decades and this non-profit making publication has had an acknowledged influence on the practice of artists.