The residency was used to research artist collectives with a focus on the conditions necessary for the formation of collective organization as well as on the economic and cultural impediments to self organizing. The claims, needs, and psychologies of collectivity were of key interested as was the historical precedent set by the group Political Art Documentation/Distribution or PAD/D, whom we saw as colleagues and kindred spirits.
At the conclusion of our residency the collective was asked to produce a work for display. We concocted a fictional though plausible questionnaire/chain letter distributed via e-mail to various cultural producers regarding the possibilities and pitfalls of collective organization within the context of New York City. The responses to this questionnaire were projected as a scrolling text in single-channel video onto a photo backdrop at the rear of the space. A number of overturned work tables, painted and arranged to mimic the construction scaffolding common in New York, created an obstacle course visitors had to negotiate in order to arrive at the scrolling text. The tables also created potential spaces of rest, discussion, and display, while barring functionality as active workplaces, at least for the brief course of the display. During this time all research materials were removed from the space. In their place was positioned a single copy of New York Magazine's 2006 Best Real Estate Finds in the City.
Among the events organized as part of this residency, Benj Gerdes and Kirsten Forkert put together the film series
Cities, Labor, and Culture: Present Crises, Past Documents at the LMCC offices.
List of films
Residency at:
LMCC, 15 Nassau Street, New York, NY - From May 23 to August 12, 2006
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