03.2011

Cover-Ed Photoshoot

Performance Re-enactment Society (PRS),
Tom Sowden and Michalis Pichler,
Arnolfini Archive, arnolfini, bristol.
thu 3 march - sat 30 april 2011
download a poster: cover-ed poster.pdf
book launch and performance - saturday 30 april at 6pm
arnolfini.org.uk/whatson/live/details/941

"By the way, what salad dressing do you prefer?"

Cover-ed is a series of curatorial and creative interventions into and around Ed Ruscha and Mason Williams' iconic 1969 photo bookwork Crackers, a copy of which is held in Arnolfini's Archive. The story follows a man who invites a sophisticated woman to a skid-row flophouse and coaxes her into lying down on a bed of crisp green salad. After asking what salad dressing she prefers, he proceeds to pour five gallons of her choice over her entire body.

Over two months this bookwork will become the script, score, instruction, and inspiration for a three-day performance of photography, a participatory performance event, an installation, and a new book work called Salad Dressing. Join us for a series of playful and critical transformations of the original book, in which gender roles and intentions shift, and in which you, the readers, can get involved.

Arnolfini invites you to a sophisticated opening, complete with limo, elegantly dressed special guests and mysterious crudités. Join us and participate in the climactic final act as it unfolds somewhat differently than in the original Crackers. Including costume design by David Curtis-Ring, and performance artist Samantha Sweeting.

Saturday 30 April at 6pm. Admission free.

Visit the Crackers set and watch as the PRS / Tom Sowden begin to re-imagine their new cover version of Crackers scene by scene. The images taken will form part of the new bookwork.

Thu 3 - Sat 5 Mar, 11am - 6pm

Admission Free

Part of a series of live events beginning a year-long investigation into the Arnolfini's themed season The Apparatus by examining the processes of making work, making relationships and making memories. This season will ask how artists, audiences and institutions interpret, reuse, and retell. From Cover-ed's revealing process of re-imagining past artworks, through Deborah Pearson's reliving of personal memories, to Sylvia Rimat trying to remain unforgettable in the minds of her audience, we consider the makings of artists, artworks, and cultural organisations.