Prabhakar Pachpute
Part of Political Animal programme CCA/GSA
Curated by Viviana Checchia
Written by Johnny Rodger
21 June – 4 August 2019
Preview: Thursday 20 June, 18:00 - 20:00. All Welcome.
This summer’s exhibition at The Glasgow School of Art Reid Ground Floor Corridor, will focus on the bestial, existential and instinctual side of our political and civic life. The intention of the curator, Viviana Checchia, is to recreate the gallery itself as a section of a book. The public are thus invited to experience it as a reader. The show will be a publication with its full apparatus of notes, references and bibliography. A book about books.
The space will be created by the artist, Prabhakar Pachpute, and inspired by the literary work of Johnny Rodger. For the past few years, Johnny Rodger has been using the form of the modern prose poem fable in order to come at the question of the ‘contemporary’ through the very different angle of literary form. There is now a collection of twenty of these modern fables. They are assembled together in the book which accompanies the show, also titled Political Animal.
For the occasion of this exhibition, Prabhakar Pachpute presents a new series of work commissioned by the Centre for Contemporary Arts (CCA), The Drouth and The Glasgow School of Art; sponsored by Leverhulme International Network of Contemporary Studies, to accompany the publishing by CCA of the book Political Animal.
The exhibition consists of 10 drawings by Pachpute as well as a series of spatial interventions including large scale drawings across the walls of the interior of the Reid Building and an extensive series of books and texts related to the content of Political Animal. The work is at the same time conceptually based on Johnny Rodger’s writing and site responsive to Glasgow and the Reid Gallery.
This show will be part of a two day event presented with the same title, Political Animal, and focused on the phenomenon of the Contemporary City. The Glasgow School of Art and the Centre for the Contemporary Arts (CCA) have invited a collection of international artists, writers, performers, academics, musicians, dancers and activists from all over the globe to come together on the 21st & 22nd of June 2019. Click here for more information and free tickets via the CCA.
Supported by Adam Mickiewicz Institute, Centre for Contemporary Arts , Creative Scotland, The Drouth, The Glasgow School of Art, Erasmus+ Programme, Esmee Fairbairn foundation, Leverhulme International Network of Contemporary Studies, Leverhulme Trust, Official Development Assistance fund, Presidenza del Consiglio del Ministri- Dipartimento della Gioventù e del servizio civile nazionale, Prince Claus Fund for Culture & Development, Scottish Graduate School for Arts & Humanities and Vessel.
