The Notice Board and Flag Pole (2019—)
By
Kate Genever
The Notice Board is an ongoing collaboration between Kate Genever, international artists and her village community.
The Notice Board is based in Uffington Lincolnshire. It forms part of my larger practice which is interested in how people improvise and care, either for themselves or others, at a time of stress - be it natural or social. Often this work sees me bringing people together by facilitating a co-creation to support or celebrate improvisation.
I was in Rotterdam when the UK was first due to Brexit and everybody was upset at the situation and worried about me – that I wouldn't be able to get home. I was moved by their consideration which reinforced the importance of connection and not separation. When I came home I thought about what I could do. How could I bring my community into a space with artists to consider a more nuanced idea of community? All I had was art and the artistic community to draw on. I decided on an exhibition space for showing work by international artists to promote or provoke conversation. That space is The Notice Board and Flag Pole, both of which are in my front garden. I put them up myself, dug the hole and mixed the concrete. There was no funding. My district council InvestSK now supports the project by covering postal costs.
The Notice Board is a rigorous artwork, collaboration and piece of responsive social practice. It has adapted during lockdown, has showcased highly acclaimed and unknown artists, young and old. All are offered a free chance to collaborate with me and my community in an unusual, open 24hrs-a-day site. Viewers can follow on Instagram or stand on the path and look at the work over the garden wall. From there we discuss ideas held in the work and the responses to the boards ongoing theme: The Land of the Free? is inspired by Vaclav Havel an activist and playwright of the former Yugoslavia and first President of the Czech Republic. He also believed in the power of the Absurd.
The Notice Board seeks to reclaim a space in a time of stress and anxiety and provide a structure of support. Both The Notice Board and its theme The Lands of the Free? are internationalist and collective in shape and form. They aim to create a community of shared goals and purpose for both artists and village residents. An approach that is based on solidarity and the re-purposing of joy and beauty. Pleasures that are not superfluous items of wealth but antidotes. Antidotes that contain within them questions of freedom, play, expertise, awareness, solidarity, acceptance, courage and their contradictions. It is the consideration of these potentially philosophical, but maybe more political, issues that the project engages with.
Artists that have shown to date include: Ai Weiwei - China, Katie Numi-Usher - Belize; Pespe – Poland; Dan Woods – Wales; Mandy Payne - UK; Ox Art - UK; Ricki Dwyer/Katy Hawkins - USA/UK; Angharad McLaren & Geoff Diego Litherland - Scotland and Mexico/England; Nisha Keshav – Zambia.
The Board offered open calls during the pandemic adapting to fit the times. It offered a 2020 Fine Art graduates show and it has supported young people in the village to make and show artworks. It fully supports Black Lives Matter and was one of 720 venues who Light it in Red on the Global Day of Action : https://www.lightitinred.co.uk/wemakeevents
“This is the only place in the whole world this year anyone can see my actual work. Everything else is shut because of the pandemic.”
“I love how this Board gives us things to talk about over the dinner table.”
More information: https://www.instagram.com/noticeboardunited
