Cash—£1m plus VAT, to be exact—for previous rope is the premise for David Shrigley’s newest exhibition, which opens at Stephen Friedman gallery in London tomorrow (14 November). Over the previous eight months, the Turner Prize-nominated artist has collected round ten tonnes, or 20 miles-worth, of rope from main seaports, climbing colleges, tree surgeons, offshore wind farms, scaffolders, window-cleaning companies and ports. He has additionally combed smaller lengths himself from shorelines throughout the UK.
The rope, which has been intensively cleaned by Shrigley’s studio, has been put in in 4 huge piles—one in every of the Cork Avenue gallery’s rooms. A neon signal within the window reads “exhibition of previous rope”.
Shrigley says he conceived of the thought particularly for the industrial gallery context. Describing his price ticket as extra of a “provocation”, the artist says he thinks £1m for “a large paintings, pound for pound or kilo for kilo, represents wonderful worth”. However, as he factors out, “for the one who isn’t an artwork insider, it most likely looks like a ridiculous value”.
In a depressed market, ten tonnes of previous rope is a tough promote for any supplier, nevertheless Shrigley is assured his gallery will make an actual try to discover a residence for his set up. “It could shock me if anyone purchased it, however you by no means know,” he says. “Both manner, it’s vital to have a value; there’s a value to each paintings.”
The gallery’s proprietor Stephen Friedman instructed the BBC that the work may go to a non-public assortment, an establishment or a basis. “We are going to discover a good residence for it,” he provides. Whereas Shrigley’s work is partially a tongue-in-cheek poke on the market—on this occasion, he thinks the primary factor he’s subverting is his personal industrial curiosity. “I’d most likely be loads higher off simply performing some work however making this sort of work and having these sorts of conversations are a part of the enjoyment of it,” he says.
Rope being collected in Dartford, UK
Courtesy of David Shrigley
For Shrigley, pleasure and humour underpin a lot, if not all, of his inventive output. “It’s the identical factor motivating me to make this curious challenge the place I get to fill a gallery with rope because it was after I was a baby in class making a portray,” he says. “My perspective is, ‘What occurs if I do that? What’s going to or not it’s like?’ And that’s the identical perspective youngsters have when making a portray of a dinosaur. For me, there’s one thing actually joyful about making an paintings, no matter that’s.”
Shrigley’s newest work can also be extremely conceptual. He describes the piles of rope as “like Tony Cragg sculptures—besides they very a lot aren’t”. Putting in the work, he provides, was an fascinating course of; the rope was roughly piled the place it was pulled from large sacks. “It’s an actual non-aesthetic set up, however on the similar time you may’t actually escape from the aesthetics of it, the rope turns into an intriguing object in itself,” Shrigley says.
Among the many lengths of rope are 20cm-thick cables comprised of Kevlar which can be used to pull cruise ships, in addition to slim cords used for marker buoys, longlines and crab and lobster pots. The rope itself, other than a couple of items fabricated from jute, is usually comprised of artificial polyester and nylon traces—making it very arduous to recycle.
Globally, an estimated 640,000 tonnes of discarded marine rope and fishing nets enter the ocean yearly, creating a serious environmental situation. In some situations, nets and ropes are shredded and become threads to make garments and different new merchandise—however not usually within the artwork world. However then once more, Shrigley is just not a typical artist. As he places it: “What do you do with stuff which you can’t eliminate? You make it into artwork.”
