Out of the Box

ALISTAIR PEEBLES discovers that small scale – and we do mean small – needn’t mean small ambition

THE PEEDIE GALLERY – “the Peedie” – is the newest new venue for the arts in Orkney. The newest, probably the oddest, and as its name implies perhaps the smallest – physically, if not in terms of its ambition.

Everywhere nowadays, old warehouses, factories, military bases and power stations have been converted into art galleries, and closer to home, in Stromness, building work continues at the former merchant’s house and Hudson’s Bay recruitment offices, but this latest gallery conversion, announced last week, started out much more…well, humbly.

True to the postmodern heritage aesthetic, however, and just as Fort Russell still has its runways, Tate Modern its chimneys, and the Pier Arts Centre its pier, the Peedie Gallery still looks very much like a shoe box.

For all its humdrum origins, and now fully staffed and still portable, it’s certainly a shoe box with attitude (and a website to boot). It has been developed by artists/curators Rik Hammond and Clare Gee of 59north, a new arts management and project development collaborative based in Orkney.

It’s an incredible opportunity to have an exhibition that can blend into the complexities of everyday life because it’s as portable as a laptop and not as heavy

Rik Hammond, Director, explained: “What began as a conversation about gallery provision in Orkney led to the logistics of setting up, in a short space of time, an ad hoc, portable, low budget, conceptual space for artists to exhibit their work within. Without a building available, what could we do? What could a gallery be made from? The idea started off as a bit of a joke.

“The first thing we thought of was a cardboard box – a shoe box seemed like a good extension of this idea. Then we would just have to work out where the ‘gallery’ could be hosted. Within the space of a few weeks we’re now on the first leg of a series of exhibitions at the Peedie by local contemporary artists.

“The gallery aims to show original, recent work by visual artists, writers and other creatives which is challenging and conceptual in nature. Work which also suits the processes and language involved in curating – as the nature of the gallery itself plays an important role within the exhibitions.

“Over time the Peedie hopes to add to this vocabulary and to explore the symbiotic relationship between artist, audience, critic, gallery and curator in the production and consumption of art.”
 
The opening show is “Coupling” by Christil Trumpet, another local collaboration which has also recently begun a new venture, somewhat larger in immediate scale: the pARTners residency at Papdale Primary School. Christil Trumpet is Christopher Prendergast and Matilda Tumim, who found that the two projects fitted together very happily.

“It’s an incredible opportunity to have an exhibition that can blend into the complexities of everyday life because it’s as portable as a laptop and not as heavy. I made my side of ‘Coupling’ while in Glasgow for the pARTners seminar – sitting in my seedy hotel room – and Chris made his ‘Peedie’ paintings having been hard at work in his garden all day while I was away.

“When I returned we put the gallery on the dining room table and assembled our exhibition, admiring each other’s contributions as we went along. How many galleries could take on collaborative artists such as ourselves who only started working on an exhibition a few days before taking up a new residency post – a week before the launch?

“Then the shoe box gallery came with us and kept us company while we set up our new studio. Like its creator/ curator Rik, it became a true friend – an inspired concept from the start. Here’s wishing him and Clare huge success with this brain wave of a gallery.”

“Coupling” runs till mid-July, and so takes in the busy St Magnus Festival tourist period, much prized by the county’s artists for their exhibitions. Regarding future shows, Rik said, “We’re currently developing the 2006/2007 programme – and we’re looking forward to working closely with innovative artists who want to show at the Peedie, as well as future hosts of the gallery itself. We’re primarily set up to show the work of local, Orkney-based artists, but we’re looking into developing a programme which also includes a few international names.

“The gallery will be hosted at a different venue, each with its own individual characteristics, for each exhibition. We’re hoping to get future shows hosted within a museum setting, a library (ideally alongside books on the shelves, with the gallery sited according to the library classification, or Dewey, system), as well as further office spaces and domestic locations within and potentially out with Orkney.

“We’re also looking into the logistics of locating the gallery, for a future exhibition, on one of Orkney’s uninhabited islands.
 
“Plans are also afoot for an outreach programme, possibly with more boxes developed to cover more locations. And we’d love to get a touring exhibition organised. But it’s early days yet, and even with a shoe box there’s a lot of work involved planning these types of projects.”

On the subject of costs and income, Rik added, “We may need to raise extra funding for some of the ideas – though I can’t see the need for an Arts Council or National Lottery grant just yet. But you never know. That idea provides an interesting commentary on the role and purpose of galleries, so it may well be something we consider.

“We’ve been asked if artwork at the gallery is for sale. It often is, but this brings into sharp focus the question of selling the gallery itself. If someone buys the work ‘and’ the gallery, the box automatically ceases to be the Peedie Gallery. I mean, we can’t sell the actual gallery. It changes to being the container, or packaging, for the artwork.

“We’d have to then undoubtedly undergo a period of redevelopment to create a new gallery. This should be quite straightforward, as we just have to get hold of another shoe box from somewhere.”

That’s an interesting thought in local terms, with the Pier Arts Centre’s redevelopment programme underway at the moment. I wondered whether, while bearing in mind the considerable differences between them, the example of the Pier was one that 59north found inspiring.

“We’re not sure if the Peedie would have happened at all, if not for the major extension and renovation at the Pier. That was the starting point for the discussion about establishing a gallery of our own.

“The idea to contribute to the mix, in artistic terms, has been something we’ve been toying with for a while, in anticipation of the Pier’s re-opening early next year. The Pier is a flagship presence for contemporary art and, of course, has been of considerable influence.

“This, plus our own work as visual artists and our professional experience of working within art studios, museums, libraries, galleries and the field of new media, has led us to develop a number of creative projects which deal, generally, with art itself as the subject.”

The Peedie Gallery is not the only project currently in development by 59north. Others include dromolog.com, an art and science research incubator (also based in Orkney), “sucking_mud”, “a low-budget, underground, visual arts ‘slash’ concrete poetry pamphlet (which will focus on new work from the Northern Isles)”, and CreativeOrkney, “the subversive, slightly menacing and potentially controversial ‘Orkney Art Inspection Board’”.

(That latter notion brings to mind an article by the mysterious Turlough MacSeumas, published in the 2000 edition of OAR (Orkney Arts Review). Found discarded in a local bar one night, “Ninety-five Theses on the Development of the Arts in Orkney” was passed to the editor (the present writer) by the author MacSeumas’s first cousin. It is perhaps unfair to mention a document now regrettably unavailable to the public, but a very short quotation might be of value to readers: “Ultimately an Art Inspectorate must be formed in Orkney the role of which will be to ensure a uniform quality in Art production throughout the county…” Bizarrely, in the present context, it suggested that artists therefore be required to register with the Arts Development Officer. I wonder now who’s pulling whose leg, foot or indeed shoe.)

Further details of the Peedie project, and an online gallery of images of the current exhibition can be found at the gallery’s web site (see below).

“Coupling” will be on show at the Peedie Gallery until Friday 21 July 2006. Because of its location, say the organisers, access to the gallery is very limited, and it is essential that all visits are arranged with the gallery’s hosts in advance. To arrange a viewing, contact Clare Gee, Arts Development Officer, at Orkney Islands Council via email at clare.gee@orkney.gov.uk  or by phone on 01856 873535 ext 2814.

© Alistair Peebles, 2006

Link

• Peedie Gallery