An interview between Ryan Gander, Rebecca May Marston & Adam Thomas, 26th August 2007.
RG: Go… You’ve decided that these recordings, which normally are only used for transcriptions that manifest themselves as text, have become a work unto themselves, which is quite worrying. Do you want to say a bit about that? AT: Not just yet. RMM: Ok. After we finished the last one we talked about things that we really wished we’d said, one of them was about the fact that you speak so quietly. Let’s talk about that. AT: Well, I don’t know, I just don’t speak so loud. RMM: Since you were a kid? AT: Yeah. I had speech problems, when I was young I had a stutter, which got resolved. RG: Resolved by a speech therapist? AT: Yes. And before I came to London I had elocution lessons, to help me speak more clearly, but it actually didn’t work so well. It was nice because I got interested in speech and language through that. I enjoyed being taught how to speak properly. RG: The idea of a recording of a conversation, to set something in stone for eternity, it’s like a heavy legacy. And for someone who knows about having speech problems… well I guess if it was me I’d have some fear about that. AT: No, yeah, I’m a bit scared. RG: Is that why you’re choosing this? Is it trying to force something? AT: Yeah. I like to challenge myself with different things. RG: It’s kind of easy to be an artist that just stutters, not verbally but in their work, when they just stick to what they do and rehash it and rehash it. It’s nice to put yourself in that place that is unfamiliar and the place that makes you scared a bit. AT: Yeah and something nice comes out of it. It’s good, the stress. RMM: Have you put yourself in that position with the other works in the show? AT: Yes, i’m not rested on any laurels. I’m trying out different things. RG: I thought it was all going to be metal. AT: I expected the metal too but then it branched out into different elements. RG: There’s a lot of print-based stuff in it now, and it’s moved into the realms of collaboration, which is quite interesting. AT: That’s something I really enjoyed, the collaboration. RG: So how many people are you working with now? The piece at Zoo is with Richard Rhys? And the print based stuff is with Work for Work? And who else? AT: Ummm, it’s my brother and my mum and dad. RMM: That’s more like they’re producing stuff for you, but with Richard you’re actually collaborating, like you’re inviting him to curate the patterns and stuff aren’t you? AT: I haven’t really gone into it with any of them and said ‘do this.’ I’ve said my bit and we talked it through and discussed it, which is actually a nice way of developing an idea, and it added a little bit for each project. Like they exist past what I wanted them to. RMM: Have you enjoyed collaborating? AT: Yeah. RG: Is this show based on you delivering red herrings? Conceptually? AT: Conceptual red herrings? RG: I mean, I like red herrings, I think they’re really good in work. I’m asking because the final diagram on the wall that you’re showing, is a very logical looking diagram. It looks like your system of logic and the spectator will make links between that diagram as a description of the way that the rest of the show works, but actually it’s an appropriated system of logic that you then patched into something it’s not really related to. Do you want to say what the diagram is? Or not? If you do say it’s in the show obviously. AT: It’s a diagram of grammatical structures. RMM: These interviews are becoming the wall texts. RG: The wall text? What do you mean? RMM: I mean that you’re asking him what the work is and he’s explaining it and the interview then becomes the wall text. RG: That’s quite nice, because it means that… I mean, if you don’t put the wall text it’s a significantly different work. AT: Yeah. It’s a nice element to include this interview within the show because, everything in all of the other objects is appropriation and abstraction, kind of hashing things together. This interview sits in relation with the whole show with more immediacy… Everything is going to have a bit of history which needs decoding or editing together. RG: The thing about contemporary art is that nothing exists in isolation. RMM: He’s ripping off Liam Gillick… You know how you said before about you applying to all those residences to have a concentrated period of time to get everything right for the show? It was like you thought that was an ideal of how to make work, but it hasn’t happened like that, the collaborations you’re doing with Richard, and Robert, Rasmus and those guys they’ve all come about from going to the pub. AT: Absolutely. I like the way this show started piecing bits together over time, through conversations, situations, moving places, that kind of thing… RG: What do you think a residency would have achieved, that this hasn’t? AT: I don’t know but I think that with a residency the show would have been pretty different, probably more about sculptures. RG: I think it was a blessing because now you have the force, not like Star Wars, the force of having to do, but residencies make people dwell a bit too much. RMM: Have you conceived of it as a total show or as different works? AT: A total show. RG: And how do the things exist in isolation? Is it necessary that they go together? AT: Each work is different; the newspaper article is really for the show and only exists within this show, whereas the publications are to take away for free, so they exist outside the show… RG: And the poster that you’re placing outside of the gallery setting, in the advertising space, a bit guerrilla, what does it say again? AT: “An ideal for which I am prepared to die” RG: Where is that from? AT: That’s from one of the books, the Guardian speech books that i’ve edited together for the publication. That poster came along in developing the project. It’s like where an idea comes to a wall and has to be changed. It’s weird, I can’t change the show, in any element, so it’s like “an ideal for which I am prepared to die” is the show. I wouldn’t show anything else, I don’t care if I shoot myself in the foot or if my career in art ends. I’d rather make the show about what really matters to myself. RG: You’re making me sad. Not sad but… RMM: Do you think we’ve done something wrong though, asking you when you literally just left your BA, do you think it is forcing a development too quickly? AT: No because you gave me lots of time. RG: But you are the young Adam. You are the youngest by about 7 years. AT: Really? Seriously? RG: Yeah. You don’t really realise… you just want to open a space and have a nice time and do good shows and do something good and you don’t think about the implications of what you do, it’s different for the different artists, but us asking them to do it has changed people in different ways and that meant they look at things in different ways. I don’t know… There’s kind of a responsibility there but I don’t think we envisioned this when we started out, I didn’t… RMM: But that’s because you had an idea of the gallery that you wanted to happen, that the artists would be associates and do it themselves and it hasn’t been like that. It’s been much more like a representational relationship. RG: Yes. Is that it then? 22 minutes. AT: Thank you. RG: Cheers.
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bishops house
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