The Trouble with Artist Collectives

This panel discussion will be an opportunity to introduce the concept of the artist collective and its recent history. The conversation will explore artist collectives who work in similar ways and contexts to Bernadette Corporation, as well as wider questions of authorship and ownership, how individuals work within a framework towards collective aims and how those aims are established, and the problems of collaboration.

The panel will comprise artist Simon Bedwell, a founder and longest-serving member of London art group BANK; the curator and critic Helena Reckitt; Gavin Wade, director of the artist-run space Eastside Projects and representatives of artist collective LuckyPDF.

Simon Bedwell is an artist living and working in London. He was a founder and longest-serving member of London art group BANK, which from 1991 until 2003 made shows like nobody else, in their own gallery and beyond, characterised by a rhetorically oppositional stance towards the art world they existed within, for as long as it was fun, until they parted ways to make ordinary art like everybody else.

Helena Reckitt is a critic and curator who teaches on the MFA Curating programme at Goldsmiths. Formerly Senior Curator at the Power Plant, Toronto, she has held curatorial and programming positions at the Atlanta Contemporary Art Center, Georgia, and at the ICA, London, where she organised talks from 1990 – 1997. She is currently curating projects by artists including the Open Music Archive, Pablo Bronstein and Heather Phillipson for Flux Night, Atlanta, this October. She is also curating an exhibition Getting Rid of Yourself – with a nod to Bernadette Corporation – for the Ontario College of Art & Design Gallery that opens next year.

LuckyPDF is a South East London based art collective consisting of James Early, John Hill, Ollie Hogan and Yuri Pattison (all born 1986). Active since 2009 LuckyPDF has been realising projects in collaboration with a large and expanding network of international artists and cultural producers. LuckyPDF often aims to explore alternative working methods and locations for the production and distribution of art. LuckyPDF work both inside and outside of arts established institutions; they have created events at the Barbican and Frieze Art Fair, and often locate work within mainstream media outlets, such as Frieze and Dazed and Confused magazines and the BBC, producing a one-off video piece for The Culture Show. LuckyPDF have diverse interests and have produced projects that explore formats such as television, film, performance and intervention, publishing, education, pop culture, fashion, parties, advertising and the internet.