Photos from the ICA

The first photographs of the CNBC event from 9th May are up on Picasa

You can view them here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/closebutnocigarphotos

If you have any photographs from that day please email them to our usual address:

closebutnocigar@bigstring.com

Our Working Agenda 2010-2011

Here is our Working agenda for the next 12 months, which will act as a kind of manifesto in planning and navigating all that we do:

WORKING AGENDA 2010-11

CLOSE BUT NO CIGAR facilitate an open artists’ network with an ethos for free exchange of ideas and opportunity.  We are intent on engaging with dialogues born out of individual and shared artistic practices with consideration to questions raised in this Working Agenda.

Placing emphasis on artistic engagement rather than professional crendentials allows us to embrace an inclusive approach to encouraging and supporting practioners from a range of backgrounds in training and approach.  Through the network we aim to disseminate and produce new ideas and opportunities, with a focus on critical and discursive activities. 

We are concerned with the artist’s position in the application of free labour, specifically understanding artistic labour in terms of current cultural and economic value.  CBNC’s working structure is founded on the free labour of its facilitators and seeks to function with self-generated funding where possible, in mind of changing economic factors.

The questions CBNC are currently engaged in asking include:

-      The Artist’s Trajectory

In an increasingly uncertain and apprehensive climate, the notion of arts production is born into a space of contingency.  With moveable and interchangable structures becoming apparent in the artworld, how does one adapt to practice in an unforeseeable future?

-      Inside/Outside the Institution

The doors of the institute are often closed to fledgling artists, with few opportunities for instigating dialogue between galleries, art schools and practitioners.  As galleries rely more and more heavily on crowd pleasing programs, the space for failure and experimentation is reduced to a minimum.  Therefore, what is the position of the artist in consenting to the process of validation orchestrated through institutional structures?

Come to the ICA tomorrow

Thank you very much for all your proposals. This opportunity is now closed, all artists included in By Appointment will receive a confirmation email today.

CBNC's aim is to bring together unknown artists so that we might raise, discuss and act upon many of the issues concerning the artist and the institute.

Galleries and art schools have come to represent a form of authority that 'governs' contemporary art; this is something we fundamentally disagree with but we do believe the institute can play an important role in our endeavours as artists. So we would like to facilitate activities that encourage dialogues between unknown artists and institutions, rupturing the structure of the system and the roles all we play within this system; as artists, employees, students and outsiders.

We would like to invite you all down to the ICA tomorrow 12-7pm to get the ball rolling; for you to meet us and each other, to discuss your interest in response to this project and to make suggestions in the formation of this new network.