#3. The Cafe & Bookshop
MOVEMENT
Dec 2012 - Feb 2013
Public event: Thursday 17th January 2013, 6pm
In response to The Cafe & Bookshop for Floorplan for an Institution, MOVEMENT gallery in collaboration with artist duo Yoke and Zoom, present a selection of MICRO-OIL PAINTINGS and THE ART OF CONVERSATION.
Traditionally, within the context of an art institution, the cafe is a place to relax, meet and talk to friends, eat and drink and perhaps discuss the exhibitions. Increasingly however, as in most forms of public space, one to one interactions between people in cafes are breaking down due to the proliferation of mobile technology and social networking. The same technologies have also led to an increase in individual customers working or social networking and sitting alone where there may have previously been a stigma attached.
MIT social psychologist Sherry Turkle has noted that:
"People today are more connected to one another than ever before in human history, thanks to Internet-based social networking sites and text messaging. But they’re also more lonely and distant from one another in their unplugged lives."
Expanding upon an ongoing body of work examining the breakdown of conversation in public space, THE ART OF CONVERSATION is a one:one portable cafe/bookshop/sculpture that serves just two people at a time and encourages them to strike-up a conversation whilst seated on adjacent tables.The spectator becomes the participant in the situation and conversation is encouraged by the provision of a selection of artbooks and other prompts, if needed. On the cafe walls are the related MICRO-OIL PAINTINGS.
about MOVEMENT
MOVEMENT gallery is a departure, a change, a stopover, or an arrival – it’s a point along a journey and a geographically democratic site for the production and presentation of contemporary artwork. Due to our location on a rail transport system we aim to conceptually take the passenger on many different journeys through time and space, commissioning work by international contemporary artists to be shown at the station. It is a micro-gallery, located in what was once a redundant gentleman’s toilet that fronts directly onto a busy railway station platform. MOVEMENT has commissioned a series of limited edition artists prints to accompany the exhibition, please contact the gallery for further details.
