Projector Collective 6
The Radiant City
John Carter Anthony Kelly Jay Roche
Common Place Amateur Projects, 10 Burgh Quay, Dublin 2
Invited Preview Friday 6th February 2009 at 6pm,
Viewing each Saturday from 12pm to 7pm
7th/14th/21st February
About the project:
The Radiant City, a new exhibition by Projector Collective at Commonplace Amateur Projects, borrows itís title from a book by the french architect Le Corbusier, considered to be the pivotal architectural theorist of the 20th century. In this book the author sets out his ideas for a new type of city - one based on social equality and functional design. At a time when social theorising was going through a period of radical change, this treatise offered one of many ideals for how people might live together and how housing could be part of this new society. Although largely dismissed by subsequent thinkers, The Radiant City had a profound effect on 20th century urban planning.
Projector Collective are interested in the idealism of Le Corbusier's book and the optimism of his theories. In absorbing these ideas and viewing them through the contemporary urban environment the collective have sought to respond to areas where these ideas might once again be relevant. While focusing on examples of decomissioned housing in the Dublin inner city the collective were taken by the closing-off of function of what Le Corbusier himself referred to as 'machines for living'. These shuttered and fenced houses carry a new skin that excludes them from use - they exist in a sort of dream state, sleeping houses waiting for re-use.
The show uses found elements that form a barrier on or around these buildings; shutters and fencing - objects that negate the usability of the building and interfere with their function. These elements have been transformed and find a new function, situated within a new space and become talismanic emblems of the transitory state of these buildings. Gold has been used as a material in this transformation and alludes to the idea of radiance.
Projector Collective have also been working on a project with Via Collective that seeks to interact directly with a specific location in Dublin City centre St. Agatha's terrace off Amiens street. The Radiant City offers a prologue or pre-meditation on some of the ideas to be explored in this coming project to be titled Bright Shadow.
One of the objectives of Common Place Amateur Projects is to promote the idea of editionable artworks and Projector Collective has responded on this occasion by producing a series of embossed prints in an edition of ten. These were produced at Stoney Road Press, Dublin. For more information about these prints please contact Sally Timmons at commonplaceprojects@gmail.com
