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Addendum (Becoming American)
August 1-September 30, 2018
An addendum project to Gretchen Frances Bennett’s broadsheet-published essay, Air, the free or unconfined space above the surface of the earth, created for the exhibition, Becoming American, was a set of instructions created collaboratively by exhibition curator Catherine Clifford and Bennett. This instruction project was titled 7,683 (for the current population of San Juan Island), for the continued development of and care for the broadsheet. Clifford, who remained onsite for the duration of the exhibition, enacted the loosely-scripted instructions.
The instructions for Air, as delivered and performed by Clifford, served as an addendum to the project and exhibition that were cumulative, organized, energetic and mixed the voice of curator, writer, cultural worker, and viewer. They allowed the work—two newsprint broadsheets folded together—to move as needed; sometimes through singular pieces that were take-aways picked up by gallery visitors, and, at the end of the day, as a complete stack, moved by Clifford or a ranger, indoors.
This instruction project was inspired by Lucy Lippard’s Number Shows, four exhibitions of contemporary art curated by Lippard 1969-1974. For Number Shows, each show took the population of the city in which it was shown as its title: 557,087 in Seattle, 955,000 in Vancouver, 2,972,453 in Buenos Aires and 7,500 in Valencia, California.
· Addendum: 7,683 (instructions):
· 1. Encourage visitors to take a broadsheet from the stack as they view the exhibition, so the work—the broadsheet with published essay and images—moves singularly.
· 2. End-of-day, bring the two stacks as they exist in installation at the American Camp location, into the building each night—to protect them from morning dew, mist, and wind. Bring them out again each morning. If the wind does take some papers, please document.
· 3. On rainy days, during exhibition hours, the stacks may be temporarily relocated to the covered porch of the second building at American Camp. For variety, on sunny days, the stacks can sometimes be placed on the front steps of the building with no porch in two or three stacks.
· 4. Reading aloud of the work by anyone is encouraged. If this happens, please document.