Do you remember it - or weren't you there?

Curated by Cally Trench and Philip Lee (2013)


Cally Trench's homepage

An exhibition of work by artists and writers whose starting point was a live performance by Philip Lee and Cally Trench.

Exercise Slip

Documenting and describing live performance art is extraordinarily difficult. Photographs and videos can show you what happened, but rarely convey the feeling of being there, of experiencing the event at the time, in real time, live.

As an experiment, in 2010, Philip Lee and Cally Trench invited a number of artists to make work (their own work, not documentation) triggered by seeing one of their Blindfold Slip performances in late 2010 and early 2011. They wanted to explore the idea that one way of creating that feeling, of conveying a memory of the experience, might be through the making of another work of art. They proposed that this would be comparable to ekphrasis, the dramatic description of a work of art in the form of a poem.

The Blindfold Slip performances took place at the Truman Brewery, London; the Nunnery (Bow Arts Trust), London; the Stone Squid Experimental Art Space, Hastings; and the University of Westminster, Harrow. Each performance involved Philip Lee (naked), Cally Trench (clothed), clay slip and a blindfold.

Do you remember it - or weren't you there? featured work by Marco Calí, Alison Carter Tai, Judy Goldhill, Jane Grisewood, Ingrid Jensen, Lydia Julien, Philip Lee, Sophie Loss, Tony Moody, Claire Norman, Lorraine Pepper, Steve Perfect, Alan Prosser, Ann Rapstoff, Zahed Tajeddin, Cally Trench, Helen Udal, Mary Yacoob, and Silvia Ziranek, and is curated by Cally Trench and Philip Lee.

The exhibition was open 31 January to 3 March 2013. An artist talk on was held on Monday 11 February 2013: Philip Lee and Cally Trench in conversation.


London Gallery West


Press release

Catalogue essay by Cally Trench and Philip Lee

Photograph album

Review by John Bunyan

A response by Lorraine Pepper

A RESPONSE BY SILVIA ZIRANEK


Catalogue supported by CREAM (Centre for Research and Education in Arts and Media), University of Westminster.

Silvia Ziranek's performances are supported by

A Better badge

Silvia Ziranek's current coiffure by Vidal Sassoon.

Exhibiting Performance conference

Friday 1 March - Sunday 3 March 2013 at University of Westminster, 309 Regent Street, London. A conference convened by CREAM (Centre for Research and Education in Arts and Media), University of Westminster, addressing the question of how performance art is documented, archived and transacted.

Cally Trench's homepage