Bernadette Corporation
The Independent Group
John McHale
Magda Cordell
Nigel Henderson
Eduardo Paolozzi
Richard Hamilton
Matt Williams
Stefan Kalmar
Richard Birkett
Gregor Muir
The eclectic work of Bernadette Corporation over the past 19 years: it started with the foundation of a high-end fashion label and later came to include film and writing, exploring consumerism and branding strategies of New York and the impact of 9/11 on the city. To coincide with the 60th anniversary of the ground-breaking exhibition Parallel of Life & Art are on view original art works by the Independent Group: beyond traditional boundaries and conventional disciplinary areas.
Bernadette Corporation
2000 Wasted Years
Curated by Stefan Kalmár and Richard Birkett of Artists Space, New York with Gregor Muir and Matt Williams of ICA, London.
The ICA, in association with Artists Space, New York, presents the first retrospective in the UK of
Bernadette Corporation.
One of the most significant art collectives working today, Bernadette Corporation (BC) has been
influential in presenting a conceptual alternative for making art. They emerged in 1993 in a New York
obsessed with Calvin Klein and Kate Moss but hit by recession. Their eclectic work over the past 19
years, which started with the foundation of a high-end fashion label and later came to include film and
writing, explores consumerism and branding strategies while reflecting the economic and social
history of New York and the impact of 9/11 on the city. While three figures – Bernadette Van-Huy,
John Kelsey and Antek Walczak – have always been central to BC, the collective has collaborated
with a number of artists including Rita Ackermann, Mark Borthwick and Chloe Sevigny. This exhibition
at the ICA traces BC‟s work and influence and presents their major fashion, film and writing projects
for the first time in London.
The group formed as a „scene‟ at Club USA, a nightclub that existed between 1992 and 1995 near
Times Square. Kelsey recalls, “Nobody had money, everybody was young, so it made a lot of sense
to band together and do things collectively. There was a real DIY ethic at that time.” Nineties New
York was dominated by big brand fashioning advertising and the creative crossover between art and
fashion was in bloom. In response to this, the first project launched by Bernadette Corporation was
their own high-end fashion label. Mimicking the visual strategies of the fashion world they explored
the hierarchy of fashion and art and the economic drive of the fashion world, while working on fashion
shoots with the world‟s glossiest magazines. This irony saw them insert references to immigration and
class as well as counterfeit goods into fashion shoots, and audition models for their catwalks through
the Yellow Pages.
The label lasted until 1997 and was followed by the magazine Made in USA in which fashion imagery
and advertising was placed alongside philosophical art texts. At the height of the anti-capitalist
movement in 2001 they started working on the film that would eventually become Get Rid of Yourself
mixing images of anti-global protest with footage of Chloe Sevigny re-performing sections of activists‟
speeches in a kitchen. In the middle of editing Get Rid of Yourself, 9/11 changed everything –
including the film. In response to these changes, BC started a collective writing project that resulted in
a novel by one hundred and fifty writers - Reena Spaulings (2005). Loosely based around the central
character, an identity-less, blank, bland model, it is also a story about the post-9/11 New York
landscape. While BC has continued to make films, explore promotional campaigns and instigate
collective writing, recent projects have seen more emphasis on the „object‟, following the failure of a
cinema project in all but its merchandising content.
The ICA exhibition will present projects from the last 19 years, including the bodies of work mentioned
above, through a timeline mapping their archival material. This is accompanied by a pavilion,
designed in collaboration with Gideon Ponte, which will present a series of works including Media Hot
& Cold, 10 hardcover publish-on-demand books, and video work Get Rid of Yourself. Vitrines and
lightboxes will present a variety of Bernadette Corporation „merchandise‟ such as Mug Stanzas, digital
printed coffee mugs and Retrospective Scarves, 7 inkjet printed silk scarves. In addition, graphic wall
based works including Smash False Dreamlands and Village Voice novel review will also punctuate
the gallery spaces.
In conjunction with Bernadette Corporation the ICA presents The Independent Group: Parallel of Art &
Life in the Reading Room, which brings together a range of artworks, design objects and ephemera.
The Group met at the ICA in Dover Street from 1952-5 and included Alison and Peter Smithson,
Richard Hamilton, Eduardo Paolozzi, William Turnbull, Frank Cordell and writer Lawrence Alloway.
Celebrated today as the so-called “Fathers of Pop”, the Group worked with art, science, technology
and popular culture. The Group challenged modernism working beyond traditional boundaries and
conventional discipline areas. Bernadette Corporation continues that trajectory, in their own words
"these are the final days of contemporary art and we‟re happy to have a seat at the table."
(Bernadette Corporation, 500 Words: Artforum)
An accompanying series of talks and events will look more closely at the artists collective in the
context of the history of the ICA, an organisation itself founded by artists.
About Bernadette Corporation
Bernadette Corporation is currently based in New York as a collaborative with three principal
members, Bernadette Van-Huy, John Kelsey and Antek Walczak. Bernadette Corporation has had
solo exhibitions at galleries and institutions including Galerie Meyer Kainer, Vienna (2011); Galerie
NEU, Berlin (2010); Greene Naftali, New York (2009); Kunsthalle Zürich (2008); Künstlerhaus
Stuttgart (2007); Witte de With, Rotterdam (2005); Galerie Meerrettich, Berlin (2003); and American
Fine Arts, New York (1997). The collective‟s work has been exhibited in group exhibitions including;
Nothing in the World But Youth, Turner Contemporary, Margate (2011); 4th Moscow Biennial of
Contemporary Art, Moscow (2011); Not in Fashion: Fashion and Photography in the 90s, Museum für
Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt (2010); 9 Screens, MoMA, New York (2010); Manifesta 7, Trentino-South
Tyrol (2008); Cult of the Artist, Hamburger Banhof, Berlin (2008); Shandismus. Autorschaft als Genre,
Wiener Secession, Vienna (2007); Make Your Own Life: Artists In and Out of Cologne, Institute of
Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (2006); Whitney Biennial 2006, Day for Night, Whitney Museum of
American Art, New York (2006); Populism, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2005); The Big Nothing,
Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (2004); Ex-Argentina, Museum Ludwig, Cologne (2004);
Let’s Entertain, Walker Arts Center, Minneapolis, Minnesotta (2000). Publications by Bernadette
Corporation include The Complete Poem (Walther König, 2011); Eine Pinot Grigio, Bitte (Sternberg
Press, 2007); and Reena Spaulings (Semiotext(e), 2005). Bernadette Corporation‟s ready-to-wear
women‟s fashion line appeared in magazines including i-D, The Face, Dazed and Confused, Index
Magazine, Harper’s Bazaar, Purple, and Visionaire between 1995 and 1998.
This project is supported by the Foundation for Contemporary Arts; Graham Foundation for Advanced
Studies in the Fine Arts; and the Friends of Artists Space.
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The Independent Group
Parallel of Art & Life
The ICA is delighted to present original art works by the Independent Group to coincide with the 60th
anniversary of the ground-breaking exhibition Parallel of Life & Art.
The Independent Group met at the original ICA in Dover Street from 1952-5 and comprised architects
Alison and Peter Smithson, James Stirling and Colin St John Wilson; artists Magda Cordell, Richard
Hamilton, Nigel Henderson, John McHale, Eduardo Paolozzi and William Turnbull; music producer
Frank Cordell and writers Lawrence Alloway, Reyner Banham and Toni del Renzio. Celebrated today
as the so-called Fathers of Pop, the Group worked with art, science, technology and popular culture.
From horror films to theories of evolution, modern architecture to Marilyn Monroe, this group project
worked beyond traditional boundaries and conventional disciplinary areas.
The exhibitions organised by the group – Growth & Form; Tomorrow’s Furniture; Parallel of Life & Art;
Man, Machine & Motion and sections of This is Tomorrow – were highly innovative, both in terms of
layout and the range of objects displayed. Building on the ICA’s Surrealist legacy, the Independent
Group shows introduced the new age of modernity and mass culture to the gallery space. Reflecting
the Group’s collage mentality, new technology and high end design were juxtaposed with avant-garde
art.
Unlike other London venues, ‘none provided a foyer, a hearth which the artists and his audience can
gather in unanimity, in fellowship, in mutual understanding and inspiration’ stated Herbert Read in the
exhibition catalogue 40 Years of Modern Art. Even before the Group was assembled by Assistant
Director Dorothy Morland, members gravitated to the ICA as the only place to see and discuss
modern art and modern culture. Hamilton, Paolozzi and Turnbull exhibited at the Dover Street
inaugural exhibition, 1950: Aspects of British Art and continued their involvement throughout the
1950s and 1960s, curating a wide range of public exhibitions and events, underpinned by clandestine
discussions and gatherings.
The ICA exhibition will include paintings, drawings and photographs by John McHale, Magda Cordell,
Nigel Henderson, Eduardo Paolozzi and Richard Hamilton, alongside related designed objects and
ephemera from the Independent Group. Evoking the ICA’s original home in Dover Street in the 1950s,
the exhibition will be designed to give viewers a sense of ‘The Home of the Avant Garde’ which first
attracted this collection of creative practitioners.
In addition the exhibition will be accompanied by a two day conference which will bring together
leading researchers, practitioners and curators who are working on aspects of the Independent
Group. The aim will be to consider ways in which the Independent Group have been, and continue to
be, exhibited. Participants will share their knowledge and approaches to this seminal moment in the
history of British art and architecture at a very timely moment when the history of the Independent
Group has come under increased scrutiny internationally.
Anne Massey is Co-Curator and organiser of the conference along with Matt Williams, Curator ICA.
Image: Bernadette Corporation
Press contacts:
Naomi Crowther | Press Officer ICA +44 (0)20 7766 1407 naomi.crowther@ica.org.uk
Sam Talbot | Sutton PR +44 (0)20 7183 3577 sam@suttonpr.com
Press Day: 26 March 2013
Institute of Contemporary Arts ICA
The Mall, London, SW1Y 5AH
Gallery opening hours: Tues - Sun 11am – 6pm, except Thurs, 11am – 9pm. Closed Mon.
Admission free