Service Entrance
11/23/14 - 3/15/15
Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens - Deurle, BE

Isaac Brest / Nick Darmstaedter / Jack Greer / Alex Ito / Brendan Lynch / Dylan Lynch / Haley Mellin / Alex Perweiler / Zachary Susskind /
Peter Sutherland / Augustus Thompson / Dominic Samsworth / Jack McConville / Phoebe Collings-James / Brad Troemel /
Joe Graham-Felsen  

The Still House Group has been invited to occupy Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens in its entirety for nearly four months, displaying both their own work and a program of nine rotating projects. This two-part endeavor involves a survey of recent Still House activity in conjunction with three seperate galleries all of which alter states three times throughout the course of the exhibition.

Room A begins as a gift shop. Set amongst a sculptural installation created by artist Joe Graham-Felsen, the group has brought together a selection of second hand books, an assortment of artist publications and zines, as well as objects and editions offered for sale during the exhibition. In Janaury, this room will turn into a theatre playing feature films, music videos, interviews and other video content chosen by Still House. In February, this room will change yet again to accommodate a selection of soundtracks made by members and peers of the group. 

Room B involves selected members of the Still House Residency program, where between November and March, eight former resident artists will alternate group presentations.

Room C involves a collaborative project produced by Zachary Susskind. Along with the non-profit organisation Art Without Bars, Susskind has guided a course involving some ten inmates of the prison Andenne (Belgium) on the topic of exhibition organization. In three consecutive parts, the prisoners will display their curatorial practice utilizing work of the museum’s permanent collection, Still House, and their own art.

Project Space Schedule

November 23rd - January 4th: 

Room A - Gift Shop 

Room B - Peter Sutherland & Augustus Thompson 

Room C - The Hazard Will Supply the First Verse (MDD Permanent Collection) 

January 7th - February 1st: 

Room A - Theatre 

Room B - Phoebe Collings-James, Jack McConville & Dominic Samsworth 

Room C - Opening Towards the Hidden Faces of Fresh Natural Fruits (Still House) 

February 4th - March 15th: 

Room A - Sound Installation - Max Barbaria, Ben Morsberger, Dev Hynes

Room B - Alex Ito, Haley Mellin & Brad Troemel 

Room C - How Are You Never You (Inmates)

ROOM A

Gift Shop 
November 23rd, 2014 - January 4th, 2015 
 

As the first of three projects in Room A, The Still House has produced a museum gift shop of their own. With an installation by artist Joe Graham Felsen, the space has been divided into three separate sections.

The first is comprised of second-hand books purchased by the members of the group. With a limited budget, each artist was given freedom to choose (from a flea market, eBay etc) any printed material they felt was worthy of consumption by a museum audience. Whether it was for the reference images contained within the book, or the odd-nature of the content, the group selected a total of twenty-two publications ranging from product catalogues to art theory texts, do-it-yourself manuals and vintage magazines.

In the second section, Still House sourced a selection from publishers of limited artist books, exporting to Belgium rare zines, textbooks and hardcovers by young contemporary artists, otherwise difficult to attain in the region.

In the final area, the artists of Still House have created limited merchandise specifically for the museum. Some items were simply purchased as low cost ready-mades, such as Flaming Hot Cheetos by Nick Darmstaedter and stash cans by Dylan Lynch, whereas others are handmade objects such as the t-shirts and painted tabloids by Dylan Lynch. Certain merchandise was produced using websites specializing in promotional items, like Isaac Brest’s stress balls, Louis Eisner’s coffee mugs and Alex Perweiler’s monochromatic puzzles. Artist Cali Thornhill-DeWitt was commissioned to create a series of six posters utilizing the text Service Entrance, in memory of the Still House’s exhibition at Dhondt-Dhaenens. 

Screening Room 
January 7th - February 1st, 2015
 

For the second installment of Room A, the eight original members of Still House have assembled a 90-minute film. The project revolves around the use of appropriated footage, utilizing source material as a ready made. Each artist was responsible for four clips - an interview, music video, commercial and a scene from a narrative film. Edited together at random, the film explores American culture, both high and low, providing an underlying visual background to the work on display in Service Entrance. While no clip was directly chosen to for its relationship to the respective artist’s practice, each were chosen by the artists nonetheless, and serve as subconscious context to the sculptures and paintings exhibited at Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens.

Sound Project 
February 7th - March 22nd, 2015 
 

For the third installment of room A, The Still House Group has commissioned 5 peer musicians to generate exhibition specific audio works. Each participant was sent images from previous iterations of Service Entrance and was then asked to create a sound track to accompany the project. The result is a compilation of varied sonic experiences, ranging from those that function similar to traditional movie scores, to more experimental, looped noises and sounds. These works ultimately operate as an audio supplement to the primarily visual experience in the adjacent galleries. Participating musicians include: Ben Morsberger, Devonte Hynes, Max Barbaria, Augustus Thompson and Tonstartssbandht.

ROOM B

Peter Sutherland
Augustus Thompson 
November 23rd, 2014 - January 4th, 2015 

Dominic Samsworth 
Jack McConville
Phoebe Collings-James
January 7th - February 1st, 2015 

Alex Ito 
Brad Troemel 
Haley Mellin
February 7th - March 22nd, 2015  

ROOM C

This World of Cut Thorns
Zachary Susskind with Inmates of Andenne Prison

This room has been allocated to three consecutive exhibitions designed by Belgian inmates within the Prison of Andenne, comprising their project “This World of Cut Thorns”.

In partnership with Art Without Bars, Still House artist Zachary Susskind led a series of workshops within the prison during 2014. Introducing the notion of the exhibition as an art form in itself, he hoped to promote the inmates’ collaboration toward aesthetic and conceptual statement-making. The following exhibitions explore their newly tapped potential.

Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens opened its collection to the inmates for The Hazard Will Supply the First Verse (23 November - 4 January), a shared biographical narrative in three nave-like segments (My Child, You and I; My Suffering, You and I; My Job, You and I). They exercised authorship by re-titling many of the works on view. Could time dedicated to a curatorial engagement with art encourage the optimism and responsibility necessary for rehabilitation?

The Still House Group has provided their own works for the inmates to contextualize as well. In Opening Towards the Hidden Faces of Fresh Natural Fruits (7 January - 1 February) they embrace the tropical and exotic in liberating fantasies while wrestling with paradoxes inherent in attaining the fruits of ambition.

How are You Never You? (4 February - 1 March) presents a fundamental question posed as a play on words. Invariably, the answer is “in prison”. Examining this dilemma as a group, the inmates testify that their exposure and reactions to historically significant art, made possible by Art Without Bars’ resource Artpad, provide the rare respite from their challenging circumstance. These men are physically manifesting the interaction of their own artwork with that of others for the first time at Museum Dhondt-Dhaenens.

The Hazard Will Supply the First Verse
(Works from the MDD Permanent Collection curated by the inmates of Andenne Prison)
November 23rd, 2014 - January 4th, 2015

Opening Towards the Hidden Faces of Fresh Natural Fruits
(Works from The Still House Group curated by the inmates of Andenne Prison)
January 7th - February 1st, 2015 

How are You Never You?
(Works made and curated by the inmates of Andenne Prison)
February 7th - March 22nd, 2015