ALAN DUNN ALAN DUNN| After months of negotiation with ScotRail and Mills & Allen, advertising contractors, the new 20x5ft billboard was constructed on Sunday 9th September 1990. Installed about 5ft from the ground, the panel was strategically located opposite the busiest part of the platform, the windowless waiting cubicle. The first posterwork appeared on that Sunday at around 2pm and then on every first Sunday of the next twelve months, a new work would replace the previous one. |
| The concept behind the Project was straight-forward; having created the framework, I would act as a curator, inviting a number of individuals to contribute 'temporary hand-painted posterworks'. Unable to pay artist's fees, I could at least offer the use of my studio to each participant. The contained space became a focus of nervous tension as concerns were shared over the works transformation from intimate private acts into publicly-seen autonomous presentations. |
| Through discussions, the tone of the Project was clarified and articulated - each work would appear anonymously (uncredited), the frame colour would be variable and no sponsors' logos would appear anywhere at the site. |
| WORKS |
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Alan Dunn & Hildebrand Frey (Urban Design Unit, University of Strathclyde)
Untitled, derived from photo of an old street sign just outside Glasgow which had become partly obscured by shrubbery - the plaque's function replaced by familiarity. |
|
James Kelman & Alex Dempster
That Other, Kelman's concise text, first published in Greyhound For Breakfast, 1972, sits alongside Dempster's vision - a large book (bible?) sitting on top of the middle of three vast tower blocks which dwarf miniscule car-filled motorways. |
|
Thomas Lawson
Untitled, Sunday 25th November. Rangers-Celtic at nearby Celtic Park. Heavy Police presence at station. Alighting fans faced with both 'real' and two-dimensional Police. Image from the cenotaph in Glasgow's George Square. |
|
Alan Dunn & Angela Trainer (Director of Harvest Clinic of Hypnotherapy)
Unfinished Sentence..., stretched canvas coated with 'lilac haze' emulsion to capture the winter shadows. No clocks or timetables on the platform. |
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Alan Dunn
68 Minutes, Mendoza, Argentina, 1978, January 1991. First month after Glasgow's reign as 'European City of Culture'. From The Scotsman a few months later: To describe it simply as a goal is to call Van Gogh's Sunflowers an undercoat. It was, by any criterion, a masterpiece. Archie Gemmill will forever be remembered for that goal, a moment of blinding inspiration when he jinked past the entire male population of Holland and into our hearts. |
|
Craig Richardson
Untitled, February 1991. The Gulf War. Snow in Glasgow. Red text on blue ground. |
|
Anne Quinn & Peter Gilmour
Untitled, The sadness and emptiness of the hollow insect-like silhouettes struggle against the sheer visual beauty of the blue expanse. |
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Brigitte Jurack
Life Circle - snow in the city, February 1991. The Gulf War. Snow in Glasgow. Proportional to or infinity? Tracking. Fake brick wallpaper and sewn velvet. |
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Ross Sinclair
Four-letter word, Original proposal - the word HATE with a Union Jack within a black frame. Actually installed - original work slid one section to the right (HAT!) - contractors' decision. Re-installed - Union Jack with no text. Result - sprayed with 'right-wing' graffiti. New work - ACHE against red-less flag. |
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Douglas Gordon
Untitled, Coincided with the large Evangelic extravaganza - Billy Graham's preaching at the nearby Celtic Park drifted across the station platform. |
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Julie Roberts
Untitled, The tools and instruments of the slaughter trade. Antiseptic green and yellow. |
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Meredith Crone
purpose and belonging, ... the composition operates within, and ultimately belongs to, the pre-set dimensional restrictions. The very low horizon line makes it somehow reminiscent of those old diorama paintings of battle charges. |
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Alan Dunn
... and babies?, June 1991. National Census. Billboards - baby's face with the texts who am I? and where was I born?. Portrait of the artist at nine months, nine months into the Project. |
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Pavel Büchler
Northern Horizon, three-sequential works, as NORTHERN (reversed) gradually transformed into HORIZON (reversed). Conversation overheard on train: - Northern - Northern. What does that mean? - It's been going on for about a year. I don't know, it keeps changing. - Every day? - No, every two or three weeks, it's a bit like Twin Peaks. - Maybe it's subliminal, - Definitely, I don't know, there's just something about it... - Maybe it's a subliminal form of... - Yes, but there's also something dangerous... - Yes, anyway, as I was saying... |
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Grennan & Sperandio
Untitled, on a clear field of blue, the image refers ambiguously to mutual manipulation, the impossibility of isolation and the repercussions that our slightest acts have on others. Making use of a current trend in advertising for images which can be read in two ways, the billboard is simultaneously a pair of bladeless scissors and the cross of St. Andrews. |
| SEPTEMBER 1991 - BILLBOARD REMOVED |
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