Output details

Fieldworks from the Museum of the Void - Experiments in the Event of an Archive

Originality

Practice based research of the artists’ archive of O+I / Artist Placement Group [APG] and John Latham led to research into Robert Smithson, with a commission from The Henry Moore Foundation, enabling extended field research to take place at the Center for Land Use Interpretation Wendover Desert Research Station in Utah, USA [CLUI] 2008-10.

Rigour

Research engaged primary archive materials, using experimental analysis of archive practices. From work with Antony Hudek, AHRC archivist at FTHo, Sue Breakell at Tate Archives, to work with CLUI on Robert Smithson original private site for Spiral Jetty, this research into expanded concept of the archive led to the exhibition and publication, ‘Fieldworks from the Museum of the Void’. Drawing on Krauss (1972) concept of art in an expanded field, Smithsons and John Latham’s concepts of time – entropy and event structure, the exhibition challenged concept of archiving artist’s work. The exhibition documented potential risks facing Spiral Jetty, Smithson work in Utah’s remote wilderness, with the Museum archive, whilst video work and GIS drawings documented site specific work by White in the Utah desert.

Significance

White’s work with John Latham helped secure funding for the archive at Lathams home Flat Time House [FTHo] following his death in 2006. Papers by White at the ‘Latham Study Day’ and ‘Archives and Events’ at the ARLIS Conference, Tate Britain 2006-8 (Non RAE 2008) led to White’s appointment as Director of O+I 2007-9 (formerly APG) and as a Research Fellow, Chelsea (UAL) from 2008-9. A report on the CLUI residency was included in the ‘Voids’ catalogue in 2009. Recent reflective essay ‘Experiments and Archives in the Expanded Field’ was written for ‘All this Stuff; Artists and Archives’. White was a regular speaker in ’APG; ‘The Individual and the Organisation: Artist Placement Group 1966-79,’ Raven Row, London, Sept-Nov 2012.