by wayout
For WAYOUT_blp, Margaret Roberts, collected 140 objects from friends and strangers spanning the country but predominantly in Central and Midwest NSW, and placed them in a blp shape on the floor around the WAYOUT Art space. What is a ‘blp’, you ask? A great question. In 1967, artist Richard Artschwager named the shape that, according to him, has informally existed forever. ‘If you slice a knockwurst longitudinally, that would give you a blp.’ Cardboard box handles, an eraser used at both ends, a glasses case, a Telstra street hole cover.
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You can think of the blp as a sculptural punctuation mark. Artschwager would describe the blp as an extended period: a full stop that has been dragged. He employed the blp to provide a focal point by putting them in places that you wouldn’t ordinarily notice. This would command a new attention, becoming a notation for ‘here’.
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Margaret asked the public to borrow a household object that they wouldn’t miss for six weeks and arranged these objects into the shape of a blp, using them as the punctuation marker of the place in which they were displayed, WAYOUT Artspace. The point thus created indicating this place was composed of these household things that have their own place elsewhere, within the lives of one hundred and forty people who, and before this installation were mostly separate from and unknown to each other.
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While I walked around the blp of objects, I was overwhelmed by all the individual history I was looking at. An eye dropper tincture bottle with a list of flowers it contained; a folded blanket; some keys; a toy rat. I have objects similar to these, each with their own significance to my life, so, naturally I created my own narrative around the objects: is this a generations old teddy bear? Was it a mother’s first bear, gifted by her grandmother? Was this pile of books for a particular research project, perhaps the owner’s mother was a leading expert in this subject? Did this piano accordion come to Australia on a migrant ship? There is endless opportunity for stories amongst these objects and the people they belong to. For those whose curiosity can’t be satiated by imaginings there is a document with all items, the Aboriginal country they come from, the lender, and a few sentences about what it is to this person. But this short description can’t possibly carry the weight or significance of the object.
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Mine was a vase. I’d not spent much time thinking about this vase before offering it to the blp, but part of the offering was telling it’s story. This was first to Margaret, but when people are standing around the blp, they share their stories. The story of my vase was repeated several times, questions were asked about its history before me. It was becoming something more than ‘my vase’. I hadn’t ever thought of this history and life of my vase. Its participation in this exhibition had extended its life story without me in it.
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To further the lives of these objects outside of WAYOUT_blp, Margaret recorded the voices of the benefactors telling the stories of their items. The oral histories of these objects providing a new platform for them to live on in Margaret’s archives. Tidbits of random histories that likely would never have been given the thought and attention that they received here, at WAYOUT.
Artists and visitors were also encouraged to sit and draw objects. The drawings introduced an individual perspective and furthered the interactive history of these increasingly autonomous household treasures. These people were welcome to take their drawings home but Margaret asked them to provide a copy of the drawing, again, for the archives.
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With oral recounts and individually sketched impressions, Margaret might, in the future, create an exhibition, held anywhere, that brings together these objects without the presence of the objects themselves, while using the shape of the blp, pointing directly to 71 Angus Ave in the middle of the gallery floor. An acknowledgement of this exact space, these objects and these people between 13th of May and 25th of June 2023.
Words by Lucy Smith
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