DOES THE IT STICK was a project at Bloomberg SPACE which interrogated the function of this exhibition space and Bloomberg’s relationship to contemporary art.

Research aims:
1 To challenge the conventions surrounding Bloomberg SPACE in terms of the visitor experience, and expectations, of the space.
2 To explore and challenge Bloomberg’s relationship to information in regards to notions of power and transparency.
3 To produce an artwork that expands the limitations of this category by containing a multiplicity of approaches and forms including curatorial strategies.

The project is framed by ideas of Institutional critique and the notion of antagonism as a relational device within recent contemporary art practice (C.Bishop, T.Hirshhorn, C.Evans). The project also engages with current debates within Curatorial and Institutional practice (Eastside Projects, Liverpool Biennale).

The project employed a number of strategies and devices to explore the research questions. Certain elements from a previous project that responded to a regeneration area within Newcastle (DOES THE IT FIT, Stephenson Works, 2013) were transposed into Bloomberg space. This included a long narrative text, photo-works and a monumental figurative sculpture/structure. This strategy allowed the project to address aspects of power, information and rhetoric without explicitly confronting the Bloomberg brand. Other methods within the artwork involved the curating and re-positioning of previous Bloomberg SPACE commissions, the consideration of ‘exhibition information’ as part of the artwork, the production of a figurative reception desk positioned within the space and the curation of a number of events that took place within the wider Bloomberg building.

The project was co-commissioned by Studio Voltaire and Bloomberg with funding of £35,000 provided by Bloomberg. A poster, that drew on the strategies mentioned above, was dessiminated as part of the project. Thorough documentation of the project exists on both the Studio Voltaire and Bloomberg websites.