Photo by Holly Revell, 2019.
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Photo by Holly Revell, 2019
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Photo by Christa Holka 2024
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My work asks social, political and ecological questions through irreverent, wandering research processes that respond to everyday experiences. I've made things for BBC Sounds, Kunstmuseum St.Gallen, Bauhaus Museum Dessau, Kunstverein Dortmund, Tate Learning, OOF Gallery, Montez Radio, Gerry's Pompeii, PlazaPlaza, Museum of London Lates, Arebyte, Bobinska Brownlee, Frans Hals Museum Haarlem, Art Night London, BQ Berlin, Viernulvier Ghent. SET London, Artsadmin, Turf Projects, Duckie, Deptford X Special Project, Salisbury Art Centre, Kunstlerhaus Bremen, Camden People's Theatre, Replicating the Model of a Village at Studio Voltaire, Coastal Currents Festival, TEDx Hackney, Wellcome Lates, Latitude and Supernormal Festival.
Currently I am...
- Studying artist-led sustainability projects in preparation for my new podcast (launching soon).
- Developing a project around resource exhaustion and paper recycling in Exeter (showing in 2025).
- Preparing to show No Kids Nursery Rhymes at The Swiss Church London (in 2025).
- My album of No Kids Nursery Rhymes is in the group show Burning Down the House: Rethinking Family at Kunstmuseum St.Gallen. June-Oct 2024. It's a collection of nursery rhymes in English and Swiss German based on a questionnaire filled in by 150+ people who don't have children (and their complex reasons and views on this). I worked with music therapist Luzia Studer and artist/writer Sarah Elena Müller.
- My book of short stories Crueller Surprise launched at Cubitt Studios London in September 2024. It has sold out but more will be printed. The book is written on my commute, it contains 13 darkly comic stories. The collection is designed to take the duration of the London overground line from Highbury & Islington to New Cross Gate to read completely.
Recently I was...
In residence at OOF Gallery, Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London (Feb-April 2024), making work about equality in sport: Women's football, queer football and the geopolitics of football manufacturing. Sound pieces, sculptures. films and disruptive stickers. Some of the work went on to be exhibited at Fußballkultur, a group show in Dortmund pubs and cafes curated by Kunstverein Dortmund.
In May I reinterpreted an old video performance for Ensemble, an audio description group show at APT London, researching accessibility and vision in experimental ways... Access as a creative opportunity for all, rather than an add-on.
At Bauhaus Museum Dessau I developed a new version of an interactive watercolour performance celebrating the weirdly inventive recent tactics of climate activists (and my grandmother's love of jigsaws, soup and other anarchist tools). Part of End Expo a real/fake trade fair organised by Association for the Palliative Turn.
Methodology
I react spontaneously to the world around me, exploring and questioning the situations and environments I encounter; collecting and re-contextualising found materials, creating narratives through objects, and making sculptural interventions. My work is an ongoing process of re-coding physical and cultural space to create an ever-changing vapour-trail of ideas, actions and artefacts. Recognising the power of small acts of resistance, I wander through the world noticing, collecting, subverting and adding things to the environments I encounter. Through this process I create situations and stories, which are re-presented as comedy performances, writing, video, sculpture, radio and participatory experiences. A conceptual magpie, I notice the details of how the world works and adjust them in order to subtly re-programme the everyday and make alternative ways of living together imaginable. I mostly intervene in urban environments or ephemera through playful direct actions, to conjure speculative realities. Humour is my chosen philosophical process because it can condense several possibilities into one idea, thereby flipping the familiar and protecting us from passivity or polarisation, by provoking the need for active, complex interpretation.
A poetic mission statement
Stay wild. Trojan horseplay. Run on our own and run with the pack. Radical accessibility. The group is a form of drag (let others set you free from yourself). The establishment can't catch us - shift shape whenever they get too close. Cuckoo to mistletoe to crocodile-bird. Learn from diverse organisms living in close association. Overshare. You are one in ten billion (and that's just the number of organisms disco dancing in a handful of ashes). Optimistic nihilism. Anarcho-comedy. Laughtivism. Disguise ourselves as something familiar but be careful not to recreate the state we left behind. Make sure your name is omni-barrelled and you change it every day.
Click here for an artist statement an audience wrote for me. It's better than all of mine.
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[email protected]
Born in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Lives and works in London.
Education:
Goldsmiths, University of London. Postgraduate Certificate in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, 2023.
AltMFA - co-founder of London's first alternative, peer-led Masters est' with Lucie Galand in 2010. Ongoing Monday evening course. Free and no budget, except 2017 programme of visiting artists which was funded by AN Artists Information Company.
The Royal College of Art, Department of Sculpture, London, 2012 - 2013. Dissertation with distinction on 'wildness', capitalism and the gaze. Showed in 2013 degree show but was unable to officially graduate due to underpaid fees.
MA Cultural and Critical Studies (merit). Birkbeck, University of London 2006 - 2008. Dissertation on 'Nomadic Tendencies in Contemporary Art'.
BFA Fine Art (1st class honours), Oxford University (The Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art) 2001 - 2004.
CV highlights
2024
No Kids Nursery Rhymes commissioned by and exhibited at Burning Down the House: Rethinking Family, at Kunstmuseum St.Gallen.
Fussballkultur - New works about equality and football exhibited at a show in pubs for Euro24 Dortmund, curated by Dortmund Kunstverein
OOF Gallery Residency Jan-April 2024. Equalities and ecologies of football explored through playful conceptual series of new works.
Nanarchism, interactive performance shown at End Expo: A Consumer Fair for Mortals at Bauhaus Museum Dessau. celebrating eco activist's ingenuity and their use of objects my grandmother liked (jigsaws, soup, confetti). This work invites viewers to reimagine their gran's favourite possessions as protest tools through watercolour, conversation and captions.
Ensemble group show at APT Gallery, Deptford. Ensemble explores Audio Description as a collaborative art form and accessible communication tool, challenging audiences to experience artworks with their minds in an entirely audio-based exhibition.
2023
What to Expect When You're Not Expecting - a film version of my 2022 performance, funded by Goldsmiths Research Support Award.
Violet - a performance at Plaza Plaza, Elephant and Castle. Narrative with props, discussing the bizarre theory that my grandmother Violet is creative director of Just Stop Oil, as a way to talk about the history of capitalism and climate protest tactics in the aftermath of The Public Order Bill limiting protest and forcing protesters to get weirdly creative with jigsaws, confetti, soup and other things my Nana liked. WIP to be developed as a stage show.
Replicating the Model of a Village - symposium on queering family and beyond-nuclear family, at Studio Voltaire. Organised in collaboration with Jasmine Johnson.
Scavenger Coat, a coat with 40+ feely pockets used to 'conceptually recycle' trash fragments found on walks into short stories in collaboration with audiences. Commissioned for Behold, a group show about touch Hypha Studios, Conduit Street, London. Curated by Sasha Galitzine and Graham Little. I've performed this in various settings on stage or at events/parties since. It's available for bookings.
2022
Bird Hut Sperm Bank, 1 hour one woman show - a research-comedy performance about my ambivalent childlessness, DNA, and the reproductive industry. 4 x sold out show at Camden People's Theatre and Viernulvier Ghent.
Unperforming, Art Houses in Whitley Bay, project creating and running a comedy course for artists, culminating in a gig at Laurels comedy club. Collab with Fritha Jenkins.
Seamonsters - scratch night series of art-comedy events I organised at a pub in Dalston featuring various performers, with pass the parcel rituals, intrusive karaoke and watercolours on every table so the audience can paint as they watch. this will be back, I don't know when!
2021
Uplands: Utopia I.O.U Solo show at Bobinska Brownlee New River, Canonbury, London.
2020
Image Power, group show at Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem, NL.
Fringe! film festival, online performance with Fritha Jenkins.
Open Space Contemporary, digital residency
BBC Sounds - Boring Talks on Breakfast Cereal.
Concrete Conversation, Frans Hals Museum and Studium Generale Rietveld Academie. Zoom performance. Louise Ashcroft and Fritha Jenkins.
A-N The Artists Newsletter Bursary recipient
2019
Awkward Stowage performance with Fritha Jenkins, 1hr performance for Art Night London, July 2019.
Cephalopod film shown at Life Hacks, group show at BQ Berlin, curated by Tabitha Steinberg and Ella Fleck. February - March 2019.
Turf Projects Fungus Press residency and billboard commission, January 2019.
BBC Boring Talk on Call Centres, BBC iPlayer, January 2019.
Performance at Vocalis, Beaconsfield Gallery. March 2019.
Boring Conference, May 2019. Performance lecture about house clearances, the baroque and empathy.
Unperforming (several editions including at Artsadmin and Milton Keynes Arts Centre). Performance night with works by Louise and friends.
Supernormal Festival, stand-up comedy performance and interactive workshop, August 2019.
2018
Deptford X Residency. Deptford X is in therapy. Unqualified experimental psychologist Louise Ashcroft devises a range of therapeutic responses to the organisation's psyche by analysing and intervening in its archives, staff, admin records, store cupboard, trustees, pensions, office, audiences, payroll, assets and activity. March - September 2018.
Unperforming 10: Louise Ashcroft and friends. Artsadmin, Toynbee Studios, London. 1st March 2018.
BBC Boring Talk: The Argos Catalogue. An audio version of Louise's performance lecture which links counterculture to consumerism, speculating that the Argos catalogue is in fact radical anti-capitalist propaganda written by the hippies of The Whole Earth Catalogue. Listen here.
Wish You Were Here. One hour group holiday / participatory performance 'walkshop'. 20 people go on a fictional holiday of a lifetime together while wandering the streets of Bermondsey, South London, carrying out a series of improvisation exercises. 17th Feb 2018.
Acts of Disruption, curated by Alice Bonnot. Concept Space, Bermondsey. Group show with Jeremy Hutchison, Marco Godoy, Benjamin Gaulon, Jamie Fitzpatrick, Thomas Langley, Nøne Futbol Club. 19th Jan - 24th Feb 2018.
You're the HD to My ADHD performance commissioned for Could I Care Less? at Wellcome Collection, London. Curated by Osborn & Moller. July 2018.
Talking to a Brick Wall, performance at CCA Goldsmiths, November 2018.
Department of Waste & Recycling interactive performance commissioned by Museum of London, October 2018.
2017
I'd Rather Be Shopping solo exhibition 18th Aug - October 2017 www.arebyte.com
Unlucky Dip & Monsters of the Deep public performance commissions for Coastal Currents Festival Hastings. 2 days dressed as a sea monster doing a survey about what sea monster to attract to the shore during a ritual as part of the council's dark tourism regeneration strategy. Followed by a four hour musical ritual on the roof of a toilet block overlooking the sea, channelling the monsters requested by the public. Coastal Currents Festival 2017.
All My Lives, solo exhibition at Arebyte Laser, Clerkenwell, London. 17th July - 2nd August 2017.
Boring Conference, 'Argos & Counterculture'- 20 minute comical performance lecture at the annual all-day cult festival of mundanity. Audience of 450. 6th May 2017.
Zone Mista at Westminster Waste, Bermondsey, London. I made an a3 print and performance about politics and Millwall Football Club with bespoke Subbuteo match. 5th May 2017.
Guest Projects. Performance of Argos & Counterculture, comical comparison between catalogue shopping and counterculture. 6th May 2017. London
Buffet d'Art group show at Hestercombe, Somerset. Summer 2017.
Arebyte off site Residency, Westfield Shopping Centre, Stratford, London. Solo show August-Sept 2017.
Arebyte Laser, solo show. July-August 2017.
Hastings Festival, autumn 2017. Performances in public space and on a train.
2016
It's Always the Others Who Die at The Koppel Project, Baker Street, London. July-Sept 2016.
Tate Modern & Britain, Artist in Residence in the learning department. September 2015-July 2016.
Mount Florida Screenings, Mount Florida Studios, Glasgow, June 2016. Curated by Morwenna Kearsley & Myles Painter.
Re-Making the Internet. Project commissioned by Museum of Contemporary Commodities, co-hosted by Exeter Phoenix, Exeter Library and Devon Fab Lab- developed in partnership with Furtherfield.
Discrete Infinity (solo) at Gallery333, Exeter Phoenix, Exeter. May-July 2016.
JIG at Yinka Shonibare's Guest Projects, London. 3-11 May 2016. Interim show of alternative art school AltMFA.
The Government Art Collection, EmbassyHACK. 1 hour solo performance 'Martian Shipping'. London, April 2016.
Buffet d'Art at Meinblau, Berlin. March 2016.
Modern Mirror at Bread&Jam, Brockley, London. Jan-Feb 2016.
2015
Cabaret Melancholique, St Mark's Church, Dalston. 11th December 2015. Organised by Brian Catling, Toni Grisoni and Oona Grimes. Performance night.
UNPERFORMING, Friday 20th November, 6.30 - 9pm. 43 Inverness Street, NW1 7HB. Performance event.
Bon Fire, Laines Farm, Sussex, Live art night curated by Rosa Farber. 7th November 2015.
Once More with Feelings, Lewisham Art House, performance event curated by Chris Alton and Rachel Hill, November 2015.
INSUFFICIENT VOID. 4th September 2015. An evening of performances by London based artists at A.M. London. Jefford Horrigan | Fritha Jenkins | Alicia Matthews | Marcus Orlandi | Louise Ashcroft. Poster image: Jefford Horrigan.
#Neoliberation - The Self in the Era of New Media. 10th June 2015. Performance event curated by Goldsmiths Cultural Studies MA students. Group show and conference after party at The Albany in Deptford.
Tremulous, event at Asylum Chapel, Peckham. 7th June. Performances with music by Buckner Building. Curated by Fritha Jenkins.
AltMFA Jamboree. A 1-month group residency and exhibition with members of peer-led art school altMFA, at Yinka Shonibare's Guest Projects space in Bethnal Green.
TEDx Hackney Women (speaker), ACE Hotel Shoreditch, 30th May 2015.
Boring Conference, 9th May 2015, I will be giving my talk 'The Stratford Centre', about my self appointed residency in the old shopping centre opposite Westfield. Curated by James Ward.
SKETCHY REMARKS - Thursday 26th March, Floating Island Gallery. An evolving group show with live performances. www.floatingislandgallery.com
A Man Called Burroughs exhibition event, 5th February at The Function Room, Somers Town, London. Screening of commissioned video ‘Burrow’.
Levity, a group show co-curated by Josh Berry and David Blackmore, Husk Gallery, Limehouse, 5th February 2015.
2014
Shortlisted for the Stephen Cripps Award 2014-15.
Cabaret Melancholique, organised by Brian Catling, Oona Grimes and Tony Grisoni. 12th December 2014, St Mark’s Church, Dalston.
Hankering For Classification (guest speaker) - an exhibition at TOAST Manchester, 22nd November 2014.
Ochlocracy Orchestra, a collaborative performance with Fritha Jenkins and Alex Chalmers for The Royal Collaboration, at The Royal College of Music, curated by Royal College of Music and Royal College of Art. Monday 17th November 2014.
Rhizome 002 at Lab451, a group show curated by Geraldine Gallavardin. Camden, London, 16th - 20th October 2014.
Silicone Fen, a performance commissioned for the opening of 'Art Language Location' in Cambridge, 15th October 2014.
The Worm and Other Objects, solo show at The Function Room, Somers Town. 26th September - 3rd October 2014. More info here.
Penetrating the Gaze: Alternative Marketing and The Stratford Centre performed at Your Culture is Ailing Your Art is Dead, Islington, 18th August 2014.
Latitude Festival, performing a solo stand-up piece as part of Your Culture is Ailing Your Art is Dead curated by comedian Robin Ince and artist Charlotte Young. 20th July 2014.
Radio performance Creaky Offcuts at All Silent but for the Broadcast. An hour long piece. Curated by Royal College of Art Curating Graduates. 26th June 2014.
PLEASE STAND BY - Film night at Chisenhale Studios
Showing short film work alongside Matt Calderwood, Karen Russo, Sheena Macrae and more… Wednesday 11th June
7-9pm, E3 5QZ.
Unperforming, performance night, Floating Island Gallery, E14. 26th June 2014.
Let's take it outside performance at The Function Room, The Cock Tavern, 23 Phoenix Road, Somers Town, London NW1 1HB. 20th June 2014.
Performing as part of The Words to my Shit: Alexander Brener & Barbara Schurz Book Fair at The Function Room, The Cock Tavern, 23 Phoenix Road, Somers Town, London NW1 1HB. 10th May, 5pm - 6.59pm.
Live at The Function Room, Somers Town: Louise Ashcroft | Lina Lapelyte | Nazim Ünal Yılmaz. April 2014.
Your Culture is Ailing Your Art is Dead a comedy night curated by artist Charlotte Young and comedian Robin Ince. London, Northampton and Brighton gigs March - April 2014.
ON PERSPECTIVE a Lab451 exhibition and performance event at Camden Image Gallery. 1st February 2014.
SQUARING THE CIRCLE performance event at Lewisham Art House. 31st January 2014.
TECHNOPOLIS group show at Departure Foundation. 23 - 26th January. 55 Gracechurch Street, London.
THE WORLD & HIS WIFE. Louise Ashcroft. 13 - 17th January 2014, David Hockney Gallery at The Royal College of Art, SW7 2EU. Nearest tube: South Kensington.
The World & His Wife is an evolving exhibition of work by Louise Ashcroft, responded to daily by artists and curators, including Anna Clifford, Richard Hards, Vesta Kroese, Miloslav Vorlicek, Angelica Sule and Amelia Newton Whitelaw. 13-17 January 2014. Hockney Gallery, The Royal College of Art, Kensington Gore SW7 2EU (South Kensington tube). By appointment, call or text 07861375101. 11am - 5pm daily. Each day has themes relating to particular models of social interaction.
2013
CHANCE/ ACTION, Kingsgate Gallery, West Hampstead. A one night group show curated by Marcus Orlandi, Tom Milnes and Yana Naidenov. 13th December 2013. Artists: Emma Alonze, Louise Ashcroft, Adam Holmes-Davies, Grant Foster, Julia Hayes, Natalie Marr and David Ashley Pearson, Tom Milnes, Yana Naidenov, Marcus Orlandi, Sylvester Piasecki, Zoe Schoenherr, Katy Wallwork and Charlotte Young.
Navigate Launch, Lucky Me project space, Hackney Wick. 6th December 2013. Curated by Sadie Edginton and Gerald Curtis. An evening of performances.
The Rushgrove Project, Rushgrove House, Woolwich, London. 23rd November 2013. Curated by Byzantia Harlow & Paula López Zambrano, with the collaboration of Anna Clifford, Joseph Constable, Tarini Malik & Ritz Wu and the participation of collectors Hector Audiffred, Adam Crick, Pasquale Guarracino, Katherina & Paolo Antonio Guidi & Huma Kabakci. Performances: Louise Ashcroft, Jack James, Fernando Laposse & Byzantia Harlow, Bertie Sterling, Ross Taylor, Amelia Newton Whitelaw. Installed Works: Eija-Liisa Ahtila, Art & Language, Katie Bell, Ernie Gehr, Richard Hards, Marlene Haring, Byzantia Harlow, James Harris, Susan Hefuna, George Hunt, Jack James, Augustus John, Fernando Laposse, James Laycock, Mariana Magdaleno, Julian Melchiorri, Hana Mitsui, Jammie Nichols, Saskia Pomeroy, Jorge Rosano Gamboa, Alejandro Santiago, Robin Seir, Sarah Shoughi, Michael Snow, Eve Sussman & Simon Lee, Ross Taylor, Daniel James Wilkinson, Rafał Zajko,
'Addendum* (*on the shortness of life)' part 2, in Prague.16th October 2013. Curated by Anna Clifford and Miloslav Vorlicek. Academy of Fine Arts, Prague (AVU). Artists: Louise Ashcroft, Marlene Haring, Richard Hards, Russell Hill, Vesta Kroese, Lina Lapelyte, Harry Lawson, Amelia Newton Whitelaw.
Art Licks Weekend. 4th and 5th October 2013, 3pm - 4pm both days. I will be performing as part of the Art Licks Weekend Bermondsey tour on the Saturday and then around Southwark Park on the Sunday starting from the AltMFA transit van at the park gate nearest The Stanley Arms off Southwark Park Road.
Unperforming. 27th September - 18th October 2013. Group show bringing together artists experimenting with performativity in live and non-live work as a means of questioning the spectacular nature of traditional performance art. Selected London-based artists. Departure Foundation, 55 Gracechurch Street, London. Opening event 26th September 6-9pm.
Doing things without an aim. 14 - 15th September 2013. A 2 day workshop led by members of Yard House Collective - Louise Ashcroft, Noga Inbar, Oliver Roy and Jack Tan. Curated and funded by Navigate (Sadie Edginton and Gerald Curtis). Itinerent exercises in aimless, disorientation and counter-normativity, around Hackney Wick, London.
Addendum* (*on the shortness of life). Curated by Prof. Michael Rittstein, Anna Clifford, Miloslav Vorlicek. 12 - 27th September 2013. Red Gallery, Old Street, London. Showcasing artworks by postgraduate students and graduates from the Fine Art departments of The Academy of Fine Arts, Prague (AVU) and the Royal College of Art, London (RCA). Artists: Louise Ashcroft, Jiří Bouma, Jakub Geltner, Marlene Haring, Richard Hards, Russell Hill, Alžběta Josefy, Kryštof Kaplan, Vesta Kroese, Lina Lapelyte, Harry Lawson, Vojtěch Pálka, Klára Pernicová, Kateřina Tichá, Amelia Newton Whitelaw. See more.
8 Bit, at Kingsgate Gallery, West Hampstead, London. 16-18 August 2013. Curated by Tom Milnes, Marcus Orlandi, Yana Naidenov. Artists: Aaron Head (UK), Emile Zile (AUS/NL), Daniella Valz Gen (Peru), Louise Ashcroft (UK), Samantha Thole (NL), Petr Davydtchenko (S) Tom Milnes (UK), Marcus Orlandi (UK). Video highlights of performances. To view my performance in full clickhere.
Talking about Economy, at Performance Studies International (Psi#19) Conference, Stanford University, USA. Curated by Gigi Argyropoulou & Katerina Paramana. Screening of 'It's Lovely Isn't It?' (collaboration with Noga Inbar).
21st Century Art and Design – RCA 2013. Selected works from the Royal College of Art design and fine art degree shows 2013. Curated by Ute Meta Bauer, Philippe Garner (Christie's director of twentieth century decorative art and photographs) and Jeremy Morrison (senior director of twentieth century decorative art and design). The show includes more than 50 works and projects selected from the College's recent graduate show. Tuesday 9 July, 9am-8pm Wednesday 10 July- Friday 12 July, 9am-4.30pm. Christie’s, King Street Gallery, 8 King Street, St. James's, SW1Y 6QT
Royal College of Art Degree Show, June 2013. Collaborating with Noga Inbar, Harry Lawson, Lina Lapelyte, Oliver Roy, Jack Tan, Marlene Haring and Vesta Kroese. Royal College of Art Sculpture Building, 15 Howie Street, Battersea, London.
Permaculture - v - Monoculture lunch with Lise Hovesen from Standart Thinking. 25th June 2013. Royal College of Art Sculpture Building, 15 Howie Street, Battersea, London.
Words to be Spoken Aloud, at Turner Contemporary, Margate. Curated by Ruth Beale and Nicole Bachmann. 8 - 11th March 2013.
Work in Progress, Royal College of Art, Kensington Gore, London. Private View - 5th February 2013.
Capturing the Glendalough Waterfall - New collaborative work by Louise Ashcroft and Fritha Jenkins. RCA Sculpture Project Space, 15-25 Howie Street, London. 20th January 2013, 2-6pm.
OPEN PLAN, 55 Gracechurch Street, London. A group project with my peers from RCA Sculpture and AltMFA the alternative masters course. Part residency, part exhibition, part research project. Beginning January 2012. For more information see our blog. I am coordinating the space and contributing to exhibitions, collaborative work and events.
2012
Works in Progress, Contributor to Graham Hudson's project commissioned by Film and Video Umbrella, London.
Bloomberg New Contemporaries speaker (with AltMFA) at the Salon on Alternative Educational Models, Institute of Contemporary Art, London. Friday 7th December.
Middle Land: Responses to Drawing. 12th November - 12th December 2012. 22 Gas Street, Birmingham. Open Fridays and Saturdays 12-4pm. A group show of work by artists in and around RCA sculpture.
Geographies of The Artists Studio #2 - Launch Event. 18th October 2012 6-9pm, Griffin Gallery, 21 Evesham Street, London W11 4AJ. Launch of Ashcroft's book (published by Squid & Tabernacle) and artist's talk. The book is available to buy at ICA and Whitechapel Gallery shops.
Geographies of The Artists Studio, 12 October – 3 November 2012. Griffin Gallery, 21 Evesham Street, London W11 4AJ. Group show with Appau Junior Boakye-Yiadom, Emi Avora, Kaho Kojima, Liane Lang, George Major, Elizabeth McAlpine, Annabelle Moreau, Tamarin Norwood, Stephen Walter.
Shelter Residency, September 2012. A residency in and around artist Sally Madge's stone shelter sculpture on the island of Lindisfarne. I will be inviting several artists to join me on this expedition. The journey to the island will be part of the project.
Vessel, July 2012, Louise Ashcroft and Fritha Jenkins. Sunday 15th July 2012 2pm-4pm. A sculptural procession from Paddington Basin to the Thames along the route of the lost River Westbourne.
Gathering Moraine: Prologue to a sculptural walk reactivating the river Westbourne. A score of intertextual materials and actions. 7th July 2012, 10am-12pm, Goldsmiths College London. Part of the MA Art Writing degree show (invited by George Major).
MICROCOSM, 14th June - 31st August 2012. A group show. Ellington building, Leeds Valley Park, Leeds LS10 1AB.
HOARD: Towards an Archaelogy of the Artist's Mind, material-based research project culminating in a publication. Leeds, February - December 2012.
Sustainability at Oxford Botanic Gardens, 6th April- 19th May 2012
Forehead 2 (collaborative piece with AltMFA), Sauna, Hoxton. 31st March - 1st April 2012.
On Bread Alone (group show), Nexus, Manchester. 19th April - 17th June 2012.
Boeing Way to Gas Street (group show), Birmingham, 25th April - 25th July 2012
Peripatetic Residency, curated by Squid & Tabernacle, February - May 2012. A publication will be made documenting my journey.
2011
Streaming Festival 2011, The Hague, 1/12/11 - 18/12/11. Selected short film and video art festival.
16 Spaces talk at LOW&HIGH's The Visitors- a series of guest lectures curated by TRANSPORT and Zbigniew Kotkiewicz as part of Folkestone Trienniale. 16th July 2011.
The Journey as a Site for Creative Practice: A Symposium on a Train Ride to Folkestone. 25th June 2011. Curated and performed by Louise Ashcroft and Helene Kazan.
Circuit, an outdoor exhibition event in Margate curated by Pavilion. This was a collaborative project made by members of AltMFA. 26th March 2011.
Soanyway Magazine, Over and Over issue, Edited by Derek Horton and Lisa Stansbie. ISSN 2043-6408.
2010
Conical: A Symposium led by William Mackrell (a No I in Art collaborative project). 16th December 2010.
The Wheel Halloween Music Festival at Cecil Sharp House (in association with the ICA). Artists' procession curated by Matthew Cowan.
Live Fridays, Modern Art Oxford. 15th October 2010. Performance.
Rhizomatic, Departure Gallery, London, October-November 2010.
PROP, Departure Gallery, London. Setember-October2010.
Stardust Boogie Woogie, Monika Bobinska Gallery, London. July 2010.
All Systems Go, Departure Gallery, London. June-July 2010.
A Tender Cut, Fold Gallery, London Fields. June 2010.
The Middle of Nowhere: Objects and Actions in the Abyss, Departure Gallery, London. 5th-8th March 2010.
London Vox, Red Gate Gallery, Brixton, London. January-February 2010.
Michael Landy: Art Bin, South London Gallery, London, February 2010. Participating artist.
Mythical Lyrical, Sueli Turner Gallery, London. November 2009-January 2010.
2009
Trident Way 2: The Southall Project, Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, London. December 2009.
Trident Way, Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, London. October 2009.
Ouroboros, New work by Louise Ashcroft and Floss Cobb at Finspace, London N4, August 2009.
Boeing Way, Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, London. April- May 2009.
2005-08
House, a site-specific installation, made in collaboration with Lucie Galand, for Brasenose College Arts Festival, May 2008.
Wrecking Ball, an exhibition of work by Damien Hirst assistants, December 2007
Re-Formation, Christ Church Spitalfields, London, March-April 2007.
Tunnel, Projects at Christ Church, Christ Church Spitalfields, London, 2005.
2002-04
Moroccan Dream, The 20th Century Theatre, Portobello Road, London. 2004.
Atomic Art Bomb, Modern Art Oxford, Pembroke Street, Oxford, 2004.
Hay House, (solo show) organised by Projection, Godstow Nunnery ruins, Oxford, 2004.
Seedy Rushes, a site-specific exhibition in Oxford Botanical Gardens, 2003.
The Turl Street Arts Festival, Jesus College Oxford. 2003.
Oxford / Lyon at BF15 Gallery, Place de la Terrace, Lyon, France, 2002.
Tele-Spectators (solo show), The Dolphin Gallery, Oxford, 2002.
Press/TV
Art15 Magazine
The Times, May 2013
Artlicks Magazine, May 2011.
The Spectator, October 2010.
The Culture Show 28 January 2010.
BBC World Service, September 2010.
Private and Public Collections
Ute Meta Bauer
Brasenose College Oxford
Frans Hals Museum
Website content copyright of Louise Ashcroft.
Currently I am...
- Studying artist-led sustainability projects in preparation for my new podcast (launching soon).
- Developing a project around resource exhaustion and paper recycling in Exeter (showing in 2025).
- Preparing to show No Kids Nursery Rhymes at The Swiss Church London (in 2025).
- My album of No Kids Nursery Rhymes is in the group show Burning Down the House: Rethinking Family at Kunstmuseum St.Gallen. June-Oct 2024. It's a collection of nursery rhymes in English and Swiss German based on a questionnaire filled in by 150+ people who don't have children (and their complex reasons and views on this). I worked with music therapist Luzia Studer and artist/writer Sarah Elena Müller.
- My book of short stories Crueller Surprise launched at Cubitt Studios London in September 2024. It has sold out but more will be printed. The book is written on my commute, it contains 13 darkly comic stories. The collection is designed to take the duration of the London overground line from Highbury & Islington to New Cross Gate to read completely.
Recently I was...
In residence at OOF Gallery, Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London (Feb-April 2024), making work about equality in sport: Women's football, queer football and the geopolitics of football manufacturing. Sound pieces, sculptures. films and disruptive stickers. Some of the work went on to be exhibited at Fußballkultur, a group show in Dortmund pubs and cafes curated by Kunstverein Dortmund.
In May I reinterpreted an old video performance for Ensemble, an audio description group show at APT London, researching accessibility and vision in experimental ways... Access as a creative opportunity for all, rather than an add-on.
At Bauhaus Museum Dessau I developed a new version of an interactive watercolour performance celebrating the weirdly inventive recent tactics of climate activists (and my grandmother's love of jigsaws, soup and other anarchist tools). Part of End Expo a real/fake trade fair organised by Association for the Palliative Turn.
Methodology
I react spontaneously to the world around me, exploring and questioning the situations and environments I encounter; collecting and re-contextualising found materials, creating narratives through objects, and making sculptural interventions. My work is an ongoing process of re-coding physical and cultural space to create an ever-changing vapour-trail of ideas, actions and artefacts. Recognising the power of small acts of resistance, I wander through the world noticing, collecting, subverting and adding things to the environments I encounter. Through this process I create situations and stories, which are re-presented as comedy performances, writing, video, sculpture, radio and participatory experiences. A conceptual magpie, I notice the details of how the world works and adjust them in order to subtly re-programme the everyday and make alternative ways of living together imaginable. I mostly intervene in urban environments or ephemera through playful direct actions, to conjure speculative realities. Humour is my chosen philosophical process because it can condense several possibilities into one idea, thereby flipping the familiar and protecting us from passivity or polarisation, by provoking the need for active, complex interpretation.
A poetic mission statement
Stay wild. Trojan horseplay. Run on our own and run with the pack. Radical accessibility. The group is a form of drag (let others set you free from yourself). The establishment can't catch us - shift shape whenever they get too close. Cuckoo to mistletoe to crocodile-bird. Learn from diverse organisms living in close association. Overshare. You are one in ten billion (and that's just the number of organisms disco dancing in a handful of ashes). Optimistic nihilism. Anarcho-comedy. Laughtivism. Disguise ourselves as something familiar but be careful not to recreate the state we left behind. Make sure your name is omni-barrelled and you change it every day.
Click here for an artist statement an audience wrote for me. It's better than all of mine.
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[email protected]
Born in Bradford, West Yorkshire. Lives and works in London.
Education:
Goldsmiths, University of London. Postgraduate Certificate in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, 2023.
AltMFA - co-founder of London's first alternative, peer-led Masters est' with Lucie Galand in 2010. Ongoing Monday evening course. Free and no budget, except 2017 programme of visiting artists which was funded by AN Artists Information Company.
The Royal College of Art, Department of Sculpture, London, 2012 - 2013. Dissertation with distinction on 'wildness', capitalism and the gaze. Showed in 2013 degree show but was unable to officially graduate due to underpaid fees.
MA Cultural and Critical Studies (merit). Birkbeck, University of London 2006 - 2008. Dissertation on 'Nomadic Tendencies in Contemporary Art'.
BFA Fine Art (1st class honours), Oxford University (The Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art) 2001 - 2004.
CV highlights
2024
No Kids Nursery Rhymes commissioned by and exhibited at Burning Down the House: Rethinking Family, at Kunstmuseum St.Gallen.
Fussballkultur - New works about equality and football exhibited at a show in pubs for Euro24 Dortmund, curated by Dortmund Kunstverein
OOF Gallery Residency Jan-April 2024. Equalities and ecologies of football explored through playful conceptual series of new works.
Nanarchism, interactive performance shown at End Expo: A Consumer Fair for Mortals at Bauhaus Museum Dessau. celebrating eco activist's ingenuity and their use of objects my grandmother liked (jigsaws, soup, confetti). This work invites viewers to reimagine their gran's favourite possessions as protest tools through watercolour, conversation and captions.
Ensemble group show at APT Gallery, Deptford. Ensemble explores Audio Description as a collaborative art form and accessible communication tool, challenging audiences to experience artworks with their minds in an entirely audio-based exhibition.
2023
What to Expect When You're Not Expecting - a film version of my 2022 performance, funded by Goldsmiths Research Support Award.
Violet - a performance at Plaza Plaza, Elephant and Castle. Narrative with props, discussing the bizarre theory that my grandmother Violet is creative director of Just Stop Oil, as a way to talk about the history of capitalism and climate protest tactics in the aftermath of The Public Order Bill limiting protest and forcing protesters to get weirdly creative with jigsaws, confetti, soup and other things my Nana liked. WIP to be developed as a stage show.
Replicating the Model of a Village - symposium on queering family and beyond-nuclear family, at Studio Voltaire. Organised in collaboration with Jasmine Johnson.
Scavenger Coat, a coat with 40+ feely pockets used to 'conceptually recycle' trash fragments found on walks into short stories in collaboration with audiences. Commissioned for Behold, a group show about touch Hypha Studios, Conduit Street, London. Curated by Sasha Galitzine and Graham Little. I've performed this in various settings on stage or at events/parties since. It's available for bookings.
2022
Bird Hut Sperm Bank, 1 hour one woman show - a research-comedy performance about my ambivalent childlessness, DNA, and the reproductive industry. 4 x sold out show at Camden People's Theatre and Viernulvier Ghent.
Unperforming, Art Houses in Whitley Bay, project creating and running a comedy course for artists, culminating in a gig at Laurels comedy club. Collab with Fritha Jenkins.
Seamonsters - scratch night series of art-comedy events I organised at a pub in Dalston featuring various performers, with pass the parcel rituals, intrusive karaoke and watercolours on every table so the audience can paint as they watch. this will be back, I don't know when!
2021
Uplands: Utopia I.O.U Solo show at Bobinska Brownlee New River, Canonbury, London.
2020
Image Power, group show at Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem, NL.
Fringe! film festival, online performance with Fritha Jenkins.
Open Space Contemporary, digital residency
BBC Sounds - Boring Talks on Breakfast Cereal.
Concrete Conversation, Frans Hals Museum and Studium Generale Rietveld Academie. Zoom performance. Louise Ashcroft and Fritha Jenkins.
A-N The Artists Newsletter Bursary recipient
2019
Awkward Stowage performance with Fritha Jenkins, 1hr performance for Art Night London, July 2019.
Cephalopod film shown at Life Hacks, group show at BQ Berlin, curated by Tabitha Steinberg and Ella Fleck. February - March 2019.
Turf Projects Fungus Press residency and billboard commission, January 2019.
BBC Boring Talk on Call Centres, BBC iPlayer, January 2019.
Performance at Vocalis, Beaconsfield Gallery. March 2019.
Boring Conference, May 2019. Performance lecture about house clearances, the baroque and empathy.
Unperforming (several editions including at Artsadmin and Milton Keynes Arts Centre). Performance night with works by Louise and friends.
Supernormal Festival, stand-up comedy performance and interactive workshop, August 2019.
2018
Deptford X Residency. Deptford X is in therapy. Unqualified experimental psychologist Louise Ashcroft devises a range of therapeutic responses to the organisation's psyche by analysing and intervening in its archives, staff, admin records, store cupboard, trustees, pensions, office, audiences, payroll, assets and activity. March - September 2018.
Unperforming 10: Louise Ashcroft and friends. Artsadmin, Toynbee Studios, London. 1st March 2018.
BBC Boring Talk: The Argos Catalogue. An audio version of Louise's performance lecture which links counterculture to consumerism, speculating that the Argos catalogue is in fact radical anti-capitalist propaganda written by the hippies of The Whole Earth Catalogue. Listen here.
Wish You Were Here. One hour group holiday / participatory performance 'walkshop'. 20 people go on a fictional holiday of a lifetime together while wandering the streets of Bermondsey, South London, carrying out a series of improvisation exercises. 17th Feb 2018.
Acts of Disruption, curated by Alice Bonnot. Concept Space, Bermondsey. Group show with Jeremy Hutchison, Marco Godoy, Benjamin Gaulon, Jamie Fitzpatrick, Thomas Langley, Nøne Futbol Club. 19th Jan - 24th Feb 2018.
You're the HD to My ADHD performance commissioned for Could I Care Less? at Wellcome Collection, London. Curated by Osborn & Moller. July 2018.
Talking to a Brick Wall, performance at CCA Goldsmiths, November 2018.
Department of Waste & Recycling interactive performance commissioned by Museum of London, October 2018.
2017
I'd Rather Be Shopping solo exhibition 18th Aug - October 2017 www.arebyte.com
Unlucky Dip & Monsters of the Deep public performance commissions for Coastal Currents Festival Hastings. 2 days dressed as a sea monster doing a survey about what sea monster to attract to the shore during a ritual as part of the council's dark tourism regeneration strategy. Followed by a four hour musical ritual on the roof of a toilet block overlooking the sea, channelling the monsters requested by the public. Coastal Currents Festival 2017.
All My Lives, solo exhibition at Arebyte Laser, Clerkenwell, London. 17th July - 2nd August 2017.
Boring Conference, 'Argos & Counterculture'- 20 minute comical performance lecture at the annual all-day cult festival of mundanity. Audience of 450. 6th May 2017.
Zone Mista at Westminster Waste, Bermondsey, London. I made an a3 print and performance about politics and Millwall Football Club with bespoke Subbuteo match. 5th May 2017.
Guest Projects. Performance of Argos & Counterculture, comical comparison between catalogue shopping and counterculture. 6th May 2017. London
Buffet d'Art group show at Hestercombe, Somerset. Summer 2017.
Arebyte off site Residency, Westfield Shopping Centre, Stratford, London. Solo show August-Sept 2017.
Arebyte Laser, solo show. July-August 2017.
Hastings Festival, autumn 2017. Performances in public space and on a train.
2016
It's Always the Others Who Die at The Koppel Project, Baker Street, London. July-Sept 2016.
Tate Modern & Britain, Artist in Residence in the learning department. September 2015-July 2016.
Mount Florida Screenings, Mount Florida Studios, Glasgow, June 2016. Curated by Morwenna Kearsley & Myles Painter.
Re-Making the Internet. Project commissioned by Museum of Contemporary Commodities, co-hosted by Exeter Phoenix, Exeter Library and Devon Fab Lab- developed in partnership with Furtherfield.
Discrete Infinity (solo) at Gallery333, Exeter Phoenix, Exeter. May-July 2016.
JIG at Yinka Shonibare's Guest Projects, London. 3-11 May 2016. Interim show of alternative art school AltMFA.
The Government Art Collection, EmbassyHACK. 1 hour solo performance 'Martian Shipping'. London, April 2016.
Buffet d'Art at Meinblau, Berlin. March 2016.
Modern Mirror at Bread&Jam, Brockley, London. Jan-Feb 2016.
2015
Cabaret Melancholique, St Mark's Church, Dalston. 11th December 2015. Organised by Brian Catling, Toni Grisoni and Oona Grimes. Performance night.
UNPERFORMING, Friday 20th November, 6.30 - 9pm. 43 Inverness Street, NW1 7HB. Performance event.
Bon Fire, Laines Farm, Sussex, Live art night curated by Rosa Farber. 7th November 2015.
Once More with Feelings, Lewisham Art House, performance event curated by Chris Alton and Rachel Hill, November 2015.
INSUFFICIENT VOID. 4th September 2015. An evening of performances by London based artists at A.M. London. Jefford Horrigan | Fritha Jenkins | Alicia Matthews | Marcus Orlandi | Louise Ashcroft. Poster image: Jefford Horrigan.
#Neoliberation - The Self in the Era of New Media. 10th June 2015. Performance event curated by Goldsmiths Cultural Studies MA students. Group show and conference after party at The Albany in Deptford.
Tremulous, event at Asylum Chapel, Peckham. 7th June. Performances with music by Buckner Building. Curated by Fritha Jenkins.
AltMFA Jamboree. A 1-month group residency and exhibition with members of peer-led art school altMFA, at Yinka Shonibare's Guest Projects space in Bethnal Green.
TEDx Hackney Women (speaker), ACE Hotel Shoreditch, 30th May 2015.
Boring Conference, 9th May 2015, I will be giving my talk 'The Stratford Centre', about my self appointed residency in the old shopping centre opposite Westfield. Curated by James Ward.
SKETCHY REMARKS - Thursday 26th March, Floating Island Gallery. An evolving group show with live performances. www.floatingislandgallery.com
A Man Called Burroughs exhibition event, 5th February at The Function Room, Somers Town, London. Screening of commissioned video ‘Burrow’.
Levity, a group show co-curated by Josh Berry and David Blackmore, Husk Gallery, Limehouse, 5th February 2015.
2014
Shortlisted for the Stephen Cripps Award 2014-15.
Cabaret Melancholique, organised by Brian Catling, Oona Grimes and Tony Grisoni. 12th December 2014, St Mark’s Church, Dalston.
Hankering For Classification (guest speaker) - an exhibition at TOAST Manchester, 22nd November 2014.
Ochlocracy Orchestra, a collaborative performance with Fritha Jenkins and Alex Chalmers for The Royal Collaboration, at The Royal College of Music, curated by Royal College of Music and Royal College of Art. Monday 17th November 2014.
Rhizome 002 at Lab451, a group show curated by Geraldine Gallavardin. Camden, London, 16th - 20th October 2014.
Silicone Fen, a performance commissioned for the opening of 'Art Language Location' in Cambridge, 15th October 2014.
The Worm and Other Objects, solo show at The Function Room, Somers Town. 26th September - 3rd October 2014. More info here.
Penetrating the Gaze: Alternative Marketing and The Stratford Centre performed at Your Culture is Ailing Your Art is Dead, Islington, 18th August 2014.
Latitude Festival, performing a solo stand-up piece as part of Your Culture is Ailing Your Art is Dead curated by comedian Robin Ince and artist Charlotte Young. 20th July 2014.
Radio performance Creaky Offcuts at All Silent but for the Broadcast. An hour long piece. Curated by Royal College of Art Curating Graduates. 26th June 2014.
PLEASE STAND BY - Film night at Chisenhale Studios
Showing short film work alongside Matt Calderwood, Karen Russo, Sheena Macrae and more… Wednesday 11th June
7-9pm, E3 5QZ.
Unperforming, performance night, Floating Island Gallery, E14. 26th June 2014.
Let's take it outside performance at The Function Room, The Cock Tavern, 23 Phoenix Road, Somers Town, London NW1 1HB. 20th June 2014.
Performing as part of The Words to my Shit: Alexander Brener & Barbara Schurz Book Fair at The Function Room, The Cock Tavern, 23 Phoenix Road, Somers Town, London NW1 1HB. 10th May, 5pm - 6.59pm.
Live at The Function Room, Somers Town: Louise Ashcroft | Lina Lapelyte | Nazim Ünal Yılmaz. April 2014.
Your Culture is Ailing Your Art is Dead a comedy night curated by artist Charlotte Young and comedian Robin Ince. London, Northampton and Brighton gigs March - April 2014.
ON PERSPECTIVE a Lab451 exhibition and performance event at Camden Image Gallery. 1st February 2014.
SQUARING THE CIRCLE performance event at Lewisham Art House. 31st January 2014.
TECHNOPOLIS group show at Departure Foundation. 23 - 26th January. 55 Gracechurch Street, London.
THE WORLD & HIS WIFE. Louise Ashcroft. 13 - 17th January 2014, David Hockney Gallery at The Royal College of Art, SW7 2EU. Nearest tube: South Kensington.
The World & His Wife is an evolving exhibition of work by Louise Ashcroft, responded to daily by artists and curators, including Anna Clifford, Richard Hards, Vesta Kroese, Miloslav Vorlicek, Angelica Sule and Amelia Newton Whitelaw. 13-17 January 2014. Hockney Gallery, The Royal College of Art, Kensington Gore SW7 2EU (South Kensington tube). By appointment, call or text 07861375101. 11am - 5pm daily. Each day has themes relating to particular models of social interaction.
2013
CHANCE/ ACTION, Kingsgate Gallery, West Hampstead. A one night group show curated by Marcus Orlandi, Tom Milnes and Yana Naidenov. 13th December 2013. Artists: Emma Alonze, Louise Ashcroft, Adam Holmes-Davies, Grant Foster, Julia Hayes, Natalie Marr and David Ashley Pearson, Tom Milnes, Yana Naidenov, Marcus Orlandi, Sylvester Piasecki, Zoe Schoenherr, Katy Wallwork and Charlotte Young.
Navigate Launch, Lucky Me project space, Hackney Wick. 6th December 2013. Curated by Sadie Edginton and Gerald Curtis. An evening of performances.
The Rushgrove Project, Rushgrove House, Woolwich, London. 23rd November 2013. Curated by Byzantia Harlow & Paula López Zambrano, with the collaboration of Anna Clifford, Joseph Constable, Tarini Malik & Ritz Wu and the participation of collectors Hector Audiffred, Adam Crick, Pasquale Guarracino, Katherina & Paolo Antonio Guidi & Huma Kabakci. Performances: Louise Ashcroft, Jack James, Fernando Laposse & Byzantia Harlow, Bertie Sterling, Ross Taylor, Amelia Newton Whitelaw. Installed Works: Eija-Liisa Ahtila, Art & Language, Katie Bell, Ernie Gehr, Richard Hards, Marlene Haring, Byzantia Harlow, James Harris, Susan Hefuna, George Hunt, Jack James, Augustus John, Fernando Laposse, James Laycock, Mariana Magdaleno, Julian Melchiorri, Hana Mitsui, Jammie Nichols, Saskia Pomeroy, Jorge Rosano Gamboa, Alejandro Santiago, Robin Seir, Sarah Shoughi, Michael Snow, Eve Sussman & Simon Lee, Ross Taylor, Daniel James Wilkinson, Rafał Zajko,
'Addendum* (*on the shortness of life)' part 2, in Prague.16th October 2013. Curated by Anna Clifford and Miloslav Vorlicek. Academy of Fine Arts, Prague (AVU). Artists: Louise Ashcroft, Marlene Haring, Richard Hards, Russell Hill, Vesta Kroese, Lina Lapelyte, Harry Lawson, Amelia Newton Whitelaw.
Art Licks Weekend. 4th and 5th October 2013, 3pm - 4pm both days. I will be performing as part of the Art Licks Weekend Bermondsey tour on the Saturday and then around Southwark Park on the Sunday starting from the AltMFA transit van at the park gate nearest The Stanley Arms off Southwark Park Road.
Unperforming. 27th September - 18th October 2013. Group show bringing together artists experimenting with performativity in live and non-live work as a means of questioning the spectacular nature of traditional performance art. Selected London-based artists. Departure Foundation, 55 Gracechurch Street, London. Opening event 26th September 6-9pm.
Doing things without an aim. 14 - 15th September 2013. A 2 day workshop led by members of Yard House Collective - Louise Ashcroft, Noga Inbar, Oliver Roy and Jack Tan. Curated and funded by Navigate (Sadie Edginton and Gerald Curtis). Itinerent exercises in aimless, disorientation and counter-normativity, around Hackney Wick, London.
Addendum* (*on the shortness of life). Curated by Prof. Michael Rittstein, Anna Clifford, Miloslav Vorlicek. 12 - 27th September 2013. Red Gallery, Old Street, London. Showcasing artworks by postgraduate students and graduates from the Fine Art departments of The Academy of Fine Arts, Prague (AVU) and the Royal College of Art, London (RCA). Artists: Louise Ashcroft, Jiří Bouma, Jakub Geltner, Marlene Haring, Richard Hards, Russell Hill, Alžběta Josefy, Kryštof Kaplan, Vesta Kroese, Lina Lapelyte, Harry Lawson, Vojtěch Pálka, Klára Pernicová, Kateřina Tichá, Amelia Newton Whitelaw. See more.
8 Bit, at Kingsgate Gallery, West Hampstead, London. 16-18 August 2013. Curated by Tom Milnes, Marcus Orlandi, Yana Naidenov. Artists: Aaron Head (UK), Emile Zile (AUS/NL), Daniella Valz Gen (Peru), Louise Ashcroft (UK), Samantha Thole (NL), Petr Davydtchenko (S) Tom Milnes (UK), Marcus Orlandi (UK). Video highlights of performances. To view my performance in full clickhere.
Talking about Economy, at Performance Studies International (Psi#19) Conference, Stanford University, USA. Curated by Gigi Argyropoulou & Katerina Paramana. Screening of 'It's Lovely Isn't It?' (collaboration with Noga Inbar).
21st Century Art and Design – RCA 2013. Selected works from the Royal College of Art design and fine art degree shows 2013. Curated by Ute Meta Bauer, Philippe Garner (Christie's director of twentieth century decorative art and photographs) and Jeremy Morrison (senior director of twentieth century decorative art and design). The show includes more than 50 works and projects selected from the College's recent graduate show. Tuesday 9 July, 9am-8pm Wednesday 10 July- Friday 12 July, 9am-4.30pm. Christie’s, King Street Gallery, 8 King Street, St. James's, SW1Y 6QT
Royal College of Art Degree Show, June 2013. Collaborating with Noga Inbar, Harry Lawson, Lina Lapelyte, Oliver Roy, Jack Tan, Marlene Haring and Vesta Kroese. Royal College of Art Sculpture Building, 15 Howie Street, Battersea, London.
Permaculture - v - Monoculture lunch with Lise Hovesen from Standart Thinking. 25th June 2013. Royal College of Art Sculpture Building, 15 Howie Street, Battersea, London.
Words to be Spoken Aloud, at Turner Contemporary, Margate. Curated by Ruth Beale and Nicole Bachmann. 8 - 11th March 2013.
Work in Progress, Royal College of Art, Kensington Gore, London. Private View - 5th February 2013.
Capturing the Glendalough Waterfall - New collaborative work by Louise Ashcroft and Fritha Jenkins. RCA Sculpture Project Space, 15-25 Howie Street, London. 20th January 2013, 2-6pm.
OPEN PLAN, 55 Gracechurch Street, London. A group project with my peers from RCA Sculpture and AltMFA the alternative masters course. Part residency, part exhibition, part research project. Beginning January 2012. For more information see our blog. I am coordinating the space and contributing to exhibitions, collaborative work and events.
2012
Works in Progress, Contributor to Graham Hudson's project commissioned by Film and Video Umbrella, London.
Bloomberg New Contemporaries speaker (with AltMFA) at the Salon on Alternative Educational Models, Institute of Contemporary Art, London. Friday 7th December.
Middle Land: Responses to Drawing. 12th November - 12th December 2012. 22 Gas Street, Birmingham. Open Fridays and Saturdays 12-4pm. A group show of work by artists in and around RCA sculpture.
Geographies of The Artists Studio #2 - Launch Event. 18th October 2012 6-9pm, Griffin Gallery, 21 Evesham Street, London W11 4AJ. Launch of Ashcroft's book (published by Squid & Tabernacle) and artist's talk. The book is available to buy at ICA and Whitechapel Gallery shops.
Geographies of The Artists Studio, 12 October – 3 November 2012. Griffin Gallery, 21 Evesham Street, London W11 4AJ. Group show with Appau Junior Boakye-Yiadom, Emi Avora, Kaho Kojima, Liane Lang, George Major, Elizabeth McAlpine, Annabelle Moreau, Tamarin Norwood, Stephen Walter.
Shelter Residency, September 2012. A residency in and around artist Sally Madge's stone shelter sculpture on the island of Lindisfarne. I will be inviting several artists to join me on this expedition. The journey to the island will be part of the project.
Vessel, July 2012, Louise Ashcroft and Fritha Jenkins. Sunday 15th July 2012 2pm-4pm. A sculptural procession from Paddington Basin to the Thames along the route of the lost River Westbourne.
Gathering Moraine: Prologue to a sculptural walk reactivating the river Westbourne. A score of intertextual materials and actions. 7th July 2012, 10am-12pm, Goldsmiths College London. Part of the MA Art Writing degree show (invited by George Major).
MICROCOSM, 14th June - 31st August 2012. A group show. Ellington building, Leeds Valley Park, Leeds LS10 1AB.
HOARD: Towards an Archaelogy of the Artist's Mind, material-based research project culminating in a publication. Leeds, February - December 2012.
Sustainability at Oxford Botanic Gardens, 6th April- 19th May 2012
Forehead 2 (collaborative piece with AltMFA), Sauna, Hoxton. 31st March - 1st April 2012.
On Bread Alone (group show), Nexus, Manchester. 19th April - 17th June 2012.
Boeing Way to Gas Street (group show), Birmingham, 25th April - 25th July 2012
Peripatetic Residency, curated by Squid & Tabernacle, February - May 2012. A publication will be made documenting my journey.
2011
Streaming Festival 2011, The Hague, 1/12/11 - 18/12/11. Selected short film and video art festival.
16 Spaces talk at LOW&HIGH's The Visitors- a series of guest lectures curated by TRANSPORT and Zbigniew Kotkiewicz as part of Folkestone Trienniale. 16th July 2011.
The Journey as a Site for Creative Practice: A Symposium on a Train Ride to Folkestone. 25th June 2011. Curated and performed by Louise Ashcroft and Helene Kazan.
Circuit, an outdoor exhibition event in Margate curated by Pavilion. This was a collaborative project made by members of AltMFA. 26th March 2011.
Soanyway Magazine, Over and Over issue, Edited by Derek Horton and Lisa Stansbie. ISSN 2043-6408.
2010
Conical: A Symposium led by William Mackrell (a No I in Art collaborative project). 16th December 2010.
The Wheel Halloween Music Festival at Cecil Sharp House (in association with the ICA). Artists' procession curated by Matthew Cowan.
Live Fridays, Modern Art Oxford. 15th October 2010. Performance.
Rhizomatic, Departure Gallery, London, October-November 2010.
PROP, Departure Gallery, London. Setember-October2010.
Stardust Boogie Woogie, Monika Bobinska Gallery, London. July 2010.
All Systems Go, Departure Gallery, London. June-July 2010.
A Tender Cut, Fold Gallery, London Fields. June 2010.
The Middle of Nowhere: Objects and Actions in the Abyss, Departure Gallery, London. 5th-8th March 2010.
London Vox, Red Gate Gallery, Brixton, London. January-February 2010.
Michael Landy: Art Bin, South London Gallery, London, February 2010. Participating artist.
Mythical Lyrical, Sueli Turner Gallery, London. November 2009-January 2010.
2009
Trident Way 2: The Southall Project, Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, London. December 2009.
Trident Way, Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, London. October 2009.
Ouroboros, New work by Louise Ashcroft and Floss Cobb at Finspace, London N4, August 2009.
Boeing Way, Departure Gallery, The International Trading Estate, London. April- May 2009.
2005-08
House, a site-specific installation, made in collaboration with Lucie Galand, for Brasenose College Arts Festival, May 2008.
Wrecking Ball, an exhibition of work by Damien Hirst assistants, December 2007
Re-Formation, Christ Church Spitalfields, London, March-April 2007.
Tunnel, Projects at Christ Church, Christ Church Spitalfields, London, 2005.
2002-04
Moroccan Dream, The 20th Century Theatre, Portobello Road, London. 2004.
Atomic Art Bomb, Modern Art Oxford, Pembroke Street, Oxford, 2004.
Hay House, (solo show) organised by Projection, Godstow Nunnery ruins, Oxford, 2004.
Seedy Rushes, a site-specific exhibition in Oxford Botanical Gardens, 2003.
The Turl Street Arts Festival, Jesus College Oxford. 2003.
Oxford / Lyon at BF15 Gallery, Place de la Terrace, Lyon, France, 2002.
Tele-Spectators (solo show), The Dolphin Gallery, Oxford, 2002.
Press/TV
Art15 Magazine
The Times, May 2013
Artlicks Magazine, May 2011.
The Spectator, October 2010.
The Culture Show 28 January 2010.
BBC World Service, September 2010.
Private and Public Collections
Ute Meta Bauer
Brasenose College Oxford
Frans Hals Museum
Website content copyright of Louise Ashcroft.