Loomio
Mon 4 Nov 2013 4:27AM

Productive Promises

MH Mark Harvey Public Seen by 15

(Hi all here's the general promo on Productive Promises - apologies for not using Loomio much at all - it's a very crazy period with students and finishing other projects... - Mark Harvey)

Productive Promises
Mark Harvey

(We should all be trying to find our happy work.
Robyn Harvey, 2008)

In Productive Promises local participants collaborate with the artist to create actions around the retail and residential districts of New Brighton testing notions of productivity and work that lead to increased confidence and happiness in New Brighton as a place to live and visit. The project will run 10am to 4pm Tuesday 26 to Saturday 30 November, and is open to participation by all at any time. Commencing at the TEZA hub 101 New Brighton Mall, workshops take place in the morning and performance actions after lunch.

We’re especially keen on participation from: those interested in the renewal of New Brighton; people who engage with volunteer work of any sort; those who feel vulnerable in their work situations; people out of work; and artists.

Since the quakes in Christchurch people have worked in different creative voluntary ways to help build the city. But how happy are those that volunteer really in their place in the current economic and political environment? There are other economic measures of worth than income, as indicated for example on the Happy Planet Index (http://www.happyplanetindex.org/data/).Productive Promises will be a fun group experience playing with collective gestures, physical tasks and offering services to those around, the re-growth of New Brighton, with a productive sense of idiocy.

A key part of Productive Promises is to partner up with local organisations and businesses. The shape of what we create will be defined not only by what the artists and participants concoct, but the exchange we have with them in guiding what we do.

Tired of slaving away and working for the man? Do you want to do something for New Brighton? As the mayor of Reykjavik, Iceland said in his election campaign some years back, ‘we promise to break all our promises’. And we promise to do this with a useful smile on our faces so that we can be the most helpful art project in our neighborhood and create some change to New Brighton’s place in the Happy Planet Index.

Background:

Productive Promises comes off the back of the 2012 Productive Bodies project curated by Letting Space as part of the New Zealand International Festival of the Arts and in association with City Gallery Wellington. That ran on a similar format, but the actions in Wellington responded to government laying off large numbers of public servants, questioning the gap between a paid job in the civil service and undertaking voluntary work in community service. (http://www.lettingspace.org.nz/productive-bodies/).

Bio
Mark Harvey www.markharvey.co.nz
is a New Zealand based artist working in performance. His practices are conceptually driven, and often dialogue driven, while testing out notions of minimal endurance with constructions of idiocy, seriousness and deadpan humour. His practice draws from both his visual arts and contemporary dance influences.
He has recently shown in a range of international contexts such as Political Climate Wrestle in the 55th Venice Biennale in Visual Arts (2013), Working the room (Trendheim Kunstmuseum, Trendheim, 2012), Productive Bodies (Letting Space, Wellington, 2012), the Wrap me up series (The Physics Room, Christchurch, Govett Brewster gallery, Taranaki, Tari, Malaysia, and ZET, Amsterdam, 2005-2112), Outlet (Action Attraction, Hamburg, 2013, and Oxford Art Factory, Sydney, 2012), Work! (Luleå Cultural Centre with Johaness Blomqvist, Luleå, 2012), the Lie down series (Zagreb, and St Paul St, Auckland, 2009), Security First (with Oreet Ashery and Johannes Blomqvist, Den Frei, Copenhagen, 2012), Gaphoomph (with Soren Dahlgaard, Te Tuhi Gallery, Auckland, 2012), and Private Dancers (Parnu Video Art and Film Festival: Pain in the class, Estonia, 2006). He recently completed a PhD at AUT in the School of Art and Design in performance art/choreographic live art practice, and he is currently a Senior Lecturer in National Institute of Creative Arts and Industries at The University of Auckland.

MAL

Michelle Anne Louise Osborne Mon 4 Nov 2013 9:32PM

Beautiful Mark - smiling is useful and also strong and brave!

SJ

Sophie Jerram Wed 6 Nov 2013 9:49AM

@rafmanji I think you might like this project in particular. Mark Harvey is holding a workshop on this this weekend.
http://tezaproject.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/creative-productive-bodies-needed-copy.jpg