Collaborative Arts

2005 Gilbert and George

Gilbert and George represent England at the Venice Biennale

2005: Collabarts.org

This website, developed in collaboration between two teams of experienced collaborators.

2004 CAE

Steven Kurtz of the Critical Art Ensemble investigated for ‘bioterrorism’ see www.caedefensefund.org

2004 Third Text

Third Text, Volume 18, Issue 6, 2004 on Art and Collaboration (download pdfs at journalsonline)

2003 Langlands and Bell

Langlands and Bell nominated for the Turner Prize

2003 Diffusion

Diffusion symposium at the Tate Modern on Collaborative Art practices

2003 BSAC

Baghdad Snapshot Action Crew poster campaign against the imminent War in Iraq

2003 Chapman Brothers

Jake and Dinos Chapman nominated for the Turner Prize

2002 Art Lovers

Art Lovers exhibition during the Liverpool Biennale featuring collaborative works by Gillian Wearing and Michael Landy among other art couples

2001 WTC

Terrorist attack on the World Trade Centre NY

2001 The Third Hand

The Third Hand (essential reading) on collaboration in art from conceptualism to postmodernism by Dr Charles Greene published by University of Minnesota Press

2000 The B-Thing

Viennese artists group Gelitin install the B-Thing, a piece that involved the artists removing a window from the World Trade Centre NY to install Balcony to then have a cup of coffee on the balcony before restoring it to its original condition.

1999 Noble and Silver

Collaborative artists Noble and Silver win the Perrier Award for best comedy act at the Edinburgh Festival

1999 Wilson Twins

Jane and Louise Wilson nominated for the Turner Prize

1999 BANK

Artist group BANK establish their Fax-bak service offering unsolicited critiques and advice on gallery press releases and invitations

1996 Co-operators

UK exhibition of works by Collaborative teams reviewed by David Barratt

1995 Atelier van Lieshout

AVL founded by Joep Van Lieshout

1994 Christo

After working together since 1961 as Christo, Christo and Jeanne Claude decide that the author of their work should be known by both their first names

1991 NSK state

Following the 10 day Slovenian War, Slovenian art group NSK redefined themselves from an organisation in to a state and issues passports

1991-2 Team Spirit

Touring exhibition Team Spirit focusing on collaborative art practices curated by Susan Sollins and Nina Castelli Sundell

1990s Bob and Roberta Smith

Uk artist Patrick Brill invents his alter egos Brother and Sister artist duo Bob and Roberta Smith

1989 General Idea

General Idea (1969-94) produce their Image Virus series on the theme of AIDS

1986 Abramovich and Ulay’s collaboration comes to an end

1985-7 The Way Things Go

Fischli and Weiss make their video The Way Things Go

1985 Gorilla Girls established

1984 Gilbert and George

Gilbert and George win the UK Turner Prize

1984 Artistic Collaboration in the 20th Century

exhibition curated by Cynthia McCabe at the Hirshorn Museum

1981 Kienholz

After working together since 1972 Ed Kienholz and Nancy Reddin Kienholz acknowledeg their collaboration and choose to co-author works from then on.

1980-81 Group Material

Group Material set up a store front on East Thirteenth Street, New York

1979 Fischli and Weiss first collaborate

1977-83 Mike Kelley and Tony Oursler

Kelley and Oursler collaborate on the punk rock band The Poetics

1976 Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen

Oldenburg and van Bruggen begin their collaboration with Trowel at the Kroller Muller Park

1976 Abramovich and Ulay

Abramovich and Ulay begin their collaboration with Relational works

1973 Anarchitecture

A collaborative group formed by Gordon Matta-Clark, Laurie anderson and Jene Highstein

1970 Punk

Rock critic David Marsh coins the term Punk Rock to describe a new DIY, anti establishment, ‘reflexive’ form of music.

1969 New York Art Workers Coalition

The NYAWC set up evets and protests on museum policies in relation to female and ‘non-white’ artists and visitors.

1969 John Lennon and Yoko Ono perform their Bed In

1969 1st peopled Moon Landing

1968-1972 BAG established

The Black Artist’s Group were a collective of musicians, writers, performers and artists working collectively on multi media presentations and social activism

1968 Art and Language established

1968 Gilbert and George

1st performance of the Singing Sculpture

1968 Demonstrations

widespread student demonstrations supporting he Civil Rights movement in the US, student riots in Paris, sit in at Leeds Uiversity and Hornsey School of Art, UK

1965-73 US Marines in Vietnam

1963 Washington Civil Rights March

1962 Boyle Family

First collaboration between Mark Boyle and Joan Hills, later to become established as the Boyle Family

1962 Fluxus

Fluxus established by George Maciunas and associates including Joseph Beuys, Dick Higgins, Nam June Paik and Yoko Ono

1959 Bernd and Hilla Becher first collaboration

1955 Matson-Jones

Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns go in to business together as Matson-Jones, making window displays for department stores.

1953 Rauschenberg erases De Kooning’s drawing

1939-1945 World War 2

1933 Black Mountain College

The college was established by John Rice after being fired from a position at Rollins College. It was experimental and interdisciplinary by nature and involved a collaborative approach to interdisciplinary creative practices. Notable alumni include Robert Rauschenberg and Cy Twombly and among its tutors were Buckminster Fuller, Josef and Anni Albers, John Cage and Merce Cunningham.

1929-33 The campaign of mass collectivisation in Russia

Unlike the earlier co-operative movement and Kibbutz movement this is an enforced scheme

1925 Club for Cultural Workers

Rodchenko devised the Club for Cultural Workers

1924 Surrealist Manifesto published

The Surrealists developed the Exquisite Corpse based on the parlour game consequences to produce collaborative drawings

1924 Kukryniksy

Mikhail Kuprianov, Porfiry Krylov and Nikolai Sokolov establish themselves as the collaborative team Kukryniksy making socialist paintings and later paintings critical of the Soviet enterprise

1920 Productionists Group

Tatlin announces the programme of the Productionists Group as a counter to the rise of the individual in constructivist art practice

1919 Bauhaus established

1919 Duchamp creates LHOOQ

Duchamp paints a moustache on a print of Leonardo’s Mona Lisa and creates the artwork LHOOQ and the first known artwork made through appropriation- so a form of collaboration..

1917 October Revolution in Russia

1917 premier of the Ballet Parade

first collaboration between Jean Cocteau, Eric Satie, Pablo Picasso and Leonide Masine with Diaghilev and the Ballet Russes (Satie was imprisoned for 8 days due to the public riot that ensued)

1916 Dada

Anti war artists exiled to Zurich (Hans Arp, Trsitan Tzara, Richard Huelsenbech, Sophie Tauber, Emmy Hemmings, Hugo Ball) founded Dada and gave performances expressing their disgust at the war and the culture that supported it at the Cabaret Voltaire.

1914-1918 First World War

1909 Kibbutz

The Kibbutz movement was founded

1840s Consequences

Parlour games such as Consequences were enjoyed by the Victorian lesiure classes

1828: Dr William King

Dr William King publishes a periodical the Co-operator offering advice and schemes for working as part of a co-operative

1771: Robert Owen

Birth of Robert Owen founder of the co-operative movement

The Renaissance

Renaissance Artists worked in workshops that were run on a hierarchical system of division of labour

Medieval times

Medieval artists were mostly anonymous working within a community of artists and craftspeople