Peter Liversidge: Notes on Protesting
— Whitechapel Gallery, London

Commissioned by EMDASH, Produced by Wedel Art Advisory

A group of sixty children collaborated with leading British artist Peter Liversidge on a performance at the Whitechapel Gallery.

Over the course of 3 months, Liversidge worked closely with 60 children aged 8-9 from the Marion Richardson Primary School in the London borough of Tower Hamlets to examine ideas around community, collectively held ideas and the power of protest. Encouraging the children to discuss what is most important to them and the changes they would like to see, they worked together to create an engaging performance of choreographed demonstrations. 

Having taken place on May Day and inspired by ideas around demonstration and protest, the artist and children created songs, choreography, colourful banners and placards which expressed their views on everything from the school playground and tight-fitting shoes to a dislike of tinned tomatoes.

Peter Liversidge has worked with a diverse range of institutions, including Tate Liverpool (2008), the Centre d’art Santa Mònica, Barcelona (2008), Bloomberg SPACE, London (2009), The Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh (2010), Whitechapel Gallery, London (2013), Tate Modern (2013), and the Tang Museum, Saratoga (2013/14). A monograph on Liversidge’s work, Selected Proposals, was published in August 2013.  Upcoming exhibitions in 2014 include solo shows at i8, Reykjavik, June/August, The Mac, Belfast, August/October. Revolver at Matts Gallery, London, October/November. Basis, Frankfurt, November/February. He is currently developing new proposals for the city-wide Vancouver Biennial 2014/15.

EMDASH Foundation: Founded by Andrea Dibelius in 2010, EMDASH is a charitable foundation that focuses on encouraging and enabling artists to realise new ideas. Among its various projects, EMDASH sponsors Frieze Projects (the non-commercial, curated projects at London’s Frieze Art Fair), and the EMDASH Award – which invites emerging artist based outside the UK to submit proposals for a major project to be shown at Frieze London. The winner, selected by jury, is awarded £10,000 to then realize their work. EMDASH also sponsored the Austrian Pavilion in Venice in 2013, and has numerous public art projects in development.

Whitechapel Gallery
For over a century the Whitechapel Gallery has premiered world-class artists from modern masters such as Frida Kahlo, Pablo Picasso, Jackson Pollock and Mark Rothko to contemporaries such as Sophie Calle, Lucian Freud, Gilbert & George and Walid Raad. With beautiful galleries, exhibitions, artist commissions, collection displays, historic archives, education resources, art courses, dining room and bookshop there is always something free to see. The Gallery is a touchstone for modern and contemporary art internationally, plays a central role in London’s cultural landscape and is pivotal to the continued growth of the world’s most vibrant contemporary art quarter.

WEDEL ART ADVISORY works with private and corporate clients on their collections, exhibition programs, special projects and philanthropy, as well as curating numerous exhibitions and artist projects internationally.