Treasure Seekers 8
Wednesday 18th - Friday 26th March
Preview Tuesday 17th March 5-8pm
Caitlin Griffiths
Treasure Seekers VIII sees Charlie Levine and Kate Pennington-Wilson present the second of a two part series of curated shows in collaboration with Birmingham School of Art and Design Archives.
This exhibition presents six new works by Caitlin Griffiths, all of which are responsive to the minute books from the archives found at Margaret Street School of Art, as well as the written interpretive text of David Miller that accompanied the first of the exhibitions in this duo of shows. Griffiths interprets and analyses the hand written text of Miller and the anonymous minute takers from 1821-28, 1871 and 1921-22. From this analysis she responds in the form of short stories, her process begins with researching the style of the handwriting through graphological methods. She then creates stories triggered from certain character traits found within the analysis, the pseudoscience of graphology becoming a fictional fact for Griffiths to reinterpret.
In addition to the series of stories, a technique found frequently throughout Griffiths work, she has for the first time developed a series of illustrations. These once again take aspects of the hand written minutes books, making something that represents a cohesive reference into something graphic and illegible. By removing the ease of reading clearly written minute notes into something illustrative, these images act as another extension of Griffiths’ philosophy of identity, titles and role; a central concept within her practice of taking someone else’s memory and making it her own.
The third aspect of Treasure Seekers VIII is ‘The Autograph Book’. This is a book made in 2007 by Griffiths and contains signatures collected by everyone she encountered within an 80 day period. The book orders the signatures by date and they remain as markers to each encounter, becoming, through the turning of the pages, dashes, dots and curls, mimicking Griffiths’ own illustrations and acting as inherent reminders of what possible pseudoscience could be used to interpret our personalities from simple everyday mark making.
Birmingham School of Art, Margaret Street, B3 3BX, open 9-5 PM Monday to Friday