Our Silver City, 2094
- Left: Installation by Céline Condorelli featuring works by Anna Barham, Revital Cohen and Tuur van Balen, Isa Genzken, Hannah Catherine Jones, Agnieszka Kurant, Delphine Reist, Ben Rivers, Cauleen Smith and specimens from Nottingham City Museums. Our Silver City, 2094 installation view at Nottingham Contemporary, 2021–22. Courtesy Nottingham Contemporary. Photo: Stuart Whipps.
- Right: The Temple, 2021 installation designed by Grace Ndiritu featuring works by Armando D. Cosmos, Tuareg, 2021; Unknown maker, Bear Jug, 1740–60; Unknown maker, Loving Cup, 1770; Vivian Lynn, Caryatid, 1986; Charlotte Johannesson, Each Is a Universe, 2018; Unknown maker, Knight Jug, 1250–1300. Our Silver City, 2094 installation view at Nottingham Contemporary, 2021–22. Courtesy: the artist and Nottingham Contemporary. Photo: Stuart Whipps
- Below: Wet Spells, 2021 Installation by Femke Herregraven. Our Silver City, 2094. Installation shot at Nottingham Contemporary, 2021. Photo Stuart Whipps
"Our Silver City feels full of hope, vitality, energy and creative spark, and doesn’t take itself too seriously, however real the approaching calamity.", ★★★★ Adrian Searle, The Guardian
"A profound exhibition", Amrit Doll, ArtReview
Our Silver City travels to the end of this century, featuring works from the last 400 million years. It is an exhibition-as-sci-fi-novel, or vice-versa.
Crossing the gallery threshold, we step into a possible future world. This world has been reshaped by decades of crisis and collapse: resource wars and evacuations, plastic-eating bacteria and flooding. Once known as Nottingham, the Silver City is set against a backdrop of fire seasons and widening waterways. Here, communities have embraced different forms of colour production, weather forecasting and spirituality.
This exhibition is imagined as a journey unfolding across four galleries, orientated to the cardinal points. It traces a route from change to understanding, from inner knowledge to wisdom. Along the way, we encounter a selection of artefacts, remnants and artworks connecting the long 21st century with what went before. All exhibitions invite us to travel in time, but this one insists on it.
Based on a methodology by Prem Krishnamurthy, Our Silver City has been developed by the artists Céline Condorelli, Femke Herregraven and Grace Ndiritu, and the novelist Liz Jensen, in close dialogue with Krishnamurthy and the Nottingham Contemporary team. It is accompanied by a novella by Jensen, and extends across the city via a programme developed with young people.
Our Silver City asks: How might art envision, prototype and practice new ways of being in the uncertain future? Who were “we” before we became “we”? Where are we going? And how might we get there?
Exhibition:
Our Silver City, 2094Dates:
20 Nov 2021 – 18 Apr 2022Artists and Contributors:
Roger Ackling, Anni Albers, Anna Barham, Chiara Camoni, Revital Cohen and Tuur van Balen, Céline Condorelli, Armando D. Cosmos, Isa Genzken, Femke Herregraven, Charlotte Johannesson, Hannah Catherine Jones, On Kawara, The Kindred of the Kibbo Kift, Agnieszka Kurant, Nicola L, Vivian Lynn, Angus McBean, Anthony McCall, Eline McGeorge, Sandra Mujinga, Grace Ndiritu, John Newling, B.J. Nilsen, Nottingham City Museums, Asad Raza, Delphine Reist, Ben Rivers, Connie Samaras, School of Geography Map Collection, University of Nottingham, Cauleen Smith, Michael E. Smith, Jenna Sutela, Elisabeth Wild, Zara Zandieh and Andrea Zittel.
Artistic and Curatorial Team:
Céline Condorelli, Femke Herregraven, Liz Jensen, Prem Krishnamurthy and Grace Ndiritu.
Curatorial framework by Prem Krishnamurthy, who has co-curated the exhibition with Kiera Blakey, Sam Thorne and Nicole Yip, assisted by Olivia Aherne and Hannah Wallis. Young people's programme curated by Wingshan Smith.
Digital and sound production by Jim Brouwer.
Technical production by David Thomas.
Supporters:
This exhibition is generously supported by The Graham Foundation, PRS Foundation’s The Open Fund, The Mondriaan Fund & Arts Council National Lottery Project Grants. With in-kind support from CHAUVET Lighting, OMNI, & specialists in art logistics, Queen's.
Supported by:
