Article from jotta

Jeff Coombs Project

By Millie Ross published on Monday, 12 October

Manchester Metropolitan University student and curator Sophie Coombs, under the moniker of Jeff Coombs Projects, utilises empty retail and office spaces around Manchester, encouragng site-specific work from artists and in turn creating a new found aesthetic inspired by Manchester’s creative community. We ask her about co-curating the recent jotta show Space Within.


Could you briefly describe the common thread in the work of the three manchester artists, and why you curated them together with the jotta artists?

I'm very good friends with all of the Manchester artists, so I know all their work very well. They all have a wonderful ability of sourcing and working with found objects. That, combined with beautifully positioning and lighting, makes the pieces appear almost filmic and it becomes a complete experience. All of the Manchester artists work completely personifies them, I suppose by working with people you don't know you get a pre-concieved idea of how they are through the work they make. Then when you get to know the artists you have a completely different outlook on the work and you see how it relates to them, it's like being let in on a secret. The whole event was a quite a social experiment. I always think that art is based on a form of communication between the artist and the viewer, but rather than this lasting a couple of minutes, for me it was for a week.

What interesting elements did you note in the way the artists worked together in the space? Did they work well together, was their a communal/collaborative feel?

I realised that I had unintentionally put together a show that was all men. Once I had acknowledged that, I realised there was also a lot of wood used in the works - in very different ways. The London artists were using more bought wood, whilst the Manchester artist were sourcing a lot of their wood from skips. I suppose these similarities in medium meant there was a lot of sharing of tools and helping each other out, which would not have necessarily ocurred if it was a mix of video and painting etc. They all got on really well, I left the artists often to just get on with their pieces, so the London artists really had to communicate with each other and the Manchester artists if they needed to source material in town.

What glitches, if any, were encountered?
Opening and closing times are annoying because you have to stick to shopping hours. Also, as it is a family shopping centre there were a few shocked responses to the Fuck Machine. This meant that I had to turn it around so that you could only read 'IT'S MAGIC' instead of 'THE FAMOUS FUCK MACHINE!' (but to be honest I think that it added to the piece).

http://jeffcoombsprojects.blogspot.com/