Olivia Aherne

4717 was a ten day exhibition that invited four artists to create new commissions in response to a work from the LUX collection. 4717 considered how the exhibition can be as much a site of active production as of display and questioned how a collection can be reanimated in a digital age. The changing exhibition space and the activities it hosted were broadcast via a video live-stream. The link to this live-stream was acquired by LUX as their 4717th work, making it the first live moving image work in their collection.  The link now lies dormant alongside a set of instructions until it is reactivated by other parties interested in producing further iterations of the project.

The commissioned works were produced and viewed alongside Ursula Mayer’s Gonda (2012), a rich and multilayered moving image from the LUX collection that delves into concepts of the individual, collectivity, narrative, and subjectivity. A film of multiple voices – it is this collaborative and interdisciplinary approach that 4717 celebrates. Gonda became a catalyst for artistic commissions that explored notions of dispersion, collection, and transformation across multiple forms of practice.

The exhibition, operating as studio and platform, also hosted a programme of performances and discussions that explored topics including the life and dispersion of a collection, reanimation and liveness through creative exchange and the relationship of the individual to the collective.

“4717 raises urgent and timely questions about the nature of collections and the circulation of moving image works and will create a unique creative context in which these questions can be addressed in the public sphere.” —Benjamin Cook, Director, LUX

Artists: Anne de Boer, Inés Cámara Leret, Libita Clayton, Ursula Mayer, Jade Montserrat

Programme participants: Estabrak Al-Ansari, Ama Josephine Budget, Ben Cook, Ben Cranfield, Bridget Crone, Karen Di Franco, Rose Lejeune, Helena Reckitt, Ash Reid

4717 was curated by Olivia Aherne, Lizzie Cottrell, Emily Davis, Evie Gurney, Nilz Källgren, Helene Remmel and Alistair Small as part of the Curating Contemporary Art Programme MA Graduate Projects 2018, Royal College of Art.