I think it harks back to being at school, but it’s always hard to be productive at this time of year… but tough, there’s no rest for Tenneson and Dale. We have an exhibition at the Harris Museum in December (http://www.harrismuseum.org.uk) and we need to get the work finished. It’s going to take a chunk of time to complete, but it will be worthwhile and besides that, we’re used to repetitive strain at this stage. (Our piece called “Rulers” which translated the duration of peerages into the form of plastic rulers – see diagram – took us forever. Attaching the string was the worst bit, as we had to do that 245 times; but at least we have each other’s company when engaged in such tasks. When I’m undertaking my own ridiculously time-consuming work, I only have myself or the radio for company and both are predictable at best.)
Tenneson and Dale usually make new work for each place in which we show – some pieces get used again, but most often we make them with a specific venue in mind. For the show in December we have mixed up our usual trio of minimalism, political statistics and public information and have come up with a colourfully bonkers piece. It’s inspired by recent discussions of the hung parliament, but also by a Frank Stella painting called Empress of India (http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=79806) and by a popular way of visualising celebration… I’ll be letting you know how we’re getting on. In the meantime, thanks to the Harris Museum for taking a chance on us (we’re not the type of artists they usually show) so Tenneson and Dale are chuffed that you liked our proposal!…that will need to be remembered when we are tearing our hair out and throwing tools at each other.
