CRUISING GROUNDS is an evolving research exhibition immersed within the reference library at LUX. Presented alongside the solo exhibition Rosalind Nashashibi: Jack Straw’s Castle in the LUX Screening Room, the two exhibitions at LUX’s new space in Waterlow Park form a central part of CRUISING GROUND: a summer-long programme of writing, exhibition, screenings, workshops and events bringing together a range of perspectives and discourses on cruising. Engaging with the 50th anniversary of the repeal of the Sexual Offences Act 1967 and the geographical and cultural landscape of LUX’s new location in North London, CRUISING GROUND takes the ponds and cruising areas of neighbouring Hampstead Heath as a departure point for the programme.
The LUX Library Display CRUISING GROUNDS is a constellation of moving image works, texts, objects, images and ephemera drawn from research into cruising and its methodologies, expanding with new discourses and references from each event during the Summer. Embedded within the shelves, books, architecture, screens and wall space of the library, the audience is invited to cruise the library space; engaging with individual pieces as they attract attention or as a series of discreet but interlinked encounters. The exhibition also acts as a growing archive of the research project; proposing the methodologies of cruising for LUX (and within the arts more broadly) as a strategy for permanent institutional destabilisation and for queering cultural mediation and production.
Works that have been discovered to date in the LUX Collection relating to cruising have been included as a mini-collection within the library. Evoking the video-booths of Adult Book stores and cinema spaces, these works are available to watch on a central monitor, the audience selecting at random the works on non-labelled DVDs, exploring the notion of random interaction and active participation.
Alongside pieces from the LUX Collection and LUX archives, the exhibition includes contributions from, Bev Zalcock / Cinenova, Andy Lipman / London Community Video Archive, Richard Healy, John Walter, Liz Rosenfeld, Rosalind Nashashibi, UCL Urban Lab, Fiona Anderson, Laura Guy, Gary Needham, participants of the CRUSEV research teams, amongst others.
CRUISING GROUNDS research exhibition curated by Matt Carter, CRUISING GROUND summer programme developed and presented in collaboration with CRUSEV.
Details of some of the works on display:
Watch Out – There’s a Queer About!, 1980, 7’57
Dir. & Written by Andy Lipman Produced by Oval Video; Courtesy of the LCVA
Fireworks Revisited, 1994, 16mm on video, 9mins
Bev Zalcock; Courtesy of the A]artist and Cinenova, London
Albert Goldman’s Martini Pitcher (Folsom’s Parade), 2014, Mouth blown glass, door keys, rope
Richard Healy; Courtesy of the artist
Albert Goldman’s Martini Pitcher (Sand in the Vaseline), 2014, Mouth blown glass
Richard Healy; Courtesy of the artist
Albert Goldman’s Martini Pitcher Stirrer, 2014, Mouth-blown glass, door keys, keyrings, each unique
Edition of 18, signed and numbered certificate
Richard Healy; Courtesy of the artist and South London Gallery
Digital slideshow of cruising maps from Alien Sex Club, 2016
John Walter; Courtesy of the artist
Posterised still from Fuck Tree (2017), Super8 transferred to HD, colour, sound, 8mins 30sec
a companion piece to Luther Price’s Sodom (1989)
Concept, Direction, Editing: Liz Rosenfeld / Filmed on residency at LUX, 2017
Glance Project, 2005, Animation, sound, 1min
Sebastian Buerkner; Courtesy of the artist and LUX
