6 things we couldn't do, but can do now
with Jimmy Robert
6 things... proposes a Minimalist-style grid of objects, with/against which actions are carried out in a live performance that is equally an ongoing process, one that explores the possibility of exchange and of making human relations manifest. - I.W.
White’s first collaboration with Jimmy Robert comprised an installation in Tate Britain’s Art Now space and a performance by the pair, which took place twice in different gallery spaces at Tate.
“The performance work which paralleled the Art Now installation proposed a minimalist-style grid of objects, with and against which actions were carried out. Wearing blue jeans and white T-shirts with the Labour Party logo on, these actions included Robert stood on bricks as though on pointe shoes, supported by White and a blank parade banner carried diagonally across the space as though miming a processional protest. Trio A was danced in unison by the two artists, with the Rainer film on a monitor placed on the floor; simultaneously Gil Leung and Simon Noble, two of Tate’s art handling team, installed and de- installed a 1984 John Cage drawing according to exacting Tate procedures on the back wall of the performance space. The actions performed by White and Robert were introduced by the handing out of a programme sheet that substituted the usual clarity of Tate-style interpretation with personal or anecdotal information which the audience read at the start of the piece while the artists sat on two chairs. The two elements of the project presented an ongoing process that explored art- making and the possibility of exchange, making human relations manifest. None of the works installed in the Art Now space were attributed to either Robert or White exclusively, although some were made separately and some together: all were made, or presented, as a result of the collaborative process.” - from Keep On Onnin': Contemporary Art at Tate Britain, Art Now 2004–07, ed. Catherine Wood
Performed: November 2004, Art Now, Tate Britain, London
