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The National Taste: site-specific audio-visual installation,

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posted on 2023-06-08, 04:50 authored by Nicholas TillNicholas Till, Kandis Cook
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History

Publication status

  • Published

Publisher

English Heritage, Belsay Hall, Northumberland

Pages

0.0

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  • Music Publications

Notes

'The National Taste' was an audio-visual installation which was part of the 'Picture House' exhibition at Belsay Hall, Northumberland. The work was commissioned by English Heritage from me and my artistic partner Kandis Cook, and was located in the Libary of Belsay. Built in 1806, Belsay is a rare example of neo-classical domestic architecture in Britain, and the installation commented on the relationship between early 19th-century British Hellenism, British geo-political interests in the eastern Mediterranean during the Napoleonic era, and the appropriation of Greek antiquities by both Sir Charles Monck, the builder of Belsay, and the Earl of Elgin. The work consisted of: i) placing on the empty Library bookshelves 1,000 miniature replicas of the caryatid that Elgin removed from the Erechtheium on the Akropolis in Athens; ii) a stencilled text from a letter by Elgin of 1804, commending his appropriations from the Akropolis for their contribution to the British national taste, running as a sentence around three walls in the space above the bookshelves; iii) a scale plaster model of one of the columns of the Erechtheium placed in the middle of the room, cut at waist height to provide a surface for a second text commenting on the modern trade in illegal antiquities in relation to the looting of the museum in Baghdad after the invasion of 2003; iv) an audio-montage of texts from interior design magazines, chosen to comment on the commodification of antiquities in contemporary culture, read by Harriet Walter and Corin Redgrave and played on audio-beam speakers. The installation was in situ between May and October 2007, and was seen by 75,000 visitors. Documentation for the project consists of the exhibition catalogue, which contains photographs of the installation and a brief description of the work.

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Legacy Posted Date

2012-02-06

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