Re-Covering

Re-Covering is an exhibition I curated with 40 local and international artists - who redesigned the cover sleeve of an influential book onto a reclaimed piece of oak sourced from closed down school libraries. These were displayed on an installation of shelves made from school desks; the works are standard paperback size (110mm x 178mm x 15mm). To coincide with Re-Covering was The Reading, a multiple writers’ residency initiated by the artist/writer Jane Chavez-Dawson and produced by myself in collaboration with Jake Geczy and Matthew Pendergast, The Reading developed throughout Re-Covering, with 70 writers working in Untitled Gallery in either 2.5 or 3-hour slots. Each writer’s work was streamed live onto the back wall of the Gallery and other screens across Manchester. All writers shared the same brief: They must use the final paragraph of the previous writer’s work, and may use as stimuli the ambience of the gallery, the exhibition’s content, the stream of visitors and the knowledge that their writing is displayed in real-time.