Exhibition: 2HB: What we make with words

In December 2011 CCA will dedicate its major spaces to a two-week programme profiling contemporary art writing and journal publishing in Glasgow.

As CCA’s own art writing journal 2HB launches its 12th volume, we are pausing to ask the question: what do we make with words?

2HB’s widening community of readers has been shared with, and developed by, five other Glasgow-based journals: Dancehall, Gnommero, Marbled Reams, Uncle Chop Chop and Victor & Hester. The proliferation of writing and publishing here has built momentum by drawing on the approaches and experience of an international community.

2HB: What we make with words is best described as a gathering; of the artists, writers, journals and publishers, local and international, who are generating a velocity in local artistic practice.

The programme consists of four elements:

What we make with words: Exhibition 
Thursday 1 – Saturday 17 Dec / 11am – 6pm / Tuesday – Saturday / FREE
2HB Artists’ Readings
Saturday 10 Dec / 3pm / FREE
The selected artists all contributed to Volumes 1 – 11 of 2HB. However, by changing the focus from ‘writing’ to ‘making’ within their practice, the work in the gallery spaces will raise the question: how is writing a motor within contemporary art practice? Artists exhibiting are: Sue Brind and Jim Harold, Ruth Buchanan, Alex Impey, Paul Elliman, Kathryn Elkin, Hannah Ellul, Kate Morrell, Charlotte Prodger, Thom Walker and Rebecca Wilcox.

What we make with words: Glasgow Journals Launch Event
Saturday 17 Dec / 5pm – late / FREE
Each new volume of these Glasgow-based journals has been launched at events created to explore editorial and artistic concerns. By synchronising the launches of the forthcoming volumes of 2HB, Dancehall, Gnommero, Marbled Reams, Uncle Chop Chop and Victor & Hester, during an evening of performance, video, music, lectures and installation, we will show how the recurrent voice of the journal creates and connects diverse audiences and practitioners, raising the question: what kind of cultural motor is independent publishing in Glasgow?

What we make with words: Book Fair 
Saturday 17 Dec / 12pm – 5pm / FREE
In discussion with the Glasgow journals, CCA has invited UK and international publishers to join us in exploring the issues and enthusiasms current within art writing and publishing, providing a context in which to view similar activity in Glasgow. Exhibitors will include Bookworks (London), Casco (Utrecht), Motto Distribution (Berlin), Torpedo (Oslo), Pist Protta (Copenhagen), Transmission (Glasgow), Abake (London/France), Automatic Books (Italy), Mousse (Italy), Mono Paper (London), VERSUCH (London), Ditto Press (London) and Eastside Projects (Birmingham).

What we make with words: Publication
Available from 21 Nov from the CCA reception or for download now
A new publication will connect the past and future possibilities of 2HB and survey journal publishing and art writing in Glasgow. The publication will also include a new commission by the Writers Group, a group formed around experimental and collaborative writing practice, currently supported by CCA.