Hans Ulrich Obrist, the Serpentine’s artistic director, welcomed the London art world to the Serpentine North Gallery last night for a private viewing of Judy Chicago’s exhibition Revelations and a panel discussion on the artist’s very topical question: “What if women ruled the world?”
The panelists, chaired by The art newspaperEditor-in-chief Louis Jebb, were Chris Bayley, the Serpentine’s exhibition curator, who oversaw the planning and installation of the insightful, graphic Revelations—Aleksandra Artamonovskaja, Head of Art at Tezos Ecosystem, and Kay Watson, Head of Art Technologies at Serpentine.
Hans Ulrich Obrist, artistic director of the Serpentine, opened the evening © Hannah Goldsmith
The panelists sat in front of Judy Chicago’s What if women ruled the world? Participatory quilta project created in collaboration with artist and founding member of Pussy Riot, Nadya Tolokonnikova, to promote the exchange of ideas on gender equality. The interactive work, created in collaboration with art and technology mediators DMINTI,invites visitors to enter the booth in the gallery and watch a short introductory video before answering one or more of eleven questions by recording a video response. Afterwards, guests of the event, like all members of the public who attended the show, could claim a digital participation token registered on the Tezos blockchain.
Obrist addressed the Serpentine’s long-standing concern to explore the connection between art and technology, most recently expressed through Gabriel Massan’s computer game-based work Third World (2023, built in collaboration with Tezos and soon to tour his home country Brazil); and Serpentine’s Future Art Ecosystems report: Art x AI; Refik Anadol’s AI-demystifying exhibition “Echoes of the Earth: Living Archive”; and from 4 October at Serpentine North, artists Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst’s highly anticipated exploration of artificial intelligence using vocal datasets created with community choirs from across the UK.
Nico Smirnoff, Head of Communications at Serpentine (and former employee of The art newspaper), was in charge of planning the evening, which also saw guests enjoy a colourful selection of cocktails from the evening’s fourth partner, X Muse Vodka, which were enjoyed with views of Hyde Park, which surrounds the gallery, and the Serpentine Lake beyond.
Prominent figures from the creative sector who attended the event included the ever-provocative designer Pam Hogg and Seetal Solanki, author of Why materials are important; together with gallery owner Matthew Flowers; Georgina Adam, editor-in-chief of The art newspaper; art consultant Teresa Cassidy Krasny; Erica Bolton from the PR firm Bolton & Quinn; Minister Yasuyuki Okazaki from the Japanese Embassy in London; and Leyla Fakhr, artistic director of the digital art platform Verse.
Artists in attendance included portrait and narrative painter Jonathan Parker and, fittingly for a technology-focused evening, two digitally savvy and innovative artists: Robert Alice – fresh from his groundbreaking book About NFTs (Taschen, 2024); and his generative art NFT sale at Christie’s 3.0 – and Gretchen Andrew, author of The art newspaper‘s Art Decoded column.
Also present were members of the core team at the National Gallery in London who have been overseeing the Gallery’s 200th anniversary celebrations – Christine Riding, Director of Collections and Research (currently engaged in a ground-breaking redesign of the Gallery), as well as Tracy Jones, Head of Communications, and Simon Magill, Deputy Head of Communications.
Guests at the panel, private view and party to celebrate Judy Chicago: Revelations at Serpentine North © Hannah Goldsmith
As guests enjoyed the event, some recalled one of the works Bayley highlighted during the panel discussion. In film footage from Atmospheres (1968-74) shows Chicago using pyrotechnics to create colored clouds that spread and soften and transform the surrounding Californian landscape. It was an intervention designed to bring a feminine impulse to a landscape where male landscape painters such as James Turrell had worked to control their environments.
“My color,” she tells Obrist in an interview for the book about these works Judy Chicago: Revelations (Thames & Hudson, 2024), published to accompany the exhibition, “merges with the landscape and blends with the wind in the air and the sky.” Thus, Chicago’s art and personal inspiration seemed to emerge on a London August evening and blend with the wind, air and sky of Hyde Park.
- Judy Chicago: RevelationsSerpentine North, London, until September 1st.
- Judy Chicago, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Martha Easton, Judy Chicago: Revelations (Thames & Hudson, 2024)
