Workshop: tremoring the archive with Joshua Leon
Saturday 30th November 2024 , 2:00pm to 4:00pm
Join writer, poet, and artist Joshua Leon in a writing workshop interrogating ideas around documentation, disrupting the archive through memoir, and the potency of minor and common histories.
This workshop is about the force of writing and the feel of “documents.” We will be thinking through the ways in which writing – in particular the writing of memoir – can be used to re-address history and the archive.
Drawing on the theoretical and methodological underpinnings of his practice, Joshua will expand from the research he produced for his exhibition at Chisenhale Gallery which collapsed personal family narratives with the history of the site and East London.
Beginning with a group reading of Suely Rolnik’s Archive Mania, and moving into a discussion about the text, we will question what a document can be, what the poetic force of documents are, and the ways in which the archive and its documents can be intervened with or altered.
We will then begin to think about writing, considering how any form of writing – be it the poem, the letter, the short story, the memoir, the novel, or even the note – might perform an invaluable function in producing the alterations we seek in the archive. To do this, we will work on two short writing exercises, the first of which will think through memory, and the second focusing on how to turn a document into a subject. For this second exercise, the paintings from the exhibition In the footsteps of the East London Group will be invited to be treated as documents.
All writing and reading materials will be provided.
This event will take place in our breakout space at Bow Arts Trust, 183 Bow Road, E3 2SJ.
Concession rate applies to students, over 65s, under 18s, Bow Arts artists, National Art Pass members, and key workers
More about Joshua Leon
Joshua Leon is a writer, poet and artist based in London whose practice centres on collapsing archival memory, history and memoir into one another. He uses the lament and its multiplicitous forms as a critical space to think about the ways in which site and place store these memories and the ways writing and exhibition making can enliven them. Selected exhibitions include: The Missing O and E, Chisenhale Gallery, London; Itinéraire Fantôme, CAPC, Bordeaux (2024); Presque Partout, 49 Nord 6 Est – Frac Lorraine, Metz (2024); THE ARCHIVE AS …, Kunstverein München, Munich (2023); Revision, PEER Gallery, London (2022); POST, Barbican, London (2022); Expo en boîte, 49 Nord 6 Est – Frac Lorraine, Metz (2022); Governmental Fires, FUTURA, Prague (2021); Loose Routes Along the Familiar, Madonna del Pozzo, Spoleto (2021); Attendance(s) Close to the Close, Daily Practice, Rotterdam (2020); The Same Tendency, Summer Hall Place, Edinburgh (2019); and Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost, Berlin Biennale, Berlin (2018).
Access information
The Bow Arts Trust breakout space has step-free access throughout from street level, including to the accessible toilet, and is service animal friendly. This venue does not have a hearing loop system. Accessible parking is not available on-site but blue badge parking can be found 500m away on Fairfield Road.
If you have any questions regarding accessibility at this venue or event, would like to make us aware of any access requirements that you have in advance of visiting, or would like this information in an alternate format including Easy Read, please email nunnery@bowarts.com or call 020 3967 1643.
Access requirements could include things like providing equipment, services or support (e.g. information in Easy Read, speech to text software, additional 1:1 support), adjusting workshop timings (e.g. more break times), adjustments to the event space or anything else you can think of!
Transport Information
Opening hours: Mon-Fri, 9am to 5pm
Address: Bow Arts Trust, 183 Bow Road, London, E3 2SJ
Nearest station(s): Bow Road (District and Hammersmith and City lines) is a 6-minute walk away, and Bow Church (DLR) is a 3-minute walk away.
Bus: 205, 25, 425, A8, D8, 108, 276, 488 and 8 all service the surrounding area.
Bike: Bicycle parking is located at Bow Church Station. The nearest Santander Cycles docking station is at Bow Church Station.
