Come Dine with Me Romford by Jessica Adams

COME DINE WITH ME ROMFORD

Photo credit: Rebecca Joseph

A PROJECT DEVELOPED IN COLLABORATION WITH: @shiftctrlesc Alan Kaprow Alex Williams All of Anne’s Cafe’s customers Anarchist Federation Andrea Whitaker Anthony Downey Avraham Cohen BBC Bobby Paul Sayers Catherine Grant Christopher Stackhouse Claire Bishop Claire Thomas Corrine Segal Denise Hickey Devon Caranicas Dictionary.com Dimitris Vardoulakis Dizzie Rascal Fraser White Gail Day Gail Heartney Grant Kester Grant Pearce Hal Foster Hannah Arendt Harold Hill Foodbank Harriet Whewell Havering Council Heather Corrie Heesoon Bai Helge Mooshammer Hennessy Youngman Interference Irit Rogoff

Iysha Rose Jodi Dean Joe Easeman John Kelsey Justine Ludwig Kim Charnley Kirsty Packer Kodwo Eshun Larry Green Lee Holden Liam Gillick Lois Mackie Lucy Britton Mark Reeves Mark Ronson Mary Black Matthew Hughes Michael Brookes Michael Kennedy Molly Hodson Natalie Bays Natalie Campbell Negar Azimi Nic Maw Nicholas Willats Nick Srnicek Nigella Lawson Noam Chomsky Olga Anatolevne Opashona Ghosh Paulo Friere Peter Mortenbock Rachel Hunter Radesh Nadesananthen Radical Culture Research Collective Rebecca Adams

Rebecca Joseph Roelof Vanwyk Ross Gibson Sarah Walters Saul Newman Seeds For Change Slavoj Žižek Sonia Williams Sophie Bland Sophie Keyse Sophie Priestley Soumyak Kanti DeBiswas Stephen Wright Susannah Haslam Tamara Szucs Tanmay Dhanania The Free Dictionary The Golden Lion The Trussell Trust The Voodoo Lounge Tom Wolfe Tristam Adams United Nations Valerie Huges

CONTENTS INTRODUCTIONS (p. 4) ● QUICK PLUG ● COME DINE WITH ME ROMFORD: A RECIPE FOR A PROJECT ● SEDUCING COLLABORATORS ● WHAT’S IN A NAME? PANTENE RADICALITY (p. 13) ● GLOBAL AGITATION ● PANTENE RADICALITY ● ART AS A NON-PLACE ● THE CARDBOARD REVOLUTION ● AGITATION TREPIDATION ● CHRONOLOGY COMPONENT 1: STRUCTURAL (p. 23) ● FOOD AS A SYSTEMIC VIOLENCE ● LOCAL ● NATIONAL ● GLOBAL COMPONENT 2: COLLECTIVE (p. 33) ● LOOKY LOOS ● EXPERI (FOOD, CONNECTIVES) ● ALTER-COLLABORATION COMPONENT 3: INDIVIDUAL (p. 39) CRYSTAL BALL GAZING: ART AS PANTENE RADICALITY/IN THE GLOBAL AGITATION (p. 40) THE COME DINE WITH ME ROMFORD LEXICON, OR, THE CHEAT SHEET (p. 44) APPENDIX (p. 47)

QUICK PLUG This project would not have been possible without the support of the Romford Contemporary Arts Programme (RCAP), and in particular the curator Sarah Walters. They are doing some amazing stuff, so check them out: wearercap.co.uk

COME DINE WITH ME ROMFORD: A RECIPE FOR A PROJECT The question driving this project is; how radical a role can art play in broader processes of change? This dissertation proceeds by establishing a concept of a ‘global agitation’ in order to conceptualise a wide set of contemporary political critiques that operate on three levels; the structural, the collective, and the individual. These three levels provide a framework for the analysis of the limits and meaning of contemporary radicality through one ‘food-related’ artistic project, Come Dine with Me Romford. In order to do this, it adopted as a research methodology Irit Rogoff’s notion of embodied criticality. She argues that a researcher’s ability to operate at a distance from their subject of study is no longer feasible. She suggests that operating from a position of inhabitation will “actualise people’s inherent and often intuitive notions of how to produce criticality”, and it will bring ”together that being studied and those 1 doing the studying, in an indelible unity.” Come Dine with Me Romford was thus developed on the premise that the contemporary condition can be more richly understood when all of the instruments of criticality are employed. To adopt this research method is to accept that as a researcher, the principle thing which will oscillate around the project, swinging in and out of focus, is yourself. In order to explain the things around which I’ve oscillated, however, it is useful to think of a recipe. The recipe for Come Dine with Me Romford thus starts, as all recipes do, with an image and description of the end result:

Anne’s Cafe, 8 August 2013

1 2

Rogoff, Irit. Smuggling; An Embodied Criticality. 2006. ww.eipcp.net/dlfiles/rogoff-smuggling/ Stackhouse,Christopher. (Mis)Reading Masquerades, Edited by Frédrique Bergholtz and Iberia Pérez

Anne’s Cafe was a pop-up cafe that was developed over three months in collaboration with a group of young artists associated with the Romford Contemporary Art Programme (RCAP). It served tea, coffee, orange squash, biscuits, sweet pasta pudding, tinned rice pudding and tinned fruit on a pay-what-you-can basis. It took place from 5 - 8pm on 8 August 2013 in a recently vacated cafe in the Quadrant Arcade in Romford, as part of the Non-Institute for Collaborative Happenings and Endeavours’ (NICHE) ‘graduation’ celebrations. It raised £55 for the Harold Hill Foodbank. Inside the cafe, a television set played a video on loop of a daytime television show called ‘Ready Steady Mook’, (see lexicon) a recorded performance led by the NO Collective, whose statement appears in the appendix to this publication. Next in a recipe comes the ingredient list, which should include everything that contributed to that final outcome. The ingredient list here, for instance, might include items such as: ● ● ● ● ●

However many collaborators you can find A few glugs of criticality One blog (www.comedinewithmeromford.tumblr.com) A dash of luck Enough pints of beer to taste

The instructions usually follow the ingredients and any good chef will tell you that it’s crucial to fully read the instructions before donning an apron in order to understand how the dish is crafted. The instructions for Come Dine with Me Romford should have just one entry and it should be held foremost in the mind throughout the entire cooking operation. That instruction is: privilege the process. In the attempt to de-hierarchise the traditional means of research by holding throwaway comments said over pints of ale, nebulous emotions, and pop culture references on the same page as critical theory, what becomes crucial is how these resources are navigated. This is why the project adopts a manner of 2 working elsewhere described as “contemplation interrupted by action.” As Sarah Walters said during a Skype meeting: I just got back from a meeting with a curator in Helsinki and the whole discussion was around following the project and how sometimes the mistakes become the work. How you shouldn’t be 3 too set on the original end goal. You should just go with the project. They’re the best type. Here, though, we hit a snag: the final element of a recipe can’t be printed. It’s the sense, affect or general vibe (see lexicon) that the recipe conjures up for you. If I cast my mind back to the start of the project when the recipe was still under development, a few things were certain. I knew there would be moments of doubt and despair (more on those later), as well as, hopefully, moments of joy and delight (more on those later too).

Stackhouse,Christopher. (Mis)Reading Masquerades, Edited by Frédrique Bergholtz and Iberia Pérez Revolver. 2010. http://bombsite.com/issues/113/articles/3659 3 Sarah Walters, group meeting 10 July 2013

But over and above those hypotheses, I knew was in a place of precarity. All I had, really, was a sketchy idea manifest as a vague question: what global conditions and political possibilities can I inhabit through a collaborative, food-related, localised event? That same question still circulates now, although a series of other questions have been added: How does knowledge travel across discursive spheres? What happens in the space between the theoretical/political/artistic? How do you explain the political?

How can the tension between the radical and the everyday be used to generate new knowledges? Where do the personal, the interpersonal and the impersonal meet? What can the local tell us about the national, the regional, the global? What happens when affect becomes effect? In the future, will we all be artists (politicians)?

Natalie Bays, comment written on draft of dissertation. August 22 2013

SEDUCING COLLABORATORS The below is an email sent to 16 artists associated with the Romford Contemporary Arts Programme (RCAP). It was sent on my behalf by the institution’s curator, Sarah Walters, on Friday 7 June 2013. Dear all, My name is Jess and I’m working on my MA in Global Arts dissertation at Goldsmiths College. Most of my classmates are writing about authors like the French philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy, who writes stuff like: “The question posed by the world in formation is this one: how to do justice to the infinite in act, of which infinite potentiality is the exact reverse?" I’ve decided to do something a bit different. With your help, I want to do a project in Romford that allows me to think about all this amazing theory but in a much more interesting way than sitting in my bedroom, all alone, sometimes crying a little bit when things get confusing. If I was trying to impress you, I’d say: “Come Dine with Me Romford (working title) is a deeply localised and collaboratively-run project to develop a food-related event which aims to better understand emerging global conditions and political possibilities. It adopts Irit Rogoff’s notion of an ‘embodied criticality’, whereby researchers work in a manner of active inhabitation rather than distanced examination. The current list of global conditions and political possibilities which it might be able to elucidate are the debates over relational aesthetics and its political potential, contemporary radicality and collectivity politics, ‘thingness’, eco-aesthetics, ‘System D’, and the constraints and opportunities certain discursive frameworks present." If I was trying to convince you to work collaboratively with me, I’d say: “Come Dine with Me Romford (working title) will be super interesting and will involve art and politics and food and alternative forms of learning and maybe some sneakiness" On Thursday 13 June at 7pm at the Romford Town Hall I’ll be doing what will hopefully be the most serious and hierarchical aspect of the project - I’ll be delivering the presentation on my dissertation that I did just this week at Goldsmiths. Please come along to find out more, or to tell me where I’m going wrong. I would love to see you there! Jess

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

A still from the Come Dine with Me television show ‘Come Dine with Me Romford’: An invitation to a group of artists to work collaboratively to ‘develop a food-related project’. ‘Come Dine with Me’: A cultural reference to the name of a popular UK reality television show where competitors host dinner parties to “win a thousand pound cash prize”, used, in some small way, to 5 ‘seduce collaborators’. (At the first meeting, some thought they were there for the television show. ) ‘Me’: A deeply reflexive personal journey. ‘Romford’: The geographic location of a local project with global resonance.

Natalie Bays suggestion, comment written on dissertation draft. 22 August 2013

GLOBAL AGITATION (see lexicon) Agitation: noun, persistent urging of a political or social cause or theory before the public

Demonstration in Madrid May 15 2011. Photo credit: Olmo Calvo When you look at the global situation you sense there is a volcanic situation bubbling beneath the surface of society and you never know when and where it is going to explode next. 7 David Harvey, 2013 In order to understand the global resonance of Come Dine with Me Romford, it is necessary to outline the new political possibilities which are beginning to emerge in which prioritisation is given to collaboration and collectivity. The first realisations were the events that began in late 2010 and constitute what became popularly known as the Arab Spring. Subsequent years have seen contextually different but ideologically aligned movements manifest in flashpoints across the globe - from the various guises of Occupy, through to the battles taking place now in Turkey, Brazil, and beyond. Place-specific differences abound, but underlying these possibilities are three components which, when taken together, constitute what is here termed a broader ‘global agitation’. What the future holds for these movements is far from certain, but read as a whole they mount a powerful systemic critique which is both in the here and now, and of the here and now.

Dictionary.com. Agitation. 2013. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/agitation?s=t The Occupied Times. Preoccupying: an interview with David Harvey, 16 August. 2013. http://www.opendemocracy.net/ourkingdom/david-harvey/preoccupying-interview-with-david-harvey 7

The three components of the global agitation Component one: structural critique The first component of this global agitation is structural and it reflects an immense dissatisfaction at the failings of the overarching systems that govern our contemporary milieu: essentially, neoliberalism and the various political infrastructures that enable it concentrate power in too-few hands. The distinction between the political and the economic is perhaps unnecessary - the former is now utterly subservient to the latter. This concentration of power continues to narrow and in addition, the failures of contemporary political structures to adequately recompense for the damages wrought by capitalisms ongoing devastations have resulted in a series of systemic acts of violence that manifest everywhere, and are determined by the lack of an identifiable culprit. Component two: collectivity In reaction to these structural failings, the second element is collectivity. The global agitation draws both its legitimacy and its modus operandi from the sheer magnitude of bodies that line the streets demanding change. The assertion that is slowly being crystalised is a fundamental rethinking of the role of the individual in relation to the masses: within these new manifestations an individual becomes inextricable from her peers. Salient here are the actual techniques and strategies that are being haltingly experimented with in order to generate mass consensus - from the human microphones used during Occupy, to the hashtags that channel swells of sentiment online. In addition, these experiments suggest a shift in our understanding of how we might work together better. A possibility that is surfacing is that it might be more sustainable to find structures that enable us to work towards our own selfish goals that in the end have commonalities, rather than collectively work towards common goals.

Component three: individual The final component is fuelled by the responsibility that this alternative conception of the populace generates. This is the move towards self-education (and politicisation) and it consists in the adoption of a pragmatic approach to effecting change by starting with yourself, and in the form of self-education. ‘Occupy yourself’, for instance, is about channelling your “energy towards being the solution instead of 8 holding a sign while complaining about the problem.”

Sasqwach.net. Occupy Yourself - Not The Street. 2012. www.sasqwach.net/?p=68

PANTENE RADICALITY (see lexicon) Within this triptych of the structural, the collective and the self, how is the future being conceptualised by these forces? The first point is that the future is actually being conceptualised. Leftist thought in 2013 is frequently characterised by an inertia - “left complaining or whining might even be the primary mode of left 9 theorising today” , and this must be counteracted by actual visions of what the future could hold. Part of this involves the development of new vocabularies. As Irit Rogoff argues; The excitement seems to be that these are not just protest movements but that they are actually 10 an effort to challenge and change the terminology which dominates political discourse. This is precisely why Come Dine with Me Romford has it’s own linguistic lexicon, as well a number of nonlinguistic vocabularies. What, then, are these vocabularies imagining? Beyond a more just distribution of power, the central tenet is that there is no blueprint that can be slid from locale to locale. One conceptualisation of what this means is provided by Saul Newman, who argues that in light of the contemporary practices which seek alternatives beyond the state and capital, a reconsideration of anarchy becomes salient. Instead of disorder, he argues that anarchy recognises a “rational, non-hierarchical order immanent in social relations and emerging organically from below”, which he describes as a ‘project of ordered disorder’. He develops a theory of postanarchist political space, which is indeterminate, contingent and heterogenous - a space where lines and contours are undecidable 11 and therefore contestable. Postanarchist political space is, in other words, a space of becoming. This bears parallels with what Ross Gibson calls ‘complex parochialism’. For Gibson, complexity refers to the promise of ongoing instability and constant change, while parochialism refers to the process of 12 developing an intimacy with a small geographic locale. Essentially, within both of these conceptualisations is a future which is local, but also unstable, and which must be made and remade at every moment. It is in precisely this remaking that change occurs. Henceforth, the question becomes one of radicality - to what extent are these changes cosmetic? Three definitions of radicality are useful to determine the type of change being conceptualised here: rad·i·cal (r d -k l)adj. 1. Arising from or going to a root or source; basic.

Dean, Jodi. Politics without Politics. Parallex. Volume 15, Number 3. 2009. p. 21 Irit Rogoff. Learning from the Future. 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnUPs3VXdw0 11 Newman, Saul. Postanarchism and space: Revolutionary fantasies and autonomous zones, Planning Theory. Volume 10, number 4. November 2011, p. 12 12 Gibson, Ross. Attunement and Agility. In Empires, Ruins + Networks. The Transcultural Agenda in Art. Scott McQuire and Nikos Papastergiadis (eds). Rivers Oram Press, 2005. p. 270 10

2. Departing markedly from the usual or customary; extreme. 3. Favoring or effecting fundamental or revolutionary changes in current practices, 13 conditions, or institutions. Most radical thought is characterised by the second characteristic - and this is all too often where things go wrong: It may be that revolutions ultimately fail precisely because they are totalising discourse - because, in other words, they propose an absolute break with existing conditions and a radical 14 transformation of the totality of social relations. Rather than push for sudden dramatic overhaul, the understanding of radicality adopted here suggests that change is meaningful and sustainable when it is a combination of the first definition (going to the root or source - namely the individual, the collective and the structural), and the third definition (favoring or effecting fundamental changes in current practices). Another element of this radicality is temporal. 27 seconds into this Pantene shampoo commercial from the early nineties, model Rachel Hunter says 15 that if you start using the shampoo she’s flogging, “it won’t happen overnight, but it will happen.”

In the global agitation the Pantene mantra rings true: it is essential that an awareness of the temporal scale necessary to create meaningful change is maintained, alongside that most scorned of desires -

The Free Dictionary. Radical. 2013. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/radical Newman, Saul. Postanarchism and space: Revolutionary fantasies and autonomous zones, Planning Theory. Volume 10, number 4. November 2011, p. 7 15 Pantene. Advertisement. Unknown date, early 1990’s. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7EweM_ILVt4#action=share 14

hope. The three elements of contemporary resistance - a critique of existing structures, experimentation with the strategies and techniques of collectivity, and the processes of self-education - can’t happen overnight. Thus, while the broader global critique is rightly called the global agitation, instantiations like Come Dine with Me Romford are better understood as examples of Pantene radicality. This distinction between the global agitation and instances of Pantene radicality is helpful in highlighting that the properly global structural critique is yet to arrive. William and Srnicek argue that what is now needed in terms of these (re)negotiations of power is a qualitative shift at the level of... emergent effects, that is to say, in terms of the resonance between different kinds of agents working on different projects at different levels (local, regional, 16 transnational, global).

Srnicek, Nick and Alex Williams, #ACCELERATE MANIFESTO for an Accelerationist Politics, 2013, http://criticallegalthinking.com/2013/05/14/accelerate-manifesto-for-an-accelerationist-politics/

ART AS A NON-PLACE (see lexicon) As a collaborative project, Come Dine with Me Romford is understood as an example of Pantene radicality, but it operates within an artistic context. How, then, to assess its contribution? In a milieu where the political arena seems increasingly compromised, it would appear that aesthetics (specifically the interdisciplinarity of contemporary art practices) is being ever more 17 called upon to provide both insight into politics itself and the stimuli for social change. Anthony Downey, 2007 Art practices with a collaborative nature have, in recent years, become somewhat omnipresent. They span a multitude of agendas, agents, locations and types of collaboration. At their heart, however, the approach to artistic practice in which “process, performativity, openness, social contexts, transitivity and 18 the production of dialogue” , termed variously relational aesthetics, socially engaged practice, 19 participatory art, or any number of other titles , shares with the global agitation a similar interest in the components identified above. These practices in some way challenge existing structures, they explore the limits and meaning of collectivity, and they manifest a deep examination of individual subjectivity in the form of self-education. In their rethinking of the power relations at the nucleus of artistic activity, “the works seeks to forge a 20 collective, co-authoring, participatory social body” which parallels the alternative power structures being evoked through the global agitation. However, the relationship between these practices and broader processes of change is complex. One assessment of that relation is provided by Dimitris Vardoulakis, who uses the notion of a ‘critical stance’. This expresses a dissatisfaction with the ubiquitous claim that ‘everything is political’: if all the cultural practices that occur within a state are termed political, in effect that assumes the total state. Vardoulakis is also reluctant to assign ‘the political’ a separate category above everything else because it denies the agency other things, like art or theory, can have. Vardoulakis determines that neither of these positions (that everything is political or the political trumps everything) are satisfactory. Instead, he proposes a malleable and open critical stance between them, which would not be “an independent space, but one that arises as a stance against the other two 21 construals.”

Downey, Anthony. Towards a Politics of (Relational) Aesthetics. Third Text . 01 May 2007. http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713448411. p. 275 18 Radical Culture Research Collective. A Very Short Critique of Relational Aesthetics. 2007. http://transform.eipcp.net/correspondence/1196340894#redir#redir 19 It should be noted that each of these terms carries with it a specific trajectory of thought, which there is insufficient space to address here. 20 Bishop, Claire. Artificial Hells: Participatory Art and the Politics of Spectatorship. Verso Books, 2012. p. 275 21 Vardoulakis, Dimitris. Editorial. Parallax - Critical Praxis. Volume 16, number 4. 2010. p. 2

What this stance highlights is a crucial component of the conceptualisation of the global agitation. His first position - that if everything is political then it suggests the total state - is very much rooted in an assessment of politics based in the here and now. There are other alternatives to the outcome he assumes. As indicated earlier, it is important to supplant left theorising with visions of possible futures - what 22 Newman, quoting Miguel Abensor, calls an ‘education of desire.’ Therefore what is fundamental to the global agitation is the positioning of a utopian future. In this future, which art helps us to imagine, we could all be (part-time) artists and we could all be (part-time) politicians. That is essentially what a dramatic redress of power would entail if the global agitation were taken to it’s logical end. In this future, Vardoulakis’s ‘everything is political’ would become a force of agency rather than a force of domination. As with the need to merge ends and means in the global agitation, what this utopian future also suggests is that art can be a tool to act in the now. As someone concerned with creating Pantene radicality, how might the characteristics that are specific or intrinsic to art be deployed to this end? In an attempt to undo some of the more elaborate claims for the centrality of art in these processes, and to in effect release some of the imagined burden and hyperbole that the art world frequently attaches to the significance, Claire Bishop suggests that; We need to recognise art as a form of experimental activity overlapping with the world, whose negativity may lend support towards a political project (without bearing the sole responsibility for devising and implementing it), and - more radically - we need to support the progressive transformation of existing institutions through the transversal encroachment of ideas whose 23 boldness is related to (and at times greater than) that of artistic imagination. This is a precise assessment of the role collaborative art should play in the global agitation now. Bishop’s use of the term ‘overlap’ is echoed in a quote from Bobby Sayers, a collaborator in the project, who sees art as occupying what he called a ‘non-place’ (he wasn’t aware of the book by Mark Auge of the same name): for me, art exists in this sort of place... it’s sort of like a non-place in society. It allows for certain 24 flexibility. Collaborative art is therefore understood here as occupying a non-place (for now), where it is both life/not life and politics/not politics. And it is in the tension between these positions that new knowledges are generated. Kim Charnley, for instance, argues that the fundamental contradiction in collaborative art practices exists because art suggests a realm of unlimited expressive space, while collaboration by its very nature entails the social, and thus social stratification. He argues that while this inconsistency could act to shut down other possibilities, it also has “the potential to act as the ground of experimentation and disciplinary openness.” The non-place of art thus becomes a site for experimentation, which Charnley calls ‘listening’,

Newman. p. 14 Bishop. p. 284 24 Bobby Sayers, group meeting 11 July 2013. 23

where the views of the (collaboratively/artistically) uninitiated are held alongside the (collaboratively/artistically) initiated. Accordingly, by maintaining “a suspicion and a discontent” between 25 these two positions within collaborative art projects, new knowledges can come to light. On a subjective level, what is inherent in Charnley’s understanding of art as an expressive space is a further strand of how arts non-place can work cognitively: I’ve been starting to wonder if the word ‘art’ is just a conceptual tool for the person making the work, because it gives you more freedom. So if you tell yourself - ‘I’m making a piece of art’, you get to do things in a bit... it allows you to think differently than if you think ‘I’m doing a social 26 change project.’ At an interpersonal level, ‘listening’ mirrors the ethos of radical pedagogy. By eliminating the distinction between student and teacher, we become constantly engaged in processes of questioning and processes of change, and all on the understanding that insights must be generated in both directions. To revert back to the methodology adopted here, what this means is a constant segue between insight and investigations and an openness and perhaps humility towards the inevitability of constant change. Finally, Stephen Wright suggests taking arts non-place to the extreme. He argues that “if it is sincere about its political engagement, art must sacrifice its coefficient of artistic visibility altogether.” His premise is that art must forgo its essential characteristics - namely the artwork, authorship and spectatorship because in labelling something art, we are also saying that it is ‘just’ art. He proposes the term ‘stealth art’ 27 which he describes as “a clandestine border crosser, like the secret agent.” Within the non-place of art are thus nestled a number of other positions, and these collectively create a smorgasbord of tools that can be deployed as a Pantene radicality demands; listening, radical pedagogy, a cognitive element and finally sneakiness. This is by no means an exhaustive list. It relates specifically to this project and it has been informed by an attention to process. How, then, to examine the deployment of this set of tools from the non-place of art in Come Dine with Me Romford, a Pantene radicality? Grant Kester suggests that in order to understand how collaborative art practices manifest an alternative set of values to what he terms ‘neoliberal development’, it is necessary to establish the strategic relationship between a given project and the larger processes of globalisation through a situational analysis of both the individual participants and the 28 various institutional or organizational actors involved This quote sums up precisely what is being attempted here - a situational analysis of one art project, from the position of art’s non-place, and the challenge it poses to ‘neoliberal development’.

Charnley, Kim. Dissensus and the politics of collaborative practice. Art & the Public Sphere. Volume 1, number 1. 2011 26 Me, in conversation with the group 11 July 2013 27 Wright, Stephen. Spy Art: Infiltrating the Real. Afterimage. Volume 34, Issue 12. 2006. 28 Kester, Grant. The One and the Many: Contemporary Collaborative Art in a Global Context. Duke University Press, 2011. p. 125

OR, THE CARDBOARD REVOLUTION (see lexicon)

Anne’s Cafe, 8 August 2013 The set-up for Anne’s Cafe and the NICHE graduation involved a number of signs being crafted from cardboard, as can be seen in the image above. One passerby stopped and asked, “are you part of the cardboard revolution?” When queried, she confirmed that she came up with the term herself. Call it what you will - Come Dine with Me Romford, Anne’s Cafe, Pantene radicality, cardboard revolution - the answer to our passerby’s question? A resounding yes.

AGITATION TREPIDATION But that ‘yes’ is not without some trepidation. John Kelsey argues that collaborative art is incorrectly interpreted as a practice of ‘communal experience’ when it is actually “a capitalist-realist adaptation of art 29 to the experience economy.” So are these practices are simply another manifestation of the neo-liberal hegemony? Is post-capitalism even possible? If it is, how will it be realised? On a personal level, as someone throwing money at a Pantene radicality, am I a ‘liberal communist’ - the 30 worst of the worst according to Žižek - who should be taken outside and shot? In essence, is the type of radicality being advanced here enough? These questions swoop and dive.

Kelsey, John. Next Level Spleen. Dis Magazine. 2012. http://dismagazine.com/blog/37146/next-levelspleen-by-john-kelsey/ 30 Žižek, Slavoj. Violence: Six Sideways Glances. Picador. 2008. p. 39

CHRONOLOGY 21 March

Proposal for course titled Come Dine with Me Romford submitted to Sarah Walters. Sarah led a collaboratively-run project called the ‘Non-Institute for Collaborative Happenings and Events’ (NICHE), which resulted in a series of twelve ‘courses’ led by creatives for young people in Romford

15 April

“I'm sorry to say that on this occasion your proposal wasn't selected.... p.s. I was really very disappointed to let your project go - if you are interested I'd be very keen to talk to you about adapting it to a one night event or something similar.”

25 April

Meeting at Havering College with the group of artists involved in NICHE

10 June

Email to potential collaborators (included earlier)

13 June

First group meeting: Havering Town Hall, presentation from Goldsmiths MA Symposium + questions + chocolate and cornflake cookies

20 June

Second group meeting: Golden Lion pub, mapping exercise of Romford’s food (see appendix) + beer/cider/wine/packets of crisps

27 June

Third group meeting: NICHE, Quadrant Arcade, response to critiques of project + foodrelated ‘issue mapping’ + cheese scones

4 July

Fourth group meeting: Romford Arts Festival opening + NO Collective performance + discussion at the Golden Lion pub + ‘Anzac’ biscuits/beers/ciders/wine/Coca Cola

10 July

Fifth group meeting: Goldsmiths + Skype/call in + introduction to project for Helge Mooshammer, dissertation supervisor + tea/coffee/digestives

11 July

Sixth group meeting: NICHE, networks in Romford/working with local businesses + cheese and cucumber sandwiches/beer

18 July

Seventh group meeting: Golden Lion pub, discussion of issues + beer/cider/wine

25 July

Eighth group meeting: Harold Hill food bank visit + lemon drizzle cake (for Joe in light of his birthday)

1 August

Ninth group meeting: Quadrant Arcade, location of final event + proposals + apricot and chocolate flapjacks/fruit loaf (the latter from Joe, to say thank you for lemon drizzle cake and to return cake tin)

7 August

Tenth group meeting: ‘sweet pasta pudding’ baking at Jess’s house in Hackney + filming of NO Collective performance + macaroni cheese/beers/Pineapple Lumps

8 August

Anne’s Cafe: Join the Revolution. Pop-up cafe as part of the ‘NICHE Bazaar’, Quadrant Arcade, Romford. Tea/coffee/biscuits/tinned rice pudding/jam/tinned fruit/’sweet pasta pudding’

Also pie, mash and liquor/beers/ciders/£1.50 Jagerbombs/cream cheese ‘Wacky Bagel’ at 3am

vodka

and

lemonades

£4

15 August

Afternoon: trip to Whitechapel gallery to see The Spirit of Utopia show, namely Pedro Reyes’s Sanatorium Evening: “'Come dine with me' themed dinner in Rayleigh on thursday anyone? - will include a jacuzzi - And edible dinner... X” (from Natalie) Capri salad/cheese/French loaf/baked peppers/dauphinoise potato/green salad/green beans/’jacuzzi tiramisu’

28 August

‘Casual Wednesday drinks’ + Vietnamese dinner

7 September

‘Book launch’/RCAP ‘rcamping’ trip - menu to be determined

COMPONENT 1: STRUCTURAL The first component of the global agitation is structural and the failures of our economic and political structures are everywhere: Mark: The thing is, you have to go to the Jobcentre every week. Nat: I think it’s Tuesday? Mark: Yeah. One of our volunteers, his wife had a baby and he had to get to the hospital to sort all that out. And eight weeks of benefit stopped [clicks fingers], just like that. Because he didn't make that appointment. Even though he rung them up and said ‘I can’t come.’ That’s not good. That sort of thing, I don’t know if that’s true, I’m only coming in and telling you things that clients who’ve come in here telling me their stories have said, so I don’t know... but I’m hearing a lot of that sort of thing. Nat: I think you can apply for a day off, but you have to apply a week in advance to change your day. Louise: But if you’re having a miscarriage, how do you know what day...? Because that’s a scenario I’ve met when I’ve gone down to fight for people. It can take five to six weeks till it’ll be sorted out. Mark: I can see both sides of it - I think benefits do need to be cut. The whole system is wrong when people are getting more on benefits than people who are working. The system is all back to front. But then, we’re here trying to plug that gap, one day at a time, until this country tries to sort itself 31 out.

Mark Reeves (Harold Hill Foodbank manager) in conversation with Lois Mackie(foodbank volunteer) and group. 25 July 2013

FOOD AS A SYSTEMIC VIOLENCE The structural critique that Come Dine with Me Romford advances proceeds on the understanding that food exists as a powerful systemic violence, understood as “the often catastrophic consequences of the 32 smooth functioning of our economic and political systems.” It refers to the less overt form of violence 33 which works to maintain structures of domination , and which is “no longer attributable to concrete 34 individuals and their "evil" intentions, but is purely "objective", systemic, anonymous.” In order to understand Come Dine with Me Romford’s structural critique of the systemic violence of food from the position of the non-place of art, it is necessary to unravel the project's relationship to the structures in which it operated. Thus, the analysis here begins with the local - the Romford Contemporary Arts Programme (RCAP), and the Non-Institute for Collaborative Happenings and Endeavours (NICHE), the Harold Hill Foodbank, Havering Council. It addresses the national - namely the UK government and the Trussell Trust, the umbrella organisation behind the foodbank. Finally, it must also encapsulate the global - namely, the neoliberal world order and the global agitation.

To elucidate the systemic violence of food at each of these scales: it is estimated that between 30% and 35 50% of the world’s food is wasted every year, yet almost one in eight people suffer from chronic

Žižek. p. 1 Žižek. p. 9 34 Žižek. p. 13 35 BBC. UK supermarkets reject 'wasted food' report claims. 2013. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk20968076 33

malnutrition. In the UK today, the sixth richest country in the world, one in five people live below the (UK) poverty line, meaning their ability to purchase food is subject to the apparent weekly whim of other 37 bills - emergency dental work, for instance. Extreme food waste occurs here also: around about 15 38 million tonnes of food goes to landfill each year. At the time of writing, there are three foodbanks in Romford (and the number of foodbanks in the UK continues to grow). From the global to the local, the story in Romford is the same: the Harold Hill Foodbank covers a small geographic area but gave 144 families “crisis food supplies” in April and May 39 2013. And it is systemic dysfunctions in our economic and political systems which prompt the vast majority of foodbank visits - the three biggest reasons why people have claimed food parcels from foodbanks run by the Trussell Trust in the past year, for instance, are benefit delays at 30%, low income at 18%, and 40 benefit changes at 15%.

United Nations News Report. Nearly 870 million people chronically undernourished, says new UN hunger report. 2012. http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=43235#.UiMpL7yi3Zt 37 Louise, a volunteer at the foodbank - “I didn’t realise that I’d have to pay for dental work. So I had to take a loan out to pay for dental work.” Meeting 25 July 2013 38 BBC 39 Harold Hill Foodbank. Newsletter. June 2013 40 The Trussell Trust. Press release: Biggest ever increase in UK foodbank use: 40 170% rise in numbers turning to foodbanks in last 12 months. 2013. http://www.trusselltrust.org/stats

LOCAL Furthering the claim that art does indeed only ‘overlap’ with the world, Claire Bishop argues that the responsibility for change cannot and should not lie with art alone. “At a certain point”, she suggests, “art has to hand over to other institutions if social change is to be achieved: it is not enough to keep producing 41 activist art.” Taking this theme further is the Radical Culture Research Collective (RCRC). They suggest that if collaborative art practices are “to be politically relevant and effective, such experiments need to be grounded in (or at least actively linked to) social movements and struggles.” In order to qualify as a social movement the group must be “trying to organize themselves to find a way beyond the system of 42 exploitative relations.” These positions thus suggest that one way for art to be radical if its non-place can be countered (not eliminated) by an active linkage to social struggles, and this was realised here: Come Dine with Me Romford found its focus following a tour of the Harold Hill Foodbank and a discussion with manager Mark Reeves and Lois Mackie, a volunteer. The postanarchic political spaces Saul Newman alludes to are characterised by the fact that these

“autonomous spaces, social practices and relations are not not striated, conditioned, or ‘captured’ by 43

statist and capitalist modes of organisation.” The Harold Hill Foodbank doesn’t fit this bill in its entirety. Instead a Pantene radicality – slow, going to the root or source, and favoring or effecting fundamental change in practice - is evident. This notion is strengthened when combined with the idea of ‘seepage’, as developed by the Raqs Media Collective, which exists when a stable structure is gradually made unstable by the infiltration of other currents. On its own, seepage is not an alternative form; it even needs the structure to become what it is - but it creates 44 new conditions in which structures become fragile and are rendered difficult to sustain. To evidence this ‘Pantene seepage’: in order to use the Harold Hill Foodbank, individuals must be given vouchers by a government agency, and they are only allowed three vouchers in a six month period. At the foodbank’s discretion this can be flouted: We’re really only here to support those other agencies. So as long as they’re supporting the client, then we’re more than happy to continue the service a little bit longer and give them more than three vouchers. But the idea is that we don’t want people to just rely on it, and turn up every 45 week.

Bishop. p. 283 Radical Culture Research Collective 43 Newman, Saul. Postanarchism and space: Revolutionary fantasies and autonomous zones, Planning Theory. Volume 10, number 4. 2011. p. 2. 44 Raqs Media Collective, quoted in Rogoff, Irit. Smuggling; An Embodied Criticality. 2006. ww.eipcp.net/dlfiles/rogoff-smuggling/ 45 Mark Reeves, 25 July 2013. 42

The act of seepage occurs at these moments of ‘support’ for other agencies. Local foodbanks essentially provide services which until recently have been provided by the state, but from within the state structure itself. In addition, because it is run on donations and volunteers it in some way begins to operates beyond capitalist relations, inasmuch as that as feasible. The RCRC also argue that although there are instances of fruitful collaborations between activists and art projects, all too often institutions get in the way, meaning that “what we see too much of is the appropriation and displacement of social desire from the streets into the aesthetic forms and administered 46 circuits of art.” To what extent then do the Romford Contemporary Arts Programme (RCAP), and the Non-Institute for Collaborative Happenings and Endeavours (NICHE), fit that bill?

NICHE, in Romford’s Quadrant Arcade. 12 July 2013 As with the foodbank, both exhibit characteristics of Pantene seepage, particularly as it pertains to their relationship to Havering Council, who funded these projects in their entirety. Both projects were organised collaboratively, and in many ways this is a direct critique of other youth service provisions in the area. What is more interesting is the Council’s decision to fund the projects. As per Bishop’s argument that “we need to support the progressive transformation of existing institutions through the transversal 47 encroachment of ideas” , what is clearly evident here is an element of internal radicality. So given these relationships, how did the actual insurrectional particularities of the alignment between RCAP, NICHE, the Council and the foodbank manifest in Come Dine with Me Romford? Or in other words, how did it manifest within the non-place of art? The project’s characteristics were determined by process; by the situation in Romford as our research understood it, and by the debates we had as a group. Two aspects of Anne’s Cafe shed light of what the non-place of art brings to this particular Pantene radicality.

46 47

Bishop, 2012. RCRC, 2008.

1. The menu was directly determined by the types of foods given away by the foodbank. This included a homemade ‘Sweet Pasta Pudding’ consisting of cooked pasta, custard 48 powder, milk and sugar.

The remnants of the ‘Sweet Pasta Pudding’ At the second group meeting, a heated discussion teased out some of the issues around foodbanks, and in particular whether or not people using the foodbanks were ‘really’ in need, or simply lazy. The visit to Harold Hill Foodbank was described as an ‘eye-opener’, especially in terms of the types of food given away. In Anne’s Cafe, the decision to use food from the foodbank thus worked as a (sneaky) 49 underscoring of the realities of the foodbank, wholly enabled by the non-place of art. 2. The designs for the cafe (see appendix) included a ‘menu’ with facts about foodbanks in the UK, ‘broadsheets’ with a selection of newspaper articles from the cafe, and decorative posters featuring food from the foodbank. In addition, £55 was raised for the foodbank (including two £10 donations from members of Havering Council). The following exchange took place during a discussion about how ‘difficult’ art should be. The group had copies of the following quote, from a piece by Negar Azimi, which includes the notion of Easy Listening Art, a term Adrian Piper coined for art that is suitably interesting, but not challenging: Easy Listening Art in the name of the political leads to the sedation of our aesthetic and critical appetites. In the end, art that stems from knowing that we actually don’t have all the answers, art 50 that refuses to serve as a moral compass, art that doesn’t ‘make nice’ may be our best hope. One of the positions in our discussion was: Joe: I think that if you’re working in a community, it has to be Easy Listening. Say like, Romford, if you’re gonna to do something more complicated, more sensational and stuff, people just won’t get it. I think when you’re dealing with a community that’s not used to the art world or that’s not interested doing something that’s easy listening is a way to…

Despite considerable trepidation the pudding was all eaten. “It wasn’t at all horrid”, according to Rebecca Joseph. In conversation 14 August 2013. 49 Credit to Natalie Bays for this point - comment written on draft of dissertation 22 August 2013 50 Azimi, Negar. Good Intentions. Frieze magazine. 1 March 2011

Nat: …get them listening at all.

The suspicion and discontent Charnley advocates are apparent here - and as Charnley indicates, this is precisely where new knowledge was generated. In this instance, the straightforward and unequivocal support for the foodbank at the expense of something more sophisticated suggests that at a local level, this might be more significant: I think the cafe is brilliant. It's a fantastic idea, because it completely brings you back to the point that you're trying to get across. You're creating the environment that someone who, um, potentially was using a food bank, might be a part of. So that's what I think of the cafe. And in terms of the food bank well, yeah as I mentioned, I have to say I was probably quite ignorant to the statistics, to what actually goes on, to how people live their lives literally on the 52 breadline.

Comment left in Anne’s Café, 8 August 2013

51 52

11 July 2013 Natalie Campbell, 8 August 2013

NATIONAL Jess: I don't know if this is a personal question or a professional question Mary: Yup? Jess: But what do you think about the fact that organisations like the Trussell Trust are sort of Mary: I think they're very good. They're filling a new gap in society. Because I work for the Council, the problem is that we can only do certain things and the money's being squeezed all the time. And there's these gaps, holes in the fabric of society. First of all it's unreasonable to expect Councils to formally respond to every need in society. Individuals need to do something. But there's another thing about finding ways of working together, so anything like this is good 53 because it starts challenging the status quo. That's my theory. To shift to the national: a number of interviews, conversations and exchanges took place throughout the development of Come Dine with Me Romford and these make up a significant component of the project. They are characteristic of the non-place of art; they are both life/not life at the same time. They are highlighted here because the insights gleaned during these exchanges provide an entry point into the project’s structural critique at a national level. When reforms to the UK’s welfare benefit system were introduced in April 2013, the Harold Hill Foodbank found that “turnover doubled overnight. From the previous two quarters we’d seen forty vouchers a month, 54 it doubled to eighty.” This situation exemplifies systemic violence; despite the apparent causality between decisions made in Whitehall and the demand for foodbanks, for Mark Reeves, Žižek’s ‘anonymous systemic culprit’ - the smooth functioning of our economic and political systems - is entirely present: We’re really just here to try and help people get through a really bad patch. We can’t really fix it, and it’s nothing to do with politics as far as I’m concerned. It’s just... it’s just getting harder and 55 harder for everyone. His words evoke a wariness and a weariness at the current political climate which was echoed in the words of Molly Hodson from the Trussell Trust, who suggested that foodbanks are in the UK today something of a ‘political football’. So how to proceed? If we exploit the non-place of art by holding the political in check, and if we hold these frontline positions with a suspicion and a discontent alongside that of Žižek, the example provided by Mark and Molly indicates Pantene radicality can play out here too. In essence, a form of critique, which is stealthier and determined by the context, becomes possible.

Dr Mary Black, Director of Public Health, Havering. 8 August 2013 Mark Reeves. 25 July 2013. 55 Mark Reeves. 25 July 2013. 54

One might wish, for instance, to use a discussion with the Trussell Trust about a proposed art project to clarify what is meant by ‘politics’ and to float a notion of systemic fault in the national charity’s press office: Jess: Do you think it would be fair to say that in some ways it’s [the Trussell Trust’s apolitical position] about kind of trying to move away from it being about party politics [see lexion]? Molly Hodson: Exactly! It’s not about party politics...

Molly Hodson, Press Relations and Marketing Manager at the Trussell Trust. 2 August 2013

GLOBAL To segue to the global; what characterises the systemic violence of food in late 2013 is the neoliberal world order and the concentration of political power with which it goes hand-in-hand. In order to unravel it, a dismantling of the ‘anonymous systemic culprit’ is required. The characterisation of resistance at the local/national level in the form of Pantene radicality is repeated in the approach here too and this begins by unravelling Žižek’s ‘anonymous culprit’ with a more empowered approach to systemic violence. In order to do this, one potentiality is borrowed from the distinction Hannah Arendt proposes between ‘power’ and ‘violence’. In this conception, power is not located in the individual but is instead located in a group. Violence, on the other hand, is determined by its instrumental nature. Thus the existent (systemic) violence of food becomes something that we can collectively choose either to exercise our power over - or we can choose to maintain the status quo. As Arendt argues, “[e]verything depends on the power behind 57 the violence.” In this revised conception of the systemic violence of food, Žižek’s anonymous culprit is replaced by the power of the masses who can change these existing structures through Pantene radicality. Interrupting the global structural critique is thus the individual - the third component of the global agitation - who becomes an actor in the local with the global in mind. In terms of the development of Come Dine with Me Romford, it has already been noted that Anne’s Cafe found its focus following a visit to the foodbank: Going to the foodbank was good. I don’t usually go out of my way to engage with politics, but I’ve realised that I enjoy it when I do. 58 Rebecca Joseph, 2013 The role of arts non-place here, then, is as a method for accessing the political. It is salient that it is only one of many avenues. Rebecca’s words, for instance, can be added to Mark’s decision to apply for a job managing a foodbank, and Louise’s decision to volunteer there. As indicated earlier, what is missing from the global agitation is a properly global resonance between Pantene radicalities. How to begin to achieve this qualitative shift? The first element is a reclamation of ‘politics’. One of Natalie’s comments on a draft of this dissertation was ‘how do you explain the political: with reference to those who deny their engagement in the political?’ In many respects, it’s about simply using the term - the title of the blog for this project, for instance, was ‘a collaborative exploration of food, art and politics’. Other elements contribute to the global resonance too, in however small a way. This project takes the form of a publication as a gift to all the contributors, and a PDF version it is being circulated online. In addition, networks developed during the project are being utilised to further the project’s scope: Anne’s Cafe will manifest again at the Brentwood Road Gallery in 2014. But the crucial question, and the question being returned to again and again, is are these small beginnings enough?

57 58

Arendt, Hannah. On Violence. Harvest Books, 1970. p. 240 Rebecca Joseph. 14 August 2013

COMPONENT 2: COLLECTIVE “There is no single model for an effective organisation, at least not one that can be known fully in advance. Leftist politics therefore must become more experimental, less tied to certain ways of organising and acting which, whilst once effective, have now become blunted The question of organisation can only be resolved through experiment and reflection on the results of such 59 experiments.” Alex Williams and Nick Srnicek, 2013 The structural critique that the global agitation proposes is both fuelled and legitimised by a wide-ranging set of experiments with the processes of collectivity. “What we are now seeing in the Occupy Movement”, Judith Butler argues, “is precisely the development of a set of strategies that call attention to, and oppose, the reproduction of inequality.” Fundamental to this is the understanding that ends and means must be merged - if the power structures of the future must be more horizontal, those same power structures must be enacted now. The question Come Dine with Me Romford raises, however, is what the non-place of art brings to the experiments in collectivity in the global agitation. People who engage with the arts can be divided into two camps, according to art historian Dave Hickey. First there are the ‘participants’, the Looky Loos, the people ahead of the curve who surround themselves with their peers, create art, and give birth to the things that later on become known as art movements. And then there are the ‘spectators’, the people who turn up to look once the artists have been captured by institutions. Hickey argues that the professionalisation of the art world means that there is now less likelihood of young artists wanting to create participant culture around them - preferring instead to jump straight to the part where, from the comfort of an institutional setting, their work is made available to the spectators. This, according to Hickey, has serious implications for art in a democracy, where under optimal conditions, [art] is a game played by voluntary participants within the textures of the 60 larger world - a game without rules, coaches, referees, or, God help us, spectators. His emphasis on the importance of young artists creating ‘participant culture’ can become a (transversally slid) lesson for the global agitation. So, following Hickey, how do you create Looky Loos? The premise of ‘contemplation, interrupted by action’ works as a) a defining feature of collaborative art projects; b) a research methodology; c) a means to create Looky Loos; and d) a means to further the Pantene radicality. Another way to describe it is to call it ‘experi’ (see lexicon).

59 60

Srnicek and Williams Hickey, Dave. Air Guitar: Essays on Art and Democracy. Art Issues Press. 1997.

EXPERI exper r ’, from Latin - to try 61 As in experiment/experience This comes from Latin and means ‘to try’; processes of collectivity must operate through both experiment and experience. The affect created in these engagements with collectivity can be profound - what is difficult is turning it into words. It is impossible to convey the personal experience and complexity of these processes through language - at the very moment at which it is articulated, something is lost. Nevertheless, one must try… Food A principle vocabulary of experi used in Come Dine with Me Romford is that of food - and the focus on the edible manifest in a number of ways. The processes of cooking, eating, and sharing together formed a key aspect of the project and a selection of recipes from the project are included in the index.

My first pie, mash and liquor: Joe’s lemon drizzle birthday cake; James, Rebecca and Fraser at my house about to eat macaroni and cheese. Fraser’s first bite: “I’m in heaven.”

The Free Dictionary. Experiment. 2013. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/experiment

Still within the vocabulary of food, but slightly to one side is The Vocabulary of Jagerbombs (see lexicon):

At The Voodoo Lounge, a club in Romford, circa 2am 9 August 2013 So how does food change the dynamic of the project? As Helge Mooshammer, one of my dissertation supervisors explains: This idea of the food, you know the whole process of preparing food, this is not an overly controlled process. It’s kind of free-flowing, it loosens things up a bit. Isn’t that the whole point of 62 creating a more social environment? The emphasis here is on fun, enjoyment and pleasure, words which seem frivolous but are in fact deeply significant. What they underline is the need to merge ends and means - if we want better structures, we have to enact them in the here and now, and if we want those structures to be more enjoyable, make them more enjoyable now. More significantly, as mentioned, the focus of the project emerged following a discussion about ‘food politics’. As I blogged at the time: We’ve decided to try and engage and work with some of the local foodbanks in Romford. Around the table, some had direct experiences from their own past about seeing their parents go without in order to provide for their kids, or visiting friends, there not being enough food and so they had 63 to watch them eat. Food thus works to narrow the ‘overlap’ Bishop attests to - or, it perfectly embodies the non-place of art. It is at the same time life/not life, politics/not politics. It provides a platform for a collaborative art project

Helge Mooshammer. 10 July 2013. Adams, Jessica. Last Night’s Meeting, 2013. http://comedinewithmeromford.tumblr.com/post/55860708246/last-nights-meeting 63

which examines systemic violence and it is also a (sneaky?) method for creating Looky Loos who can further the global agitation. Connectives The second, fundamental aspect of experi in this project is the actual experience of working collaboratively as the fundamental instantiation of the need to merge ends and means. One way to analyse these processes is through the binary established by @shiftctrlesc that distinguishes between 64 collaboration as collectivity versus co-operation as connectivity:

Accordingly, “by linking selfish yet common acts together, connectives are able to empower individuals while creating new kinds of group value.” The question of radicality appears again - as @shiftctrlesc 65 argue, connectives are “fuelling most of the disruptive innovations of our time.” This is because connectives, being leaderless, are much closer to the underlying philosophy driving the global agitation. So how to assess how radical, how connective, Come Dine with Me Romford is? Working through each of the characteristics above is one potentiality. Characteristic one: single goal vs. selfish but common goals To begin with the goal of the project, which was established from day one. This was to ‘produce a food related event on 8 August’. At its heart, this makes it entirely collaborative in that we had a single group goal. But there are elements of connectivity here too. First, all of the participants were there on a

@shiftctrlesc, Cooperation vs collaboration. Undated. http://cloudhead.headmine.net/post/3279118157/cooperation-vs-collaboration 65 @shiftctrlesc

voluntary basis. Secondly, because we were operating from within RCAP, an artistic institution, the desire to create work and realise personal goals was already apparent. Characteristic two: shared identity vs. no shared identity A shared identity categorically existed within the group:

And this, crucially, was enabled by the existence of a number of social/professional/creative relationships and networks, as Natalie indicates in her artistâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s statement (included in the appendix). But this identity was also immensely fluid. A changing assembly of individuals appeared at each meeting from the original 16 approached for the project - some never appeared, some disappeared, others reappeared, a couple joined at the last moment and some contributed from afar. Characteristic three: hierarchy vs. self organised What enabled that fluid membership to actually produce something was the role I played as the mediating force between these various actors. The hierarchy inherent in this was consistently negotiated, and I tried to ensure that the emphasis was on each individual being able to contribute however they saw fit:

And small-scale empowerments did take place - the questioning and checking of each element of the project with me started to reduce, as group members began to take decisions for themselves.

ALTER-COLLABORATION (see lexicon) In order to actually deliver a project, the various elements of collectivity were crucial - a single goal, existing networks, a ‘leader’. But the aspects of connectivity - namely the component of self-interest - is where the real insights in the project lie. For me personally, my motivation was initially this dissertation, but this was in some ways supplanted by being able to combine, in one project, three of my favorite things - food, art, politics. For the others, reasons vary, but as Sarah explained how she perceived the motivations of the artists associated with RCAP: They want to improve their community for themselves. The artistic community that we're building, people aren't doing it because they think they want to make Romford a better place, because it's, you know, so wonderful to do community work. They're doing it because they get personal payback from that Otherwise why aren't they working in a charity shop? That’s how I felt about it. 66 But I think I might be being a bit mean! Sarah Walters, 14 July 2013 In order to conceptualise this mixed model it is possible to use what Joe Easeman called ‘alter67 collaboration’. In this, what gets privileged is finding means by which individual interests can be realised but is cognizant of what is needed to make a project actually happen. This mixed model is, once again, entirely characteristic of Pantene radicality.

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Sarah Walters. 14 July 2013. Joe Easeman. 28 August 2013.

COMPONENT 3: INDIVIDUAL Self-education is the final corner of the triangle that makes up the global agitation. The best means, then, by which to elucidate the utter centrality of this, as manifest in Come Dine with Me Romford, is through a discussion of my experience, my self-education and, essentially, my politicisation. Nick: I hope it’s been beneficial for you Jess? Jess: Oh man, I I’m not going to get too cheesy on it Nick: Jess, why don’t you? Jess: I’ve never ever been happier - I wake up and I just really want to work on this. Fraser: Don’t cry! Jess: No I won’t cry, but it’s just, you know, a really really exciting way to be working - yeah.

It is possible to distill in the following the exact moment the penny dropped as far as the project is concerned: Sarah: And from an even more political point of view, rather than the Council making decisions about, like, our town, if we all stand together we can make the decision about how our town looks. It doesn't have to be Cash Convertors and Poundshops. If enough of us stand together Jess: Yeah utterly, I mean that's kind of Well, to relate it to something that's like, much more macro-political, that’s the kind of thing I'm interested in in terms of Occupy, and all of these movements across the globe. I mean that's basically what's happening people are going, you know, the existing institutions fundamentally aren't working. We need to create new forms of democratic decision making, which are based on collaboration rather than Maybe that's the point. Sarah: Maybe that is the point. Maybe the food is vehicle for you to start getting that. That is a political message. And I'm not saying it's ok to indoctrinate people with it, but I agree with what 69 you're saying and it's like, maybe it's about empowering the community What has slowly became apparent is that this has been a process not only of self-education, but also of politicisation. I grew up in a right-wing household and it took me a long time to understand that my politics were different to my parents. Nevertheless, I used to think I wanted to be a politician - Prime Minister of New Zealand, to be exact. A year-long internship in the New Zealand House of Representatives was the nail in the coffin; that kind of politics was not for me.

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Group meeting. 10 July 2013. Sarah Walters and Jessica Adams. 14 July 2013.

Lucy Britton argues that in many contemporary art practices, something she calls ‘gentleness’ can be perceived. This is a style of practice which is “non-definitive and open ended where error, small, weak and normal are invited to have their say.” She worries that because many artistic practices today are ‘gentle’, this might eventually be overridden by newer, shinier theoretical tools: if this essence of gentleness, with its openness and time, has become a popularised gesture, 70 what will happen to it when another one comes along?” Come Dine with Me Romford’s style of practice is seductive. It operates at a level which is much closer to everyday, actual human endeavour. In essence this project was, in a way, how I’ve found my politics. As Lucy Britton points out, this style of (political) practice allows you to get things wrong, and I’ve found that component crucial in terms of my ability to ‘keep going’. Moreover, how we find ways to keep going is perhaps the biggest question that the global agitation poses. So in terms of the extent to which art enables radicality - what could fit the bill more than this experience? A clear indicator is the development of this project. The question with which I started (what global conditions and political possibilities can I inhabit through a collaborative, food-related, localised event?)

and the question with which I’ve ended up (how radical a role can art play in broader processes of change?) are pretty self-explanatory.

Britton, Lucy. Take Your Time. In Journey 004 - February 2012. The Contemporary Spirit. http://thecontemporaryspirit.tumblr.com/page/3

CRYSTAL BALL GAZING: ART AS PANTENE RADICALITY/ ART IN THE GLOBAL AGITATION Mark: Um, so do you do art, or do you display art, or do you talk about art? What do you do? Jess: Sorry I didn’t think to... do you guys want to explain what you do? Becka: Um, I’ve just done my foundation and I’m going to study photography in Brighton this year. Fraser: I’m going to Anglia Ruskin, I’ve just finished foundation year, and I’m doing fine art. Mark: Fine art, what’s fine art? Like, Mozart? Not Mozart, what’s that other bloke? Louise: Picasso? Mark: Yeah, Picasso. What’s fine art, is it like, traditional..? Fraser: Oh gosh, don’t make me explain it. Natalie: Well, what kind of work do you do? Fraser: Mostly painting. I like painting. That’s my thing. Mark: But that’s... I mean, [to Becka] you’re doing photography and when you say art, I thought everyone stands there with an easel. I think art is like painting, but you’re saying art is photography... Joe: Well me and Nat we’re in a collective, we’re do like, performance art. Mark: Right... (laughter) So you’re actors? Joe: Sort of. It’s like performing as an art form. But we’re art graduates, we graduated two years ago, from uh, Chelsea, in London. Jess: I originally studied art history so I’m more interested in the, like, writing about art rather than doing it myself but I’ve been thinking recently - these guys have inspired me to call myself an artist (laughter). Mark: So the thing about art, is that there’s more to it than just painting, there’s lots of other stuff. How can we use photography, and painting, and actors...? At the Harold Hill Festival, my wife was there doing t shirt painting with the kids, splashing a load of paint over a t shirt. Louise: It’s still art!

Mark: Yeah. And that raised 50p at a time, and all that, and it’s... it’s awareness and funding. I 71 don’t know really what to say you can do... To return to the question that opened this publication: how radical a role can art play in processes of change? The argument advanced here was that current global demands for change can be understood as a ‘global agitation’. This entails a reconsideration of our overarching structures, it explores the limits of collaboration, and it rethinks the role of the individual in relation to the masses. Within this, the notion of Pantene radicality has been used to elaborate a meaningful approach to change which is local, anarchic, complex, slow, and in the end, full of hope. In order to assess arts role in these processes, a conception of its ‘non-place’ has been developed, where it is both life/not life, and politics/not politics. Arts non-place essentially contains a number of tools, or approaches, which were used in Come Dine with Me Romford to advance the global agitation, and at each scalar shift, the intricacies of its characteristics have been fleshed out. At a local level, arts non-place was partially countered by the projects solidarity with existing ‘Pantene radical’ spaces, and it also provided a platform for a project, which is now archived here, as a ‘Pantene radical’ space itself. It also highlighted the extent to which processes of Pantene radicality can take place from within the very structures which are seen to be problematic. At a national level, it was a veneer for a stealth structural critique and globally, it forced a return to the individual, and it provided a forum to empower individuals - the only means by which the systemic violence of food can be contested. It used the ‘experi’ of food (and Jagerbombs) as a way to enable political discussions, and as an access point into the systemic violence of food. And as an experi in collectivity it used the platform of art to further explore how we might best work together, and proposed a conception of ‘alter-collaboration’. Finally, on a personal level, art was my politicisation, and it became a method to ‘keep going.’ In bringing together some of these intricacies here, what is apparent is that it is impossible to separate out each of the components of the global agitation triangle - they interweave and intersect with one another, and this must be bore in mind in each and every instantiation of Pantene radicality. The circling question, that of Come Dine with Me Romford’s radicality, needs further elaboration. What the privileging of process in this project has enabled is a much harder look at the actual, real-life ways in which change happens. The understanding of radicality advanced in this dissertation developed out of that experience - or action - in tandem with contemplation. However, I’m still not sure of the extent to which I can claim the project as radical, even using the understanding advanced here. Žižek, for instance, argues that a communist liberal is someone who buys themselves out of the situations they themselves create. The project’s miniscule budget essentially came from my pocket - through the money that I earn in my job, and with the help of an Arts and Humanities Research Council Professional Preparation Master's Award. That money paid for travel costs to Romford, ingredients for baking, beers at

Group meeting. 25 July 2013.

the pub, printing, food for Anne’s Cafe, a taxi back to crash at Natalie’s house at 3am following essential post-NICHE graduation celebrations... Žižek suggests that when a liberal communist “donates his accumulated wealth to public good, the capitalist self-negates himself as the mere personification of capital and its reproductive circulation: his life 72 acquires meaning.” In addition: We should have no illusions: liberal communists are the enemy of every progressive struggle today Precisely because they want to resolve all the secondary malfunctions of the global system, 73 liberal communists are the direct embodiment of what is wrong with the system as such. Given this position, are things now worse off, because of me? Given that these efforts fly in the face of reality - that power continues to concentrate in the hands of fewer and fewer, should I have been fighting for resolution-as-overhaul? Kester argues, in order to respond to the critique that collaborative art projects are no more than ‘pocket revolutions’, that what is actually happening is an “unorthodox and often indirect relationship to 74 conventional forms of political struggle.” This certainly encapsulates my experience - but, as always, the question is the extent to which these actions fly in the face of the increasing concentration of power. However one possibility is that it is the very concentration of power that might contain the seeds for change itself: The more those concentrations of power and authority continue, the more we will see revulsion 75 against them and efforts to organize and overthrow them. Noam Chomsky, 1976 And if that happens, then art is going to have to be nearby: Well art is politics. Art has always been close to politics as dissent and disruption and antiestablishment, it's all of that. I actually think we're losing the plot on the economic model. The 76 future has got to include art as a disruptive influence. I'm sure of this. Dr Mary Black, Director of Public Health Havering. 2013

A final note. After I was shortlisted but not selected as a Professor for the NICHE programme, the Professor of Leadership ended up falling through. Someone needed, on paper, to take their place. My first and only lesson as the Professor of Leadership? We’re all leaders.

Žižek. p. 23 Žižek. p. 37 74 Kester. p. 226 75 Chomsky, Noam. The Relevance of Anarcho-syndicalism: Noam Chomsky interviewed by Peter Jay. 1976. http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/19760725.htm 76 Dr Mary Black, Director of Public Health, Havering. 8 August 2013. 73

THE COME DINE WITH ME ROMFORD LEXICON OR, THE CHEAT SHEET Alter-collaboration Noun, a half-way point between collaboration/collectivity and cooperation/connectivity, moving towards the latter, in which individual interests can be realised but with an awareness of the practicalities needed to make things happen. Anarchy “Origin: 1530–40; (< Middle French anarchie or Medieval Latin anarchia ) < Greek, anarchía 1 lawlessness, literally, lack of a leader, equivalent to ánarch ( os ) leaderless ( an- an- + arch ( ós ) leader 77 + -os adj. suffix) + -ia -y” Anne’s Cafe 78 Noun, the name given to this project’s ‘food-related event’ because “it sounds a bit like anarchy.” Big Society Noun, see: the global agitation, the Pantene radicality, the cardboard revolution. Antonym, something created by PM David Cameron. (But he’s still part of the global agitation) Cardboard revolution Anne’s Cafe as as Pantene radicality, part of the global agitation Come Dine with Me Romford Noun, the name I gave to a collaboratively-run project devised for a dissertation for an MA in Global Arts. Conners Noun, an example of subjective violence - the people who ‘steal’ from foodbanks, thereby diverting attention from the systemic violences which foodbanks seek to remedy/perhaps further. Easy Listening Art See, Anne’s Cafe. Experi Noun, from Latin, to try - experiment and experience. Fuck the pasta Expression, used to describe what one should do if something more important comes along. Origin: Rebecca Joseph. General vibe Noun, like affect, but more street.

77 78

Dictionary.com. Anarchy, 2013. http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/anarchy?s=t Natalie Bays. 1 August 2013.

Global agitation Noun, the global movement which consists of a structural critique, a prioritising of collectivity, and an emphasis on self-education. I also help fat kids in America. Proper fat. Phrase, riffs on Jamie Oliver, used to solicit unstoppable giggles from Fraser White. Origin: Joe Easemann Keep going Finding ways to make change happen – in my case, by combining food, art and politics Mook Noun, to cook, used in the television show ‘Ready, Steady, Mook!’ NICHE Acronym, the Non-Institute for Collaborative Happenings and Endeavours Non-place Noun, the ‘location’ of art in the global agitation. “For me, art exists in this sort of place, it’s sort of like a non-place in society. It allows for certain flexibility.” Bobby Sayers, 11 July 2013. Party politics Noun, a term which works harder to define the structural critique that the Trussell Trust are perhaps unwittingly advancing. Pantene radicality Noun, a view of change which is slow and consists of seepage into structures, self-education, and experiments in the processes of collectivity. Uses an understanding of radicality based on the notion of a) going to the root or source - namely the individual, the collective and the structural, and within that b) favouring AND effecting significant change (even if it’s small). Pantene seepage Noun, a view of structural critique in which a ‘seepage’ into a stable structure occurs, thereby rendering that structure unsustainable RCAMP Noun, celebratory camping trip for those involved in RCAP, including a ‘book launch’ of this publication Sexy chip Noun, hot potato chips with melted cheese - Romford’s most famous culinary export? The School of Embodied Criticality Noun: Goldsmiths College, University of London

The Vocabulary of Jagerbombs Noun: making a Pantene radicality fun. Tu meke Noun: from Mâori (of Aotearoa, New Zealand), literal translation: "’too much’. In the 20th century in New 79 Zealand it came to be used as an exclamation of excitement, in a similar vein to the term "awesome".” YOLO Noun: you only live once.

Urban Dictionary. Tu meke. 2013. http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=tumeke

APPENDIX 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Mapping documents Natalie Bays, artist’s statement Ready, Steady, Mook Designs for Anne’s Cafe Recipes (cheese scones, chocolate and cornflake cookies, Irish cream tiramisu, Jess/Becka/Fraser’s mac’n’cheese)

1. MAPPING DOCUMENTS

Credit: Sarah Walters, 20 June 2013

Credit: Fraser White, 20 July 2013

2. NATALIE BAYS, ARTIST’S STATEMENT

3. READY, STEADY, MOOK Challenging the forced media perception of consumption. Performing from a food-related charity influence, the work aims to question the difference between the luxury and necessity of food- and also aims to unconsciously outline hidden in-considerations about ‘general’ public perspectives of the subject. The work demonstrates financial and social context above all else by utilising the familiar yet brash daytime television programme. It can often be perceived as only the ‘underclass’s’ that have the time and the interest to watch daytime TV programmes such as ‘Ready Steady Cook’ (the main format of this piece), and these perceptions are probably voiced by those who think that being unable to afford to buy food is luxurious- and ironically, in this type of programme, nutritional value and thrift is never quantified and celebrated as much as ‘small plates’ and decadence. It is almost laughable when a television chef suggests a ‘budget option’ for example BBC1’s Saturday Morning Kitchen – which suggests a wine under £10 to drink with each meal. It is moments like this that you realise the sheer polarisation of wealth in our society. The presentation of the Mook, entertains with an egocentric sillyness, undermining this cookery splendour. Questioning the programmes’ structures - as tools of social cohesion, and asking whether the set up is a paradoxical form of a life suppressant? The NO Collective www.nocollective.co.uk

4. DESIGNS FOR ANNE’S CAFE (Sophie White, Grant Pearce, James Maloney)

5. RECIPES Cheese scones Ingredients ● 225g/8oz self raising flour ● pinch of salt ● 55g/2oz butter ● 25g/1oz mature cheddar cheese, grated ● 150ml/5fl oz milk Method 1. Heat the oven to 220C/425F/Gas 7. Lightly grease a baking sheet. 2. Mix together the flour and salt and rub in the butter. 3. Stir in the cheese and then the milk to get a soft dough. 4. Turn on to a floured work surface and knead very lightly. Pat out to a round 2cm/¾in thick. Use a 5cm/2in cutter to stamp out rounds and place on the baking sheet. Lightly knead together the rest of the dough and stamp out more scones to use it all up. 5. Brush the tops of the scones with a little milk. Bake for 12-15 minutes until well risen and golden. Cool on a wire rack. Chocolate and cornflake cookies Ingredients ● 200 grams of butter, at room temperature ● 1/2 cup of castor sugar ● 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour ● 3 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder ● 1 1/2 cups of unsweetened corn flakes (Kellogg's) Icing ● 1 cup of icing sugar ● 2 Tbsp of unsweetened cocoa powder ● 3 Tbsp water ● 1/4 cup of flaked almonds (optional) Method 1. Pre-heat the oven to 180C. Line a baking sheet with baking paper. Set aside. 2. Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. 3. Sift together the flour and cocoa powder and mix into butter mixture with a wooden spoon. Fold in cornflakes. 4. Roll or press 1 1/2 teaspoonfuls of the dough into balls and flatten them slightly. Place them about 2 inches apart on the baking sheet. 5. Bake in the oven for 10-15 minutes. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack. 6. Prepare the icing by combining the icing sugar, unsweetened cocoa powder and water in a bowl. Mix well until the mixture is free of lumps and of a creamy consistency. 7. Spoon icing on each cookie and then decorate with flaked almonds.

Irish Cream Tiramisu (Nigella Lawson) Ingredients ● 9 teaspoons instant espresso powder dissolved in 350ml water (cooled) ● 250 ml baileys ● 400 grams savoiardi biscuits ● 2 large eggs ● 75 grams caster sugar ● 500 grams mascarpone cheese ● 2 1⁄2 teaspoons cocoa powder Method 1. Mix the coffee with 175ml / 3⁄4 cup of the Baileys in a shallow bowl. Dip the biscuits into this liquid; let them soak on each side enough to become damp but not soggy. Line the bottom of a 22cm / 81⁄2 inch square glass dish with a layer of biscuits. 2. Separate the eggs, but keep only one of the whites. Whisk the two yolks and the sugar together until thick and a paler yellow, then fold in the remaining 75ml / 1⁄4 cup of Baileys, and the mascarpone to make a moussy mixture. 3. Whisk the single egg white until thick and frothy; you can do this by hand with such a little amount. Fold the egg white into the yolky mascarpone, and then spread half of this mixture on top of the layer of biscuits. 4. Repeat with another layer of soaked Savoiardi, and then top with the remaining mascarpone mixture. 5. Cover the dish with clingfilm and leave in the fridge overnight. When you are ready to serve, push the cocoa powder through a small tea strainer to dust the top of the tiramisu. Jess/Fraser/Becka’s mac’n’cheese Ingredients ● A hunk of butter ● Plain flour ● Milk ● More grated cheese than you think necessary ● Grated nutmeg if possible ● Macaroni ● Salt and pepper Method 1. Heat a large pot of water on the stove and add salt. Once boiling furiously, tip in enough pasta for however many are eating plus lots more just in case. 2. Ask Fraser to grate ridiculous quantities of cheese for you and shut your ears while he moans about how long it takes. 3. Melt some butter in a small saucepan. Use (very roughly) one tablespoon per person. 4. Once melted, tip over some flour and whisk furiously with a fork. Add a small amount of milk and whisk again till there are no more lumps. Continue to stir constantly, adding more milk once the mix is very thick. Ask Becka to take over but keep a close eye on her. 5. Stir pasta every now and again. 6. Get Fraser to make breadcrumbs by crumpling up old crusty hunks of bread into tiny tiny pieces. 7. Get flustered when James arrives and fail to meet him at the station. 8. Get even more flustered when the pasta is ready before the sauce.

9. Drain pasta. 10. Once you’ve added lots of milk and you think the sauce won’t be able to take any more, tip cheese in. Don’t use all the cheese - Fraser grated way too much. 11. Ask Becka to stir cheese in. Wince when she says ‘Fuck the pasta’ (see lexicon) because a song comes on the radio that she’d prefer to dance to. 12. Stir sauce furiously to melt all the cheese, until arm is sore. Use sore arm to explain why cooking is sort of counted as exercise. 13. Tip sauce over pasta and stir together. 14. Tip into a baking tray which can go into the over. Ask Fraser to delicately sprinkle over breadcrumbs. 15. Sit and wait for Nat/Joe/Jess’s friends to arrive before eating. 16. Get too hungry to wait - put mac’n’cheese in oven to warm through and for breadcrumbs to crisp up. 17. Eat the best mac’n’cheese you’ll ever try.

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