ATTIC ARCHIVE POSTCARDS

The Attic in Union Street produced a set of postcards that were given out to visitors.

They featured some of the correspondents Pete Horobin was communicating with.

Each postcard has the image of a correspondent made entirely from the content of the letters they wrote to each other. These were done using the original cut and paste method, sentences and words physically cut from a page then reassembled and photocopied into these excellent portraits shown above.

So as a wee memento from Retro's recent visit to the Attic, here are the people in the cards above - Chris Horobin (Pete's brother) - Jack Saunders - Stefen Szczelkun - Susan Young - Mark Pawson - Philip Pilkington - Karen Strang - Barry Mitchell.

There is a good 2 part video up on Youtube made in Budapest showing the mountain of material from the Attic Archive they have in storage in the Artpool Gallery.

Boxes and boxes of stuff from Union Street being dipped into!

They go under the title of "From A to A - New Directions" (2 videos).

Here are the links -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tUUsa5EQjYE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HppxEPH42c

Courtesy of The Attic Archive.

FOOD ART ACTION

A photo of Pete Horobin with another nude model, this time under the title - Food Art Action.

I think that's a rabbit - or maybe a baby ET..!!

Courtesy of The Attic Archive

DESTRUCTION / CREATION - PART 2 - 1981

[Over the winter of 1981/82 a group of Principal Players met daily in the DATA Attic to improvise with domestic utensils, regular instruments and second-rate machinery. A few of their recordings survive as audio cassettes, some of which have been digitalised.
Listen to the Elephants – recorded live in the DATA Attic one winter afternoon by the Principal Players - Pete Horobin, Gerry Mitchell, and Tam McGibbon.]

Continuing with Horobin's journal, above is the lowdown on the the 2nd half of the Destruction / Creation event at Laings

Below is the "Listen To The Elephants" track recorded by The Principal Players (plural). A whimsical wee jam session that had them beating out their best Johnny Wakelin jungle rhythm, and with Pete doing a rather fine impression of Barbara Woodhouse!

Courtesy of The Attic Archive.

DATA FROM THE ATTIC ARCHIVE

A combination of packaging & politics from Pete Horobin's collection of work.

1st sachet contains a poster, ticket & badge from The Clash gig at the Caird Hall which took place on 18th January 1980.

There is also an additional sachet within!

2nd sachet has supermarket items with some literature at the back on the subject of trainee employment. Dated 7th March 1980.

3rd sachet has a Betty White bag, sums calculus and Conoco logo. Dated 8th March 1980.

4th item reveals a visit to the dentist on 25th August 1980 with C. Rimmer in the Nethergate.

Or does it expose a con man?!

5th item is a photo of the Bell Street car park which was built on top of a graveyard. Dated 31st August 1980.

6th item is an arty postcard stamped "Without the financial assistance of the Scottish Arts Council".

Courtesy of The Attic Archive.

THE ATTIC ARCHIVE

It's time to take a delve into The Attic Archive and display some of the material that has been stashed away for 3 decades.

The Attic Archive in Union Street, closed down last year, the contents of which have since been distributed far & wide.

This was a space where lots of artwork was produced and stored, but a place that was visited by a select few.

It was the brainchild of artist, Pete Horobin, and it is mostly his work that will be showcased on Retro Dundee, including photos, art, ephemera, literature & recordings.

To give you a more detailed overview of The Attic Archive and Pete Horobins DATA project, here below is a more authoritative introduction...

[When Pete Horobin graduated from Duncan of Jordanstone college of Art in 1975 he began the habit of collecting daily ephemera and sealing it in cardboard boxes. These little time capsules led to a compulsive documentation which was to expand over the course of the ensuing 40 years.
Two seminal and influential projects – The Accessibility of the Art Object (1978) and Junk Into Art/Art Into Junk (1979) – prepared the ground for a more sustained and obsessive ten-year documentation called DATA – Daily Action Time Archive - which began precisely on 01.01.1980 and concluded just as precisely on 31.12.1989. DATA was intended to be an extremely detailed self-portrait of an ordinary working-class artist living within a very particular moment in time within a British welfare state culture. Horobin gave everything that he produced and amassed, equal status, which is to say that complex artworks were equal to little pieces of ephemera – everything was data. And this data could provide the components for more artworks and collaborations with other artists. DATA was self-published and freely distributed globally through the Mail Art Network. Parts of the DATA project are now archived in Dundee University, Dundee Central Library, the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, and Artpool in Budapest which holds the greater percentage.
The creative life of Pete Horobin terminated with the precise conclusion of DATA and the activities of the DATA Attic - as an open space for artists to visit and correspond - closed down. The Attic continued to be a repository for Horobin’s output, and over the course of the following 15 years was occupied by various sympathetic art students. It was administered by Marshall Anderson, a freelance arts journalist, whose own journals and drawings were added to the archive. Anderson’s role concluded at the end of the 20thC and was taken on by Peter Haining whose activities as a researcher and artist were focused in Ireland where he made an audit of autodidactic self-expression and folk art. In 2005 Haining assumed responsibility for The Attic Archive and began to self-publish a series of DVDs & CDs, the contents of which deployed the considerable material within the archive.
Since the end of 2010 The Attic Archive has ceased to exist. Its many varied parts are now relocated in numerous museums and collections as follows –
The Museum of Childhood, Edinburgh.
The Museum of Communications, Burntisland, Fife.
Kirkcaldy Museum & Art Gallery, Fife.
McManus Museum & Art Gallery, Dundee.
Central Library, Dundee.
Dundee University Archives.
Artpool, Budapest.
The Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh.
The National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh.
The National Irish Visual Art Library, Dublin.]

Courtesy of The Attic Archive.

PETE HOROBIN ARTWORK

You may recall I put a piece up on Retro in Feb this year about Pete Horobin's "DATA" project, so I won't bother repeating his background details, you could check that out yourself if you need a reminder.

I do have more of his work though.

The top image is a postcard designed by Pete and was published in 1978. Called "One In A Million" - it's kind of romantic, but without being soppy!

He kept the black, white & dab of red look going well into his DATA project with the second items, a couple of pages taken from the 1983 Dundee book - "View From Urban Dwellings - 2".

If you look to the bottom right of the hand, you'll see what appears to be, another heart (or 2) too!

So I'll use this opportunity to include another audio track of Pete's - this time under the name of Principle Player.

The title is "The Weight Of Your Work" and it has a simple, yet catchy, minimal synth loop over which Pete talks in and out of in a repetitive loop along the way.

DATA - DHSS INTERVIEW - 1980'S

DATA was the brainchild of Dundee artist, Pete Horobin. It stands for - Daily Active Time Archive. The concept behind it was to document 10 years of his life on a daily basis, from 1st January 1980 to 31st December 1989, using art, films, audio recordings, journals, photography and a few other methods. A rather hefty project to undertake! He was based at 37 Union Street, with his living quarters & studio known as "The Attic", which was also open to like-minded artists who he collaborated with. A couple of examples of DATA output here - The image above is his introduction page from a book published by AAGA Productions called "Views From Urban Dwellings - 2" dated 1983. PH was one of 9 contributors to the book, containing poetry, stories, observations, graphics etc. Below is an audio recording he made during an interview with the DHSS using the name DATA DD1 4BS. A great piece of work using layers of cut up loops, similar in style to Steve Reich. The repetitiveness of certain sections is a good reminder of what it's like signing on over & over again, a situation that feels like you're trapped in a never ending cycle, and one that could possibly drive you crazy!! It lasts 7 minutes, so you've been warned..!!