BANK (art collective)


BANK was an artists' group active in London during the 1990s.

History and project

and John Russell spent a few years on sporadic art events and fake mailout-only 'shows' in the years after leaving St Martins artschool, then in 1991 organised their first proper show, with fellow ex-St Martins friend Dino Demosthenous, in an ex-Barclays on Lewisham Way, South London; this is where the name BANK came from. Dino Demosthenous left in 1992. In 1993, Russell and Bedwell were joined by Milly Thompson, David Burrows and Andrew Williamson. Burrows left BANK in 1995, Williamson in 1998, Russell in 2000. When BANK's own gallery, Gallerie Poo Poo, closed after the three-day show Press Release in January 1999, the group began to exhibit their collective work in other venues: The Mayor Gallery, London, Magasin 4, Bregenz, Rupert Goldsworthy Gallery, New York, Anthony Wilkinson Gallery, London, Chapman FineARTS, London, Suburban, Chicago, and finally the inaugural show at Store, London, after which Milly Thompson and Simon Bedwell began to work separately as artists whilst managing the BANK archive. BANK works have continued to circulate in exhibitions in the UK and abroad, most recently in The Banquet Years, a mini-retrospective at MOT International, London, who now represent the 'estate' of BANK as well as Bedwell and Russell.
BANK's contribution to UK contemporary art was a series of curated group shows, often with comical, and sometimes offensive, titles. As a group they adopted an aggressive stance towards the mainstream contemporary art scene of the time.
The approximately twenty shows curated by BANK included the work of the BANK artists alongside the work of several future Turner Prize nominees and winners. Although the BANK exhibitions were mostly held in warehouse spaces on Curtain Road, then Underwood Street the name of the gallery changed. Initially it was BANKSPACE, then DOG, and finally Gallerie Poo-Poo. The various artworks were bound together, via polemical mailouts, deliberately overt thematizing and radically non-hierarchical methods of display, within single sprawling installations with a penchant for what then seemed like visual vulgarity.
BANK also published a satirical magazine delivering tabloid-style critiques of the art world. Headlines included, "AD MAN YOU’RE A BAD MAN," and, "GALLERIES 'ALL OWNED BY RICH PEOPLE' SHOCK." Other "frankly adolescent" headlines were "ARSE COUNCIL", "SIMON PATTERSON - ONE IDEA, EIGHT YEARS", "CARRY ON CURATING", "PIPPA-LOTTA-RIST-ACTION" and "SAM-TAYLOR WOULD-NOT" These 34 tabloids, along with the Fax-Back project - in which gallery press releases were returned to galleries with corrections and commentary - have since become BANK's best known work.
Julian Stallabrass describes BANK’s activity as "the parodic creation of corporate identity at the centre of which is a noisy and constant reference to that matter of which the art world usually whispers: money." They had, according to Matthew Collings, a "surly, self-destructive, self-conscious, introspective attitude - combined...with critical intelligence and a flair for spotting weaknesses in the art system".
BANK SHOWS 1991 - 2003
2003
SIMON BEDWELL & MILLY THOMPSON Store, London
ART IS HELL The Suburban, Chicago
2002
BANK Anthony Wilkinson Gallery, London
CAPITULATER! Project, Dublin
2001
BANK Chapman Fine Arts, London,
BANK Centre for Artist Books, University of Dundee
1999
PRESS RELEASE Gallerie Poo Poo, London
PRESS RELEASE Rupert Goldsworthy Gallery, New York
IF HOPE WAS A TIME MACHINE Magazin 4, Bregenz, Austria
DEAD LIFE Mayor Gallery, London
1998
WHITE3 Gallerie Poo Poo, London
WHITE3, Gallerie Poo Poo, London
WHITE3, Gallerie Poo Poo, London
STOP SHORT-CHANGING US. POPULAR CULTURE IS FOR IDIOTS. WE BELIEVE IN ART! Gallerie Poo Poo, London
GALLERIE WINNER Gallerie Poo Poo, London
CONFERENCE Waygood Gallery, Newcastle
1997
SEWAGE LUST ICA, London
JESUS WAS A JEW
The Works, Berlin,Germany
MASK OF GOLD Gallerie Poo Poo, London
WINKLE THE POT BELLIED PIG AND HIS WOODLAND CHUMS Gallerie Poo Poo, London & Bricks and Kicks, Vienna
IT'S A STITCH-UP! DOG, London
GOD DOG, London
1996
DOG-U-MENTAL VIII!!! DOG, London
Viper/BANK TV DOG, London/Dukes Bar, Manchester
F**K OFF! DOG, London BANKcatalogue
THE HAPPY SQUIRREL CLUB De Fabriek, Eindhoven, Netherlands
1995
COCAINE ORGASM BANKSPACE, London
THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE, BANKSPACE, London
ZOMBIE GOLF, BANKSPACE, London
1994
WISH YOU WERE HERE, BANKSPACE, London & Newcastle
1993
NATURAL HISTORY 2 - 6 Battlebridge Road, London
1992
SPACE INTERNATIONAL ex-Barclays Bank, 239 Lewisham Way, London

Selected exhibitions since 2003

2013 THE BANQUET YEARS MOT International, London
2012 SELF PORTRAIT: RELICS AND ARCHIVES Treize, Paris WRITER IN RESIDENCE Ormeston House, Limerick, Eire
2010 RUDE BRITTANNIA: BRITISH COMIC ART Tate Britain, London
GRAND NATIONAL: ART FROM BRITAIN Vestfossen Kunstlaboratorium, Vestfossen, Norway
PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT Invisible Exports, New York
EAST END PROMISE: SHOREDITCH 1985-2000 Red Gallery London
SO BE IT:INTERVENTIONS IN PRINTED MATTER Roth, NY
GALLERY, GALERIE, GALLERIA Norma Mangione Gallery, Turin
2009 IN NUMBERS: SERIAL PUBLICATIONS BY ARTISTS X Initiative, New York
THE MIND OF THIS DEATH IS UNRELENTINGLY AWAKE Office for Contemporary Art, Oslo, Norway.
FAX The Drawing Center, New York; Contemporary Museum, Baltimore
THE LITTLE SHOP ON HOXTON STREET Limoncello, London
2008 LESS IS LESS, MORE IS MORE, THAT'S ALL CAPC Bordeaux
AIR KISSING Arcadia University Art Gallery, Philadelphia
EXACT IMAGINATION CCAD Canzani Center Gallery, Columbus, Ohio
2006 FAX-BACKS Dolores/de Bruijne Projects, Amsterdam
BRING THE WAR HOME Elizabeth Dee Gallery, New York & QED Gallery, Los Angeles
2005 STILL LIFE Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, Panama City: Museo de Arte Moderna, Guatemala City; SESI, São Paulo, Museo de Arte de Lima, Lima MAC, Niteroi, Rio de Janeiro
2003 FRASS UBS Bullion Vault, London
DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THAT FROG WHO WANTED TO BE A PRINCE? HE WENT TO A BED AND DREAMED THAT HE WAS ONE... WOKE UP AND FOUND THAT HE HAD BECOME ONE. HE WAS STILL A FROG Club Egg, London
FORGETKULT The McAllister Institute, New York
SUBSCRIBE: RECENTART IN PRINT Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, New York
NIHILISM/FAITH 47 Paul St, London
CHOKKABLOKKA Jeffrey Charles Gallery, London
STILL LIFE Museo de Belles Artes, Museo de Arte Carrillo Gill, Mexico City Caraccas & Biblioteca Luis Angel Arango, Bogota cat