Sunday, October 5, 2008

Please allow me to skip the introductions

Sometimes the thought crosses my mind that I might not actually be invisible. But it can’t possibly be true because theres no way I could manage the aggressive sure-mindedness of visibility, you must be seeing things. I would rather be the gentle disembodied voice in your ear that says “don’t worry, it’s alright.” Or the passive unspoken paragraph; constant and considered, deliberate and deliberated. First means past, first means post.
Welcome to the Embassy blog by the way, I hope you have stopped reading by now, in fact I hope you didn’t even start in the first place. The point of this first entry is essentially to make way for subsequent dispatches. The Embassy of the present is aiming to be much like this blog post, or like Martin Creed’s runners hidden behind a door; hopefully you won’t notice until we reach full speed. The Embassy works best as a perpetual mechanism; all are equal; all are relative.
In the perfect tense we will have already started.
Robert Louis Stevenson said something about it being better to travel hopefully than to arrive, I can’t remember exactly, you should just google it. But what I mean is, now that we are in motion, with the next installment I can tell you where we’re going. And then delete this nonsense.

John

Saturday, August 30, 2008

Tuesday, August 5, 2008



The Annuale, organised by the Embassy Gallery, is now in its fifth year. Running throughout August parallel to the Edinburgh Festivals, it’s an opportunity for local artists and instigators to remind ourselves, the city and its visitors, that we are here. In a range of permanent and temporary venues such as: vacant shop and office units; tenement flats; underground passageways; indoor and outdoor stairwells; public and private gardens; as well as regular and irregular publications, a huge spectrum of creativity is given an extra boost. This year there will be an emphasis on further galvanizing these disparate collectives with a series of salons, artist talks and a symposium highlighting the context of Edinburgh and its complex relationship with contemporary art. We want to highlight the local at a time when the emphasis tends to be on the international. It’s a motivational support network built upon the grassroots foundations that actually function here all year round. A practical and pragmatic camaraderie that says, perhaps we’ll be the bridesmaids, but at least we can have nice frocks.


BAND TOGETHER - WWW.ANNUALE.ORG