For ‘Half a second or less’, Papazoglou turns her attention to the world of punctuation, paratext and marginalia. Presented here entirely removed from their intended context and isolated from their inherent function, her chosen symbols serve as a subversive reflection on the order and disorder of communication systems, as well as a commemoration of their mundane beauty. Whilst ubiquitous in the written word—a back and forth between reader and writer; controlling, instructional—punctuation is all but entirely invisible when spoken. Instead, its purpose becomes performative, comprising breaths, interruptions, stutters and subtle facial expressions; the speechless movement of a mouth. The exhibition’s title, therefore, references the recommended length of pause required between sentences when speaking, the verbal equivalent of a comma. Papazoglou proves that whilst meaning is defined, it is also adrift and open to individual interpretation.

Wall vinyl interventions set the stage for an exhibition consisting of errors, lapses and stutters. Featuring Papazoglou’s own invented punctuation point—the merging of a bracket and parenthesis, both symbols intended to make space for additional information, explanation or afterthought—it appears to enclose and encase the gallery space itself, holding space for the artworks within. Each fictitious glyph is enlarged onto a life-sized scale, inserting the corporeal into the paratextual while assigning importance and supposed significance to the assembled forms. Papazoglou repeatedly implies meaning, and yet withholds it. Artworks present as if coded ciphers desiring a solution, or keys available if only for correct elucidation.

Throughout the exhibition, Papazoglou highlights the importance and omnipresence of graphic design. The visual language of information exchange, it is integrated into almost every aspect of public life. A constructed call and response between context and the conveyance of meaning, at once relational, institutional and instructional.

***
To accompany the exhibition, I wrote the text A nothing full, which can be read here

Bearings is a duo exhibition with works by Oona Wilkinson and Eleni Papazoglou. It takes notice of what is already present in the project space: labour and collectivity, ajar doors and murmurs through walls, temporalities and shifting circumstances, daydreaming and impending eviction dates. It sits with the social and physical conditions of artist-run spaces in London in the face of being squeezed.

The exhibition was accompanied by two poems written by Francis Jones which can be read here.

A sign is designed using punctuation symbols that hold or make space~like asterisks and brackets. The sign can be read but not spoken; its meaning both fixed and adrift. Placed on the high street, it marks P.E.T. Projects as container in itself, one that allows unprescribed activity. In doing such, it celebrates the mechanisms that allow for open-endedness next to shops that cover one’s day to day needs.

Hall of mirrors is an exhibition that draws on the residency as a site for self-reflection, distortion, refraction and fragmentation. The title references Versailles’ Hall of Mirrors, as an example of the historic use of mirror or lens as a tool for power. Works on display range from pools for gazing or fleeting glances across a crowd, unlikely doppelgangers and carbon copies, parodies of group behaviour or private moments of split-self.

Products & Services is a poetic catalogue of the visual language(s) surrounding commodities. Through a series visual works, texts, and a hoard of found objects, the publication explores how value is held: by dusty packaging, bootleg logos, misspelt slogans, global display systems and localised notions of worth.

By applying frivolity as a method for questioning value systems, the publication churns commercial with art objects, forges ubiquity through the handmade, and swirls in the long string of small social interactions that make nothing into something in a world that seems to sell everything.

Products & Services stems from Eleni Papazoglou’s visual investigations presented alongside the written contributions: Friendly Exchanges by Lucy Cowling, Bag and Bootleg by Elaine M L Tam and The Artist & The Shopping Centre by Lisa Sudhibhasilp, The Commodity & the Exhibition by Joshua Simon. Edited by Daniel Fletcher. Published by Foolscap Editions.

Available here

Hole Hold Whole was an intervention that took place in the corner shop Tabakshuis, Amsterdam in collaboration with the project space reclame and artist Lisa Sudhibhasilp. reclame is interested in practices that challenge the culture of advertisement and the notion of merchandise.

*

The Dunkin Donuts ‘Munchkins’ are small round bites of dough that come in all kinds of flavours. First sold as ‘Donut Holes’ in the 70s, they were marketed as left overs from the removed centres of the doughnuts. As a child, I believed this story to be true, an ingenious way to reduce food waste, and as it turns out, it was.

Some time ago, I stood in a store holding a broken piece of their display that I wanted to take home with me, wondering if to take it would be an act of stealing, or if it would be possible to buy something that is not for sale. Can we buy the bone before the meat? With Hole Hold Whole, we attempt to celebrate the valuable waste, the discarded matter and the donut holes, and we cherish this absent space where nothing becomes something in a store that appears to sell everything.

*

Tabakshuis is a corner shop that sells convenient products, cold drinks, cigarettes, newspapers and stationery items. Many thanks to the owner Buick Ismaili for hosting us. reclame #6 was kindly supported by the Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst.