If You Build It, They Will Come

g39 has survived ten years in Cardiff while larger spaces have come and gone. It has partly been flexibility and a responsive attitude that has lent the project its longevity. Though the physical space is small – the size of a threestorey townhouse – its catchment is far larger, encompassing networks of artists, groups and galleries that the space is actively involved in. It is clear that our attention to this network, and a commitment to working with artists to present pioneering work in a clear and accessible manner, that has generated and sustained support from visitors and artists alike. This ongoing success confirms that g39 is functioning as it was envisaged and that it is crucial that we continue to play an influential role in the visual arts in Wales and the UK. By virtue of surviving this long the space may have become part of the establishment, but its history of adaptability keeps the threat of bureaucracy, and the stagnation that comes with it, at bay.

If You Build It, They Will Come demonstrates the extent to which g39 has supported artists as well as the wealth of talent that has grown from g39’s activities – a retrospective of sorts. Every artist that has worked with the space has been invited to produce a single work for exhibition and eventual publication. The show is a demonstration of the links between artists, official or unofficial, forged at g39 or made subsequently. We know these exist, whether they are swiped at as nepotism or viewed as a collective zeitgeist or artscene, but it is these relationships that maintain a flow of ideas and theory, dialogues and interconnections. For the rest of its tenth year g39 will host a series of symposia that look at the promises artist led activity seemed to offer, at different ways of working and at the role(s) this activity can assume. It is the first step in a year-long review; an open evaluation of the last decade and a period of planning for the next.

Contributors include: Bedwyr Williams, Sean Edwards, Sofia Hulten, Jem Finer, Ella Gibbs, Tom Dale, Jennie Savage, Marcos Chaves, Rachel Thorlby, Simon Blackmore, Antony Hall, Richard Page, Paul Granjon, Lucy Harrison, Lloyd Durling, Nooshin Farhid, Dave Ball, Lizzie Hughes, Tiago Carneiro Da Cunha, Calum Stirling, Matt Cook, Craig Woods, Charles Jeffery, Igor Grubic, Boredom Research, George Henry Longly, Gordon Dalton, Simon Aeppli, Toni Latour, Peter Finnemore, Richard Owen, Gary Ward, Tim Davies & Michael Cousin.