Peter Liversidge: The Thrill of it All

"I propose to write a group of proposals for Richard and Florence Ingleby at the Ingleby Gallery," begins the first of the 160 weird and wonderful proposals that run the walls of the gallery’s ground floor rooms, interspersed with a scattered array of ostensibly disparate artworks that continue upstairs. On moving through Peter Liversidge’s take-over of the Ingleby, this initial disparity gives way to what is essentially a highly thought-provoking and engaging questioning of the creative process and the limits of artistic possibility.

Composed on a manual typewriter, the proposals are concerned with both the possible and the impossible; from electrifying the gallery floor to creating a floral tribute to Percy Shelly, from visiting every town and city twinned with Edinburgh to admitting a disinterest in Lady Gaga, Liversidge’s thoughts are bizarre and intriguing. Yet what pervades this assorted confection of ideas is an undeniable sense of humour and playfulness that offers a refreshing respite from the severity that can choke the contemporary art scene.

Similarly refreshing is the casual arrangement of the various realisations of these proposals. The viewer stumbles upon these physical manifestations of the artist’s mind—as they avoid disturbing the colourful mass of dice that litter the floor—confronted by their own reflection in the mirror disguised amongst the framed proposals, and are met by a life-size photograph of a bear at the bottom of the stairs. What is particularly likeable about this artistic exploration is that the physical works by no means overshadow the initial proposals themselves; in fact they are secondary to them. Liversidge’s work is far more concerned with the artist’s psychological processes in developing ideas, and a humble admittance of their at times sporadic and inexplicable nature.

Unfortunately, the first floor fails to live up to the creative conglomeration downstairs. The halt of running proposals leaves lonely artistic objects that in themselves hold some artistic merit, but which without their framed counterparts lose the strength of their meaning. Given that a principal strength of the show is its subversion of the traditional format of curatorial display, it is difficult to understand why the proposal aspect is suddenly removed, especially as it is effectively the backbone to Liversidge’s creative experiment. But in spite of this minor flaw, The Thrill Of It All is very much a worthy insight into the creative workings of the artist in a wholly original and unpretentious manner.