Paul Needham's first solo exhibition at Bureau

8th May 2008

Let us stop making art for the 20th Century

Let us take up our foundations and forgo our own institutions
Let us grab the machine and show it future delights
Let us refuse to be led and give ourselves no choice
Let us leave the quagmire to those who wish to stay

Let us excel in our avoidance, contradict our contradictions, confuse and belie
Let us delight in our fear and worry not about ideas that are no longer of relevance
Let us refuse ourselves the comfort of going around in circles
Let us stop picking over the bones of the established

Let us cut through that which we know
Let us understand the ideas of the past for what they really were
Let us not try to make interesting that which was not
Let us place our objects on new foundations

Let us stop ignoring that which deserves only to be ignored
Let us not suffer in silence but let them fear our replies
Let us cease to make excuses
Let us tell them it is not good enough

Let us delight in the challenge and dispel the myth
Let us not career forward, but stride, and cease our sentimental stumbling
Let us leave the established to talk amongst themselves
Let us make not the radical anew
Let us start making art for the 22nd Century

© Paul Needham, 2008...