A particularly virulent type of woman in business is one called “Machiavellian Mary”

 

…This style denotes a superficially agreeable, yet ruthless, self-focused, and false individual. Machiavellian Mary is “mean business.” She kills “buy-in” from key stakeholders— the employees who are the face and backbone of the business. Her authoritarian style poisons the working environment that could otherwise nourish new ideas. Hers is a “topdown” communication style—one that promotes a culture of dishonesty and fear.

 

Yet, Machiavellian Mary often rises to high-level positions. Why? Because she plays well in the “male” game of pyramidal hierarchies. She knows how to be pleasing to those on top and how to control and step on-and-over those below… 1

 

Kingsgate Project Space will be transformed into an office boardroom and become a stage for a series of performances and interventions. The space will change throughout the month as artists disrupt, confront and alter the set, calling into question the behaviours, language and structures of current working environments.

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Event programme

 

Friday 16 March 2018

Stasis will be performing new work ‘Best of 3’ from 7pm

Alana Francis will be performing new work ‘436 from Battersea Park’ from 8pm

 

C L O S I N G  E V E N T

Friday 13 April 2018 6-9pm 

There will be readings from Nadia Hebson at 7pm, Reba Maybury at 8pm and Kari Robertson at 8:30pm

*No booking required*

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Lucy Ayliffe (b.1992) is an artist, researcher and curator based in London. Lucy studied at Fine Art Newcastle University. She recently co-curated and exhibited in ‘P.O.V - Point Of View’, Project 78 Gallery, St Leonards-on-Sea (2017) and curated Newcastle City Council’s Community Arts Exhibition, Roundabout, Tyneside Cinema Pop Up Film School (2016).

 

Alana Francis (b.1989) is based in London and studied at the Royal Academy of Arts. Recent performances include; ‘The Summer Exhibition’, Royal Academy of Arts, London (2017); ‘Deptford Pride’, London (2017); ‘Deptford X Festival’, Deptford X Gallery, London (2016) and ‘Schools Show’, Royal Academy of Arts, London (2016). Previous exhibitions include; ‘Small is Beautiful’, Flowers Gallery, London (2015); ‘Artist of the Day’, Flowers Gallery, London (2015) and ‘Platform Exhibition’, Modern Art Oxford, Oxford (2012).

 

Nadia Hebson studied at the Royal Academy Schools. Recent exhibitions and talks include; ‘I See You Man’, Gallery Celine, Glasgow; ‘Alpha Adieu’, Museum of Contemporary Art, Antwerp; ‘Choreography’, Arcade, London; ‘A Room of Our Own’, Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art; ‘We (Not I)’, Artists Space, NYC; ‘So’, Mauve, Vienna; ‘MODA WK’, Lokaal 01, Antwerp and ‘Christina Ramberg’, 42 Carlton Place, Glasgow International with Sophie Macpherson. In 2015 she published ‘MODA WK Work’ made in response to the paintings, drawings, correspondence, clothing and interior design of British artist Winifred Knights, 1899-1947, (an expanded legacy) with AND Public. Further critical writing has been published in Persona, Foundations Magazine, The Journal Of Contemporary Painting, British Art Studies, Paul Mellon Centre and Cadavere Quotidiano, X-TRA, Los Angeles. In 2017 with Dr. Hana Leaper she co-organised the conference ‘Making Women’s Art Matter: New Approaches to the Careers and Legacies of Women Artists’ at the Paul Mellon Centre, London.

 

Paul Kindersley (b.1985, Cambridge) graduated in 2009 from Chelsea College of Art & Design, London with a BA (Hons) in Fine Art. Selected solo exhibitions include: 'Narrator, Relator & Stimulator', Belmacz, London, (2017); ‘#TheBritishAreCumming’, Kunstschlager, Reykjavik, (2014); ‘#ExtremeDreamMakeover’, Nottingham Contemporary, Nottingham, (2014) and 'She wanted his soul, but he could only give her his blood', Transition Gallery, London (2009). Recent group exhibitions include: 'New Material, living in a material world', A.P.T. Gallery, London (2017); 'Mad Cow (Life is Random, Why Not All The Rest?)', SCAG Contemporary, Vienna; 'Creative Rage', The Gallery, Liverpool; 'Liberate yourself from my vice like grip', Islington Mill, Salford and 'Chateau Double Wide', part of Glasgow International, Glasgow. Artist Residencies include: Guest Project Space, London (2016) and Unilever, London (2015).

Reba Maybury is a writer, political dominatrix and lecturer. In 2017 she published her first novella ‘Dining with Humpty Dumpty’ at Bridget Donahue, NYC; The Community, Paris and Schloss, Oslo. She teaches a program in subversive thinking at Central Saint Martins on the Fashion Masters.

 

Phoebe McElhatton (b.1994) is an artist based in London, who recently graduated from Newcastle University.  Her practice includes sculpture, video and photography. Recent shows include; ‘P.O.V - Point Of View’, Project 78 Gallery, St Leonards-on-Sea (2017); ‘Playing Footsie’, The Holy Biscuit, Newcastle Upon Tyne (2016); ‘Palinoia’, XLibris Gallery, Newcastle Upon Tyne (2016) and ‘What makes you Climax’, Kunstakademie Münster, Germany (2016).

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Kari Robertson (b.1988) is a visual artist based between Scotland and The Netherlands, who works primarily in film, video and sound. She graduated from the Piet Zwart Institute, Rotterdam in 2016. She recently undertook a residency at The Banff Centre in Canada and her recent exhibitions include; The ICA, Singapore; The Showroom, London and The Centre for Contemporary Art, Glasgow. Robertson served for two years on the committee of Transmission Gallery, Glasgow. She currently co-runs ‘GHOST’, a nomadic curatorial project who programme monthly screenings at WORM Cinema Rotterdam as well as recent exhibitions in Microscope Gallery, Brooklyn and MIAMI, Bogota. Alongside her visual artwork Kari plays in experimental band Difficult with fellow artists Eothan Stearn and Tracy Hanna, which is a noisy and public meditation on punk/DIY/improvisational sound-making and total non-expertise.

 

Eli Samuels recently completed a BA in Fine Art at Newcastle University (2017). She predominately works in film, performance and set construction, creating installations that parody these familiar formats. She explores representations of female stereotypes through amateur style broadcasting and probes the expectations of femininity and womanliness through illustrated characters. The work both expresses and explores the artist's frustrations with the contradiction in assumed gender duties that continue to define womanhood.

 

Stasis live and work between Glasgow and London. They are a group working across dance, live art, theatre and installation. Stasis is Aniela Piasecka, Isabel Palmstierna, Olivia Norris and Paloma Proudfoot. Recent performances include: 'Eros' KOKO, David Roberts Art Foundation 10th Anniversary, London (2017); 'New Work', Galleria Marselleria, Milan, Italy (2017); 'It Just Keeps Happening', Baltic39, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne (2016); 'She's a Soft Touch', Inverleith House, Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh (2016) and 'The Second Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women', Glasgow International, Glasgow (2016).

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1) Shoba Sreenivasan, Ph.D., and Linda E. Weinberger, Ph.D., 2017. Toxic Femininity: Machiavellian Mary in the Workplace. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/emotional-nourishment/201711/toxic-femininity-machiavellian-mary-in-the-workplace [Accessed 23 February 2018]

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