Dr Jo Hamill

St. Chad’s Broomfield Cricket Club has served the local community of Headingley for over 140 years. The pavilion had fallen into significant disrepair and required substantial redesign to meet the current and future needs of the club. Armitage and Hamill, in collaboration with Architecture colleagues and undergraduate students, devised the interior and external supergraphics of a new pavilion for the club. The supergraphics take the form of large CNC-engraved plywood panels installed across the back wall of the pavilion’s central community space. This co-design project explored how live design projects in proximity to the institution can provide learning and professional practice opportunities. The collaborative process of design questioned the traditional demarcation between design practices (such as Architecture and Graphic Design) and the role of client, designer and student, ultimately advocating for a less hierarchical approach. The St Chad’s Pavilion project provides a model for collaborative and interdisciplinary ways of working within Higher Education that benefit local communities. The integration of design thinking across the disciplines resulted in an inclusive, non-hierarchical approach which has been extended to members of the local community. It has established a pedagogy which supports interdisciplinary and relational ways of working that can continue across Architecture and Graphic Design. Motivated by empowering a community to realise and manage the future of its assets, this co-design project enabled students to experience first-hand the significant contribution they can make, as designers, to the communities in which they live. This co-design project has been the catalyst to empower members of the local community and students. The pavilion functions as an important community space and is used by twenty senior and junior cricket teams, representing approximately 225 members and over 5,000+ attendees annually. It will continue the legacy of St. Chad’s Broomfield Cricket Club and its annual programme of cricket events. It also enables the club to commercialise the space for wider community events.

(M) Hamill, J. (2012) Closer Series [Artwork]. Exhibited at Stable [Group Exhibition], 10 October to 3 November, 2015, Platform A Gallery, Middlesbrough. http://www.platformagallery.net/shows/stable/ http://lovemiddlesbrough.com/whats-on/event/5811/stable

Hamill, J.,Bell, E. (2015) Call Me [site specific installation], 27 June to 15 August 2015, Gallery on the Green, Settle. Book Arts Newsletter, July - August 2015: Issue 98 - Book Arts - UWE Bristol. http://www.bookarts.uwe.ac.uk/pdf/newspdfs/98.pdf http://www.galleryonthegreen.org.uk/call-me-by-ellen-bell/ http://www.livingnorth.com/yorkshire/arts-whats/whats-week-33

Hamill, J. (2016) Gutter Words [site specific installation]. Exhibited at Reading as Art [Exhibition], 26 August to 19 November 2016, Bury Art Museum & Sculpture Centre. David Briers reviews ‘Reading as Art’ in Art Monthly's Anniversary Issue, October 2016, no. 400. pp. 25-6. Also reviewed by Zara Worth for the online contemporary art journal, This is Tomorrow: http://thisistomorrow.info/articles/reading-as-art And in Edwina McEachran’s blog about art and culture in Manchester:   https://betweentheland.wordpress.com/2016/09/03/reading-as-art-bury-art-museum/

The James Joyce Centre is delighted to welcome Gutter Words, the latest installation of the exhibition by Jo Hamill. Jo Hamill’s work explores the multifarious occurrences innate within language and in particular the written word. Found installed on the walls of the building, it is a work that asks the central question: what needs to be said? Working with her personal copy of Ulysses, artist Jo Hamill systematically obliterated the words of Joyce but carefully retained those words positioned closest to the gutter — the technical term used to describe the central margin of a bound page. The remaining fragments are an echo of the original, the act of deletion exposes the architectural scaffolding that holds the words in place. Voids become physical spaces to be read and the words become unanchored, set adrift in an uncertain space. Gutter Words is a complex book work and accompanying installation. It is the culmination of a 13-year enquiry by Jo Hamill. It aims to explore the sculptural space of language, the book and its physical connection to the body. The written word and the book are mediated through an array of linguistic, design and typographic conventions which act as the safeguards to a tightly managed experience. Omnipresent is our compliant respect for these conventions as we navigate through an encounter and are directed to read. Gutter Words attempts to draw attention to the potential that these conventions have to rupture, offering a less defined but perhaps more intimate reading experience.

Invitation to exhibit at the James Joyce Centre in Dublin as part of the Bloomsday festival

Gutter Words is a complex book work and the culmination of a 10 year enquiry which aims to explore the sculptural space of language, the book and its physical connection to the body. The written word and the book are mediated through an array of linguistic, design and typographic conventions which act as the safeguards to a tightly managed experience. Omnipresent is our compliant respect for these conventions as we navigate through an encounter and are directed to read. Gutter Words attempts to draw attention to the potential that these conventions have to rupture, offering a less defined but perhaps more intimate experience. The critically successful ‘Reading as Art’ exhibition at Bury Art Museum in 2016, presented works by artists such as Martin Creed, Kenneth Goldsmith and Eugen Gomringer, which investigated the potential of reading as an act of making. Gutter Words, 2016, a site-specific work by the artist Jo Hamill, was also included. It was one of a number of iterations of the same work which form part of a sustained investigation by the artist into the material and sculptural potential of language. Working with an edition of James Joyce’s Ulysses, Hamill systematically obliterated the words of Joyce but carefully retained those words positioned closest to the gutter – the technical term used to describe the central margin of a bound page. The retained fragments formed two extended columns, these were then sited in the ‘non-space’ of a corner within the Bury gallery space. Whilst Hamill’s practice of making is reminiscent of the abstract restrictions and disruptions employed by Oulipians such as Raymond Queneau and George Perec, it extends the notion of restriction and disruption to the space in which the work is viewed. Here in her minimal intervention Gutter Words, 2019, an installation at Platform A Gallery, Hamill continues to explore how the ubiquitous fabric of a space or the ‘non-spaces’ can be ruptured by language and viewed in the way that one might view a physical sculpture. Gutter Words, is also presented in the form of a book. Hamill explores the relationship between the book, as a sculptural space and the role the body plays in activating this physical space. Notable here is how design and typographic terminology is so entrenched in bodily references. Header, footer, body-copy, the arm of a ‘K’, the crotch of a ‘Y’, the foot of a ‘T’, the ear of a ‘G’, the shoulder of an ‘R’ and so on. As is the architectural scaffolding of Joyce’s schema which underpins the structure of Ulysses; kidney, genitals, heart, lungs, esophagus, brain, blood, ear. etc. Lawrence Weiner refers to language as material for construction, the act of deletion in Gutter Words exposes the architectural scaffolding that holds words in place. Voids are physical spaces to be read and words become unanchored, set adrift in an uncertain space.

'The size/shape of a brick and almost as heavy. Yet, this is a truly beautiful 'artist's book' and astonishingly realised in its materiality and content. An inventive and abstract re-imagining of Joyce's iconic novel. — Staff Pick / Jim “If Joyce’s first readers found he had his mind in the gutter, readers now can see what Jo Hamill has mined in the gutter.’”– Craig Dworkin. Working with an edition of James Joyce’s Ulysses, artist Jo Hamill systematically obliterated the words of Joyce but carefully retained those words positioned closest to the gutter – the technical term used to describe the central margin of a bound page. The retained fragments form two extended columns that continue for 933 pages. Notable here is how design and typographic terminology is so entrenched in bodily references. Header, footer, body-copy, the arm of a ‘K’, the crotch of a ‘Y’, the foot of a ‘T’, the ear of a ‘G’, the shoulder of an ‘R’ and so on. As is the architectural scaffolding of Joyce’s schema which underpins the structure of Ulysses, kidney, genitals, heart, lungs, oesophagus, Brain, Blood, Ear. etc. Lawrence Weiner refers to language as material for construction, the act of deletion in Gutter Words exposes the architectural scaffolding that holds words in place. Voids are physical spaces to be read and words become unanchored, set adrift in an uncertain space. The architectural qualities of this physical space are exposed, Gutter Words is devoid of the accoutrements associated with a ‘book’ such as cover, boards, end papers, dust jacket and will retain only the innards, an unprotected text block. Published by Information as Material in partnership with Yorkshire Sculpture International on occasion of the exhibition, Gutter Words by Jo Hamill at Platform Gallery, Middlesbrough, November 2019.

Hamill, J (2014) Thinking Out Loud [Solo Exhibition] 23 August to 20 September 2014. Object/A, Manchester. https://www.artforum.com/uploads/guide.002/id27888/press_release.pdf

Nasser Hussain and Jo Hamill are proposing a joint presentation on ‘The Space of Language and the Language of Space’, in which Hussain and Hamill will present their current and new work(s), SKY WRI TEI NGS and Gutter Words, and open them up for general discussion. Gutter Words (2016) was a sitespecific work, installed as part of the ‘Reading as Art’ exhibition, curated by Professor Simon Morris, at Bury Art Museum in 2016. Words were obliterated from an edition of James Joyce’s Ulysses, leaving only those positioned closest to the ‘gutter’ (the central margin of a bound page). The salvaged fragments formed extended columns, which were then sited in the architectural gutter of the gallery space – the corner. What appeared was a visual stutter, a concrete poem. Unconnected words were forced to connect across the previously unthinkable physical gap of the gutter. The viewer/reader was invited to make sense of a disparate set of words, formed out of the appropriated, redacted, transcribed, translated and constrained words of Joyce. Currently the work has returned to the page and the space of the book, where, the architecture of the page continues to govern the positioning of Joyce’s words, albeit in a subverted typographic space. SKY WRI TEI NGS (Coach House Books, 2018). From the publisher: ‘Poems written only from three-letter airport codes demand a new kind of passport. Every major airport has a three-letter code from the International Air Transport Association. In perhaps history's greatest-ever feat of armchair travel, Nasser Hussain has written a collection of poetry entirely from those codes. In a dazzling aeronautic feat of constraint-based writing, SKY WRI TEI NGS explores the relationship between language and place in a global context. Watch as words jet-set across the map, leaving a poetic flight path.'

Rub, stroke, chew, wear, sniff – Sensational Books explored our experiences of the book beyond reading. Structured around six senses of sight, sound, taste, smell, touch and proprioception – the sense of self-movement and body-perception – this exhibition unlocked a world of sensory engagement with books. We explored how early books and manuscripts engaged with the senses, in ways similar to more recent works by book artists in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Displays included dynamic and interactive elements from sound artists, tactile items and even a smell wall.

Exploring the experience of the book beyond reading, Sensational Books features books and items from the Bodleian’s collections that invite a sensory response across the five senses of sight, sound, taste, smell and touch and beyond. Visitors will be able to experience the sound of manuscripts unravelling, the smell of vellum in early books or the touch of an old book cover and have many other sensory experiences with the treasures on display. As e-books grow in use, this exhibition captures the renewed interest in the material book, as evidenced by everything from the recent popularity of gift books to high quality book design.