Kingston University London

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A Day in the Life of Ernesto Bones - Ab Rogers Design

"My name is Ernesto Bones and I write to you with an important request. I have a very serious problem that only you can help fix. You see, though I am writing to you now, I do not yet truly exist…"

So began 24 letters sent to 24 invited contributors, who together brought life to Ernesto Bones, the fictional character at the centre of Ab Rogers Design's new Stanley Picker Fellowship exhibition. As the project unfolded over the period of the Fellowship, each of the ‘creative souls' who received this letter – including culinary alchemist Heston Blumenthal, architect Andrea Branzi, illustrator Sara Fanelli, fashion designer Shelley Fox, chef Fergus Henderson, musician Daniel Hunt from Ladytron, author Miranda Carter, critic Adrian Searle and Design Museum Director Deyan Sudjic amongst others – gave narrative form to a single hour in Bones' one and only day of existence.

The writing process was inspired by the rules of ‘Exquisite Corpse', a surrealist game in which a series of collaborators add to a drawing or story in sequence so that an unexpected composition emerges from many fragments. For the tale of Bones, each contributor was assigned one hour of the day and received the last line of the previous hour's narrative as well as an image of an object representing one of Bones' possessions; the objects selected from amongst the vintage domestic items and design pieces from the truly extraordinary collection at the Stanley Picker House in Kingston upon Thames. With these points of inspiration, their stories breathed life into the ‘exquisite corpse' of Ernesto Bones himself.

Producing the final exhibition in collaboration with students from Kingston University's Curating Contemporary Design MA and Interior Design BA, Ab Rogers Design has in turn adapted the 24 written accounts into a narrative installation; a sparkling and multi-layered mélange of imaginative object-scenarios, rhythmic narrative sequences and colourful storyboards. Echoing the circular relationship of art to life to art, A Day in the Life of Ernesto Bones reflects upon the dynamics of collaborative production and the nature of the exhibition as a creative process in and of itself.

Venue: Kingston University
Faculty of Art, Design & Architecture 
Knights Park campus
KT1 2QJ
Tel: 020 8417 4074
Email: picker@kingston.ac.uk
www.stanleypickergallery.org

Ab Rogers from A Day in the Life of Ernesto Bones 2011 (Stanley Picker Gallery) Photo: John Short