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Version Control is a large-scale interdisciplinary exhibition about the notion of performance and appropriation – the re-use or re-visiting of existing works.


With: AP News, Amalia Pica, Andy Holden & David Raymond Conroy, Antoine Catala, Bernadette Corporation, Eva & Franco Mattes, Felix Gmelin, Gerry Bibby, Giles Bailey, Gretchen Bender, Ken Okiishi, Loretta Fahrenholz , Louise Hervé & Chloé Maillet, Louise Lawler, Melvin Moti, Morag Keil, Nicolas Ceccaldi, Nora Schultz, Oliver Laric, Rabih Mroué, Ruth Buchanan, Seth Price, Simon Denny, Tim Etchells , Tobias Madison & Emanuel Rossetti

It presents the works of 27 artists and collectives from different generations and backgrounds, looking at the idea of performativity and how it has informed artists working today. Ranging from live activities to video, sculpture, and painting, the works share an interest in the potential of objects and images to represent actions and social processes, and how the apparently stable world of ‘things’ and the time-based idea of performance interact, influence and determine each other.

The artists included stage their work through mediation, appropriation and re-presentation of established material. On-going reinstallation and a series of performance interventions add a further layer of performativity, as the exhibition itself changes over the course of its duration.

The exhibition is closed on Mondays (except Bank Holidays).

Read more in the exhibition guide or join Arnolfini staff and invited speakers to hear more about, and discuss the artworks.

Latest blog entry relating to Version Control – Things That Talk.

Exhibition Tours

Saturdays 2pm. Free. Meet in Foyer.

Download our family guide here.

Version Control is produced by Arnolfini in association with the collaborative AHRC- funded research project Performing Documents, hosted by the University of Bristol in partnership with Arnolfini, In Between Time and the University of Exeter. With kind support of the Holburne Museum, Bath. Additional funding by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia.