The Foundling — Terry Smith

CA' PESARO MUSEO INTERNAZIONALE D'ARTE MODERNA, VENICE

At the Venice Performance Festival 2014

FOUNDLING BACKGROUND

The Foundling is a performance, video and sound work which opened at the Foundling Museum on Wednesday 7 October 2009. Commissioned by Gill Hedley for the Foundling Museum’s contemporary art programme.

The final installation at the foundling Museum was presented in the form of a video projection in the Exhibition Gallery, and a sound work called string installed on the original eighteenth century staircase.

The process was developed through a series of discussions, workshops and performances that began with Lost and Found at the Tete Opera Festival Riverside Studios in August 2008. Sticks and Stones in St Georges Church, Venice, June 2009 and finally Hide and Seek – a promenade piece was performed at the Foundling Museum in April 2009.

The most recent version Foundlings was performed in 2014 at the Ca’ Pesaro Museo Internationale d’art Moderna in Venice. A collaboration with Marita Isobel Solberg, Georgio de Battisti, Micaela Leanardi and Samanta Cinquini as part of the Venice Performance Festival.

The foundling plays with ideas of the hidden and the lost. In a sense part homage to Hograth, Handel and Vivaldi who all made active contributions to institutions in London and Venice respectively, dedicated to giving vulnerable and destitute children a second chance at life.

The Foundling is a collaborative project bringing together musicians, composers, sound designers and writers and cinematographers. Smith’s approach to these projects is an open collaborative process. Discussions, workshops, rehearsals and performances have enabled him to construct a work that is informed and determined by the different skills and ideas of the individuals involved. The Foundling is a unique meeting of different art forms.

There is a book The Foundling published in 2009 with commissioned poetic texts by Mel Gooding. The book also includes photographs and text that informed the video and performances.

There is also a one-off book called Naming the Dead, that has occasionally been exhibited.

The Foundling Series is an on-going project, developing and changing at each manifestation.