Radical Seafaring

Andrea Grover (wikipedia) is a curator and writer that changed my life in the most direct way. From picking my work to exhibit for the exhibition “29 chains to the moon”, to refer me to the TED Fellow Program, she’s given some small pushes that have altered everything from me. I am so grateful to her and her kind brilliance. Her father was a boat maker, and she organized an exhibition about “Radical Seafaring” in which the work of Open_Sailing was - and published a book of the same title. She’s now onto new adventures at http://www.andreagrover.com/

The Book

"Radical Seafaring", Author: Andrea Grover, Sasha Archibald, Alexander Dumbadze, Christopher French, Dylan Gauthier

Publisher:Prestel Publishing (May 8, 2016) by Prestel Publishing, Language:English, ISBN-13:9783791355122, ISBN-10:3791355120

This exciting and multifaceted book makes a direct connection between today’s seafaring art and performance pieces of the 1960s and ’70s. Bringing together artistic expressions that take place on bodies of water, this book connects contemporary creative explorations at sea with works by Land, Environmental, and Conceptual artists. Among the artists included are Atelier Van Lieshout, Ant Farm, Chris Burden, Michael Combs, Mark Dion, Buckminster Fuller, Marie Lorenz, Robert Smithson, Simon Starling, and Swoon. Featured projects tackle subjects as diverse as freedom from the law of the land, Utopian impulses, and seaborne laboratories and studios. Three contributed essays make crucial connections between projects, expounding on the larger idea of water as a frontier to be explored and a valuable resource that is at once dangerous and life-affirming.

“In the 1975 performance In Search of the Miraculous, Dutch artist Bas Jan Ader was lost at sea on his way across the North Atlantic. After studying this piece in 2006, Parrish Art Museum curator Andrea Grover began a decade of research on site-specific artworks on water—a venture that culminated in the innovative exhibition, programming, and publication Radical Seafaring…Radical Seafaring demonstrates the relevance of the thinking of this era to the present and outlines a movement in response to current environmental and social issues while developing a strong historical and thematic framework that invites future additions.”

“One of those ‘Why didn’t I think of that?’ moments hit me when I opened the package containing Radical Seafaring . . . Excellent reproductions and short, engaging texts describe 25 artist projects that embrace the sea. They include Bas Jan Ader’s famous ‘In Search of the Miraculous’ (1975), a long-distance sailing expedition that led to the artist’s death; artist-designed vessels like Duke Riley’s 2007 wooden submarine — a replica of a crude but effective Revolutionary War craft; and an armada of rafts, floated from Slovenia to the 2009 Venice Biennale, by a group under the leadership of street artist Swoon (Caledonia Curry).”

—San Francisco Chronicle

“The elegantly silver-covered coffee-table book, which documents a current exhibition at Parrish Art Museum in Water Mill, N.Y., belies the mostly rugged and ragged nature of the projects showcased, but fits the dreamers’ enchantment. Radical Seafaring introduces the reader to conceptual artists from around the world who have — whether individually, in collaboration with someone else or as collectives — explored architecture, made cultural and political statements, and expressed quixotic notions without the limitations of terra firma.”