Signals

David Medalla, Takis, Sérgio de Camargo, Carlos Cruz-Diez, Mira Schendel, Lygia Clark, Antonio Calderara, Gerhard von Graevenitz, Mary Martin, Hélio Oiticica, Li Yuan-Chia, and many others

S│2 London presents an exhibition dedicated to the spirit of Signals London. In August 1964, David Medalla, Guy Brett, Paul Keeler, Gustav Metzger and Marcello Salvadori began to publish Signals Newsbulletin as part of the Centre for Advanced Creative Study, which they had set up in Medalla and Keeler’s apartment in Cornwall Gardens, South Kensington. The news bulletin declared the group’s aim to be ‘dedicated to the adventures of the modern spirit’ and presented a wide range of international art, alongside and often fused with poetry and progressive articles on architecture, agriculture, technology and science, among other topics. Alongside the newsbulletin, the group held early exhibitions at the Cornwall Gardens address, but Signals truly came into being with the opening of a gallery in a four-storey space on Wigmore Street in central London where they were able to present multiple exhibitions on a larger scale.

The constantly evolving and dynamic nature of their exhibition programme created a fertile ground for experimentation and the coalescing of a genuine internationalism of various social and cultural approaches together and it is from this position that this exhibition at S│2 London seeks to continue the conversation and ethos of Signals.

During its two years of existence, Signals London brought together a network of Latin American, European, Asian, and North American artists in London. The history of Signals as a place for artists from across the world to gather and experiment without limits has rarely been told and holds as much relevance today as it did during the early sixties in London.

A new book will be published on the occasion of the exhibition including previously unpublished photographs from the archive of Signals photographer and artist Clay Perry, as well as interviews with Signals founder David Medalla, and Liliane Lijn and Carlos Cruz-Diez recollecting on their personal experiences of exhibiting at the gallery.

The exhibition at S│2 London will bring together works by artists such as David Medalla, Takis, Sérgio de Camargo, Carlos Cruz-Diez, Mira Schendel, Lygia Clark, Antonio Calderara, Gerhard von Graevenitz, Mary Martin, Hélio Oiticica, Li Yuan-Chia and many others. The format and presentation of the exhibition at S│2 London will echo the fluid and shifting character of Signals itself, with the gallery rehung every few weeks encouraging new conversations and visual synergies between all the artists and their works. We invite our audience to visit the exhibition multiple times over the course of the two month run period.