09.05.2008 | Universität der Künste Berlin, Raum 110, Hardenbergstraße 33, 10623 Berlin-Charlottenburg

Cop Talk

Friday, May 9, 2008 / 8 pm

Berlin University of Arts, Room 110, Hardenbergstrasse 33, 10623 Berlin-Charlottenburg, U2/U9, S5/S7/S75/S9 Zoologischer Garten

For a country to have an effective police force, its employees should reflect the demographics of society. It is perhaps inevitable that members of arts communities are underrepresented in police forces. In response to this, the artist Chris Evans has invited representatives from national police forces to give presentations at art academies in Europe, illustrating the opportunities in such a career and encouraging students to join. On one level, the work gently punctures the idealism of art schools—ultimately only a small proportion of art and design students eventually pursue a career directly linked to their studies. It also introduces the implicit contrast between jobs that have an overt social function (police) and those that are commonly thought not to (artist). But ultimately, by bringing the artist into the police force, it suggests that nonvocational and creative thinking could enrich the creativity, thought production, value, and ethics of the most surprising sections of society. Chris Evans, born in 1972 in Eastrington (GB), lives and works in London (GB), Berlin (DE) and Amsterdam (NL).