User talk:Alexchappel

Hi Phil

Hello - it's nice to hear from you after all this time.

Well the answer to your question about "dragging up the past" - I am using Wikipedia very much in the spirit it is meant - to fill in bits of info where none exists. Things do not have to be historically important on this, they just have to be verifiably true and as unbiased as possible. History does the rest I think.

Thanks for your huge contribution to the decima article. This is much appreciated. However I would like to pick you up slightly on your version of events. Far from dumbing down anybody else's contribution to the gallery, I have merely told the story from my point of view, which is surely all I can do. While I accept that the gallery would never have existed without your good self, and in particular yours & Matt's original efforts in starting us off, I do like to keep in mind that it was something Guy & I were trying to do as early as May 1997, when we had found the space, and brought you & Matt in in an honest attempt to forge a partnership that worked. It turned out that my/your/our ideas did not sit well with Guy prompting his early departure, a decision that with retrospect I think (and maybe he does too) was regrettable.

What is happening currently I think says a lot - Guy is now running a very successful gallery ("The best Gallery in the World" according to Mark McGowan and Patrick Brill aka Bob & Roberta Smith) which has been noticed by several high-profile curators as having been greatly influenced by Decima's style. And that's before you even ask my opinion. And to name a few of the people involved in his gallery? David C West has done several shows there, Alex Chappel is involved in producing documentaries based around it's artists, oh and one Matthew John Andrew, is represented. So where's Philip G Hunt, the mastermind behind it all? A big-shot musician I'm told......

Anyway I would be interested in your response to this, and I hope that you have more faith in my determination to represent the truth, and you understand that any omissions or errors I may make are in good faith rather than an attempt to 'post false assertions.'

Thanks again for the huge contribution, and let's hope it can keep going. I particularly love the article mooooved along, which is relevant also to my neopublicism entry, so I will work on this.

Hope you're well and hope to speak soon..... cheeers, Alex

Hi Alex

Yes I saw that Guy has opened a gallery and it's been titled the Best Gallery in the World. I wish him the best of luck. I'm not doubting what people are currently doing, only was you claim to have happened.

I have to pick you up on a few facts yourself. I was present at the Joshua party along with Derrick. You may not rmember me being there. Perhaps it's old age catching up. The party was in a loft conversion in East London and some guy went climbing out the windows onto the roof and got locked out (was that you?). I remember very clearly the female artist who originally wanted to found a gallery at Decima Street. She was going out with Derrick at the time and wanted to manage him so spent a considerable amount of time at our flat while you were still living out of London. She had personally asked Matt, Derrick and I to come in on the gallery with her so you cannot claim that you were going to co-found it with her and Guy alone. The reason we never took her up on her offer was because she was mad as a hatter. Don't you remember, we very deliberately waited until her deposit was lost then you or Matt contacted the landlord. I remember us scanning loot trying to find the space. Before we opted on Decima you, I and Matt had already been looking around for flats to rent; before any talk of galleries got started. Your claim to being the driving force behind running a space is a bit arrogant to say the least, especially concidering both Matt and I had up to that point been involved in numerous art shows including ones which we had set-up in alternative spaces together. At the time of starting Decima, my work was part of a show called Tap, Ruffle and Shave which had 200,000 visitors at the Museum of Science and Technology, and the Hayward (If I remember rightly). I certainly had thoughts of starting a space especially after Derrick's girlfriend bought up the idea for the space in Decima Street. It was not exclusively your idea.

I'm nit-picking with Guy being a founder because he lived at Decima rent free (or was he paying you??) and didn't seem to have any contribution to the setting up of the space. I've left him in the Wikipedia entry if only to end a constant editing war. Good on him for starting his own space.

I never claimed to be the mastermind behind Decima but I take real offense to your constant reference to yourself as the font of all things creative. Just for one moment sit back and look at what you write sometimes. I tends to be along these lines "Alex Chappel decided to.... Chappel was responisble for......Alex wanted to......", even in this message you've refered to yourself in the third person. Hell, Matthew seems to have been downgraded to being involved in nothing more than organising 'Lost and Found'. You have to remember Alex, while you may feel that what happened in the first year of Decima was nothing important to you, it was the foundation of the infrastructure and profile from which you were able to run Decima and that infrastructure was not a one man job. I had total respect for Matts contribution because he had a huge encyclopedic knowledge of contemporary art. It was he who picked up on Simon Starling, who went on to be a Turner prize winner, and he was also massively involved in the general running of the space. We also put on less shows at the beginning because we had the space used as a film studio twice (which Matt was hugely involved in) as a studio for Matt for about a month, and yeah I was getting more into music. Now, why do these things not seem to come under your definition of artistic practise? You seem to view yours and David's faxing of press releases, pantomime cow routines etc as being the core of Decima while Matt working for a month in the studio and then having a private view of the work as not being art. Basically, everything the Decima collective did together at the beginning was relevant, it's just that you and David shared a similar vision and then went on to run the place together. Try to concider that everyone had their motives for starting Decima, not just you.

Do you want to know what I did after Decima? After Decima I was offered to start spaces by 3 differnt people but I turned them all down as I hadn't enjoyed running Decima that much. Instead, I worked as a Producer and later Department Associate, which is kind of like manager, for Antenna Audio, the largest audio producer for museums and galleries around the world and which has recently been sold off to the Discovery Channel. I personally worked with the National Galleries of London, America, Canada, Germany, France, etc... I think I was personally responsible for about 200 productions in major museums galleries and exhibitions sites everywhere from Hong Kong to Tel Aviv. I left them a couple of years ago with a nice hand-shake and I've been living in Italy ever since. Yeah I released a few singles in the UK during this time and had some minor success but I'm hardly tooting my horn about it, it was more luck. My wife works for a major art magazine as a journalist and exhibition organiser and she personally organises shows of artists from all over the world. In a while she's organising a show of Bob Dylan photographs and the photographer, who has been in Martin Scorses documentaries, is flying over for the opening. I get to meet lots of artists all the time and I've even contributed to translating books for some of them. I don't feel the need to organise shows anymore and I just tag along as an interpreter and to drink the free booze. I made my comment about you being a big shot movie director as tongue in cheek (hence the smiley) after reading a comment you'd left on a message board along those lines. Don't get offended. I think it's great you got back into film.

Basically, you have your vision of events and I have mine. All I'm asking is to not try to belittle anyones contribution to Decima. What happened is over and I'd like to think we've all grown up a bit. It suprises me how much some people still remember of Decima and for that reason I don't accept a revisionist history of events.

Good luck to all of you with what your doing. Say Hi to Matt and Guy when you see them and I'll look forward to your next edit. :)

"Perhaps it's old age catching up"

indeed

Old Age

Nice one Phil, I enjoyed reading your response and your latest edits.

I don't really have time to do any editing today but I will do so next time. I don't have time for any discussion type thing either, but no doubt I will catch up on this also. So, for the moment, I'll try my best to respond to your message by sticking to it's factual errors only - maybe you will have chance before me to edit the article accordingly.

First thing is the Joshua Compston party. You will notice I used the word "meeting", and that is because that is what it was, that is where Guy & I met Iris. Neither of us were at the party you talk about and that is not what I meant. It was a meeting, like a formal, sober, meeting of the Joshua Compston Trust.

In fact, I didn't remember you being at the Joshua Compston "Death Party" as it was called. It was a party held once a year around the time of his death which I found myself at. I probably went with Derrick. Honest mistake, I'll take out that we ever met there.

I indeed don't remember you being there, because I was not there myself.

If Iris was ever Derrick's girlfriend at any point then I don't remember this. And the God's honest truth is I don't think she was. I think you must be thinking of someone else. But I'll ask Derrick. As for her wanting to found a gallery at Decima Street, well if this was true then it must be a huge coincidence, because I remember 100% certainly that Guy & I found that space in Loot after we moved to London and were (a) wanting to start a gallery and (b) wanted somewhere to live.

If Iris was not Derrick's girlfriend then she certainly acted like it. I assume she is the same person we are talking about. She spent alot of time at our house in Tooting and it was her that suggested starting a space at Decima to Matt and I. I find it a bit strange that you think you found the place in Loot as it was Iris who lost her deposit on the Decima before we then took it. If you found the place then how come it wasn't your deposit? And if your grand scheme all along was to move into Decima Street then how come you Matt and I went looking at flats elsewhere. Do you remember looking at the flat in Mile End? You seem to have a selective memory with certain facts.

Your other claims about Iris are somewhat inaccurate although thanks for the memory jogger. She had indeed personally asked you, Matt and Derrick to come in on the gallery with her but as I remember that was through my suggesting it. Anyway, never mind, because she was indeed mad as a hatter.

I don't think I claimed to being the driving force behind running the space, I think I said it was an honest attempt to forge a partnership. Your descriptions of shows you had previously been involved with says a lot Hey! You were the one who started the "where's PhilipGHunt now" tone to the discussion. I just wanted to demonstrate that I have been far from idle since Decima, and I get the impression now as I did then, that you considered you were some 'expert' expert of what? that was reluctantly working with plebs. Perhaps this is the source of your 'surprise' for it's recognition....The London artworld is small, of course people remember.

I never concidered myself an expert. Running a gallery was a "learn as you go" experience for me. As for working with plebs; perhaps that was one of the problems between us, if that is how you thought I saw everyone else. Before moving in together Derrick had warned me that you had a tendency to single out one flat mate as being your enemy and I think over the course of the first year I was "Alex enemy number 1". Quite how it got to that stage is another story. Perhaps we just both have very conflicting personalities. We are certainly both arrogant to some degree and we both fight our corner. I never concidered people plebs and myself an expert. What I did feel, however, was deceived by you on several occassions. Doing things in the space without telling anyone, taking money from exhibiting artists without telling anyone, I even caught you trying to nick money from my wallet one night. Do you remember, when I said I wanted to move out and I didn't want you to fuck up my chances of getting my deposit back you seemed honestly suprised that I would think such a thing...well, instead you didn't pay the final phone bill in my name leaving a personal debt on my name. Now, why do you think I didn't trust you?

In my view Guy was very definitely (whether you, or indeed he, likes it or not - and I think neither of you do) a founder.

I find it touching that you are so adamant on including Guy in the co-founding of Decima, especially considering that Matt and I got deligated to "leaving after a few months" in your first Wikipedia entry. If your view of founding a place consists of living there rent free for a few months and then moving out after not being involved in any of the setting up, or the shows, then I guess alot of co-founders could start creeping out of the woodwork. What about your friend who dossed at our place for months, perhaps we can include him too? Yes, Guy was there at the beginning. Perhaps you and Guy had a vision to run a place together, if so then you were never very honest with us from the beginning.

I would like you to step back for a moment and try to look at things in a different way. You say that you wanted to forge a partnership, well, from the beginning it seemed to me that you wanted to divide everything into "Matt and Phil's crappy shows" and "The Alex show". In the first year, you only got actively involved in Matt Calderwood's show, looking down on the other shows as worthless. You and David pulled off the Fuck Art and Pimp show behind everyone elses back. How I found out about the press releases was from the curator of another gallery. How do you think that was for me? Any sense of partnership was blown out of the water after Fuck Art and Pimp, from there on you were in your own little world which consisted of telling everyone you were the Director of Decima Gallery while not being actively involved in any shows. As I said, I don't think you were very honest about your intentions from the start.

One night, near the beginning, we all sat down together and talked about what we could do with the space. Back then I was keen to start regular performance nights (something which I regret not doing from the start), Matt wanted to put on exhibitions and you were keen to have film nights and screenings, you never hinted at what you had planned. There was never any talk of turning the space into another Hollywood Leather (remember that space in London?), you never mentioned any of your press hoaxes, and one of the things which I understood from the beginning was that we were going to exhibit other people's work and not our own.

Basically you and I have very different views on art practise and why someone should run an exhibition space. I feel that an exciting space should be somewhere that you can discover new talent, that can tap into new trends. Joshua Compston was pivotal in discovering many of the Young Brit Artists, City Racing was famous for discovering Gillian Wearing, Douglas Gordon etc.. These spaces were what I wanted Decima to be like. The most sucessful thing to come out of Decima was Matt Calderwood and that is something to be proud of. I also feel that the best spaces, and ones that last the longest, are dedicated to exhibiting other peoples work, otherwise they are vanity projects.

These are just my ideas and an honest attempt to try and describe why I became disillusioned with Decima. It's obvious that you and David wanted Decima to be more like an art group in a similar style to Holywood Leather and you succeeded in associating Decima with a certain curatorial style. That's fine, it's just that this was never discussed in the beginning and if that was your plan then you weren't honest about it.

I'm not trying to piss on anyones parade but this heated debate about the origin of Decima and who founded it etc.. is like dogs fighting over scraps. All credit to you for what you did in Decima in the second year, no one can take that away from you, but likewise I'm not going to let you diminish what I feel Matt and my contribution was to starting Decima. For me Decima had two seperate lives, the first year and what happened after that. What you did at the space in the second year was the core of Decima's life span but it was not the totality. In the second year Decima's style was defined as your style, this is true, but some of those early successes were just as important for me. And, when all is said and done I still feel that the biggest successes (Matt Calderwood, World-wide press scandal, future Turner prize winner) were all done in the first year. You probably think otherwise, that's ok!

Oh, one last thing, David was not brought in through Derrick. I persuaded him to come in personally when I know you two were leaving. I actually introduced them to one another.

Honest mistake. I met David at our flat in Tooting before moving into Decima. I assumed he was one of Derrick's many friends. David and I managed to break a hole in our bath and destroy most of the kitchen in Tooting one night. Remember when he got carried out of the Photographer's Gallery by the bouncers? Carried right over the people's heads before being rudely deposited on the curb with a knee in his back. Quite a sight!

Thanks for letting me know what you did after Decima. Very interested. I'm always interested in what people are up to, and thanks for letting me know.

I'm now going to take my editing hands to the article and strip it down to the bare facts. I'd like to take out as many references to "who did what" and "who founded what" and just keep it short and simple. Look forward to your next entry.

Proposed deletion of Neo-publicism

The article Neo-publicism has been proposed for deletion because of the following concern:

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COI concerns

Hi Alexchappel, I've started a discussion re: your edits here [1]. Please feel free to comment. 99.0.81.41 (talk) 17:52, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

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Your submission at Articles for creation: Slamboree (December 22)

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