on/off collaboration
On/Off Collaboration first came together in the summer of 2014 as a group of artists and art professionals from several geographical backgrounds interested in sharing concerns theoretical and practice-based research, and exploring off and online ways of communication and collabo–ration. Our original practice borrowed from the concepts of game and play in order to establish a working relationship between the members, as a way of organisational structure and as a re–search methodology to gather and share knowledge about our topics, interests and everydayness.
We are interested in producing different kinds of knowledge approaching topics like cultural commons, collective collaboration, creative labour, and the generation and circulation of know–ledge. We are starting from scratch, making no assumptions about our intended subjects or possible results, aiming to post questions without prejudice and generate possible answers in a wide array of formats.
Our investigation takes the shape of artistic projects, archival research, editorial and writing projects, as well as theoretical statements and collaborative research formats. We see our work as a wider sea of knowledge; creating, reflecting and organising the material for online circu–lation.
The name of the group points to the intermittent nature of our collaboration. Various factors affect the group’s ongoing work: from different time zones to different professional backgrounds and interests. Contexts and life circumstances like access to technology or an Internet connec–tion also may vary, making the collaboration process more open and aware of its presence.
We organised our first exhibition Pure Game (25 Jun 2016 - 01 Oct 2016, Casa Del Lago, MX) directing our focus on the internal working mechanisms of the group and turning to collaboration itself as our research object. This culminated in an exhibition that reflected much of our group dynamics but also the challenges and difficulties of digital communication and collective colla–boration. This exhibition in Mexico City was the first time all the members of the group meet in the same physical location, giving us a chance to reflect on the positive and negative aspects of our doing and triggering a second reconfiguration of our focus, methodology and practice.
Since then, we have created a diversity of projects, proposals, games and game boards to stimulate distinct forms of reading, reflecting and thinking critically. Ultimately, we look for ways to challenge our own prejudices and evoke possible relationships and lines of flight that we couldn't envision without this kind of oblique intervention.
