In The Event That Something Terrible Might Happen is a work which I presented, or rather initiated, for my interim presentation. Rather than present an art work of my own, I chose not to turn up to the presentation, instead leaving instructions encouraging the class and tutors to make work on my behalf.

My interim presentation took place on 6th December 2006 at Grand Parade, Brighton.
One week before this, I posted the following writings on a blog on the internet for the group to read:

• An excerpt from “Fluxus as a Laboratory” by Craig Saper (from The Fluxus Reader, ed. Ken Friedman)
• An excerpt from “Relational Form” by Nicolas Bourriaud (from his book Relational Aesthetics)
• An excerpt from “The Dematerialized Object, Almost” by Tony Godfrey (from his book Conceptual Art), concerning the work of John Baldessari.

On the morning of the 6th December, half an hour before my presentation was due to begin; I set up the following prepared objects in room 207, the CFAP third year studio, where the group usually tend to gather to watch the interim presentations:

• White canvas with black hand painted lettering of the following text:

• Printed note on A4 card

• Cardboard box, labelled “A”, containing the following:

       
- Sheets of blank white A4 paper
- Pens
- Video camera containing 63 minute DV tape with the title “In the event that something terrible might happen” already recorded onto the start of the tape

• Cardboard box, labelled “B”, containing the following:

       
- Printed note on A4 card

- Apples
- Chocolate digestive biscuits
- Cola
- Lemonade
- Mince pies
- Orange juice
- Part ring biscuits
- Plastic cups
- Selection of confectionary

The boxes were both taped shut and positioned with box B on the bottom and box A on top of it, with the canvas resting on a chair behind them, and the first note on top of Box A.

The idea was that I would take credit for whatever work was produced collaboratively by the group, as such the video is titled and creditted in my name. However, as is demonstrated in the video below the class chose to make a work for which the camera was not present, a performance piece which went undocumented.

> click here for a clearer, audio only version

Despite this the conversations which people had both before and after, whereby the group discussed how they would go about making a collaborative art work and then subsequently how, and if they would present the work to me, was incredibly interesting. By subverting the usuall traditions of the presentation, turning the focus onto the rest of the class and away from myself, it was interesting to see how different the presentation became. Although I did not meet ideally with all of initial intentions with the work, it nevertheless served as an invaluable social experiement, at the least in terms of informing my subsequent practice.