Four Slade MA Graduates

HS Projects commissioned Jenny Chong, Nikolaj Bendix Skyum Larsen, Dominic Lewis and Emily Webber for a site specific exhibition to create visual responses to Cable & Wireless’ headquarters in Theobalds Road, London. The exhibition examined ideas around corporate identity, process and the physicality of the office environment.

Jenny Chong was inspired by the different hand gestures captured in a series of commissioned photographs in the company’s Report and Accounts and transformed a list of stated corporate goals and objectives into questions that provoked thoughtful engagement.

Nikolaj Bendix Skyum Larsen explored the iconography of the various software programmes used by Cable & Wireless employees in their day to day activities. Larsen worked the app icons into a series of individual colour saturated large framed images installed in sequences to challenge the perception of this otherwise mundane imagery. At times in a playful manner, as with the ‘Bin/Trash’ icon installed in the lower right corner of the lift lobby.

Emily Webber was inspired by the collections of family photographs and holiday postcards used to personalise and demarcate an individual’s space. Focussing on the concept of holiday postcards, she distilled the variety down to four generic types installed in sequences high on the walls, evoking the personalisation of the work spaces and their screens.

Dominic Lewis took his inspiration from the interior architecture of the Theobalds Road building. Lewis installed Cable & Wireless blue coloured silk ribbon behind perspex strips into the architecturally decorative grooves running along the walls creating a dialogue between the idea of corporate identity, branding and space. He also worked with instructional texts, such as the ‘Override’ button in the lifts, installing the command in large red lettering onto the wall next to the lifts in the lift lobbies.

Works by Jenny Chong, Nikolaj Bendix Skyum Larsen, Dominic Lewis and Emily Webber were exhibited in 2002 as part of the Cable & Wireless Exhibition Programme, 1992 – 2006.