Tim Etchells

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English artist and writer

title: "Tim Etchells" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["living-people", "1962-births", "theatre-practitioners", "english-contemporary-artists"] description: "English artist and writer" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Etchells" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary English artist and writer ::

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nameTim Etchells
imageTim Etchells.jpg
captionEtchells in September 2012
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birth_placeStevenage, Hertfordshire, England
death_date
website
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::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/27/Etchells_Mousonturm.jpg" caption="Etchells' ''the future will be confusing'', Mousonturm, [[Frankfurt"] ::

Tim Etchells (born 1962) is an English artist and writer based in Sheffield and London. Etchells is the artistic director of Forced Entertainment, an experimental performance company founded in 1984. He has published several works of fiction, written about contemporary performance and exhibited his visual art projects in various locations. Etchells' work spans performance, video, photography, text projects, installation and fiction. He is currently Professor of Performance and Writing at Lancaster University.

Biography

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e2/Art_that_slows_time,_Tim_Etchells,Lisbon_2015.JPG" caption="''Art that slows time,'' in Lisbon"] ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/45/Art_that_summons_shivers,_Etchells,Lisbon_2015,_Marginal.JPG" caption="''Art that summons shivers,'' Lisbon"] ::

Etchells is currently Professor of Performance at Lancaster University and has been teaching extensively in a variety of contexts. In 2006, he convened The Presence Project, a series of workshops at Stanford University.

Etchells' publication, Vacuum Days, based on his year-long web-based project of 2011, was published by Storythings in 2012. Etchells has published several works of fiction, Endland Stories, The Dream Dictionary for the Modern Dreamer and the novel The Broken World and has written about contemporary performance in The Guardian and in artist monographs, such as an MIT Press publication on the work of Tehching Hsieh and a Live Art Development Agency publication on Ron Athey.

In 2013 he was guest curator of Ljubljana's Exodos Festival – selecting an international programme of work in performance, theatre and dance. On 25 November 2013, Etchells gave a public keynote address Live Forever, at Tate Modern in the frame of their research series Collecting the Performative A new public sculpture work by Etchells, A Stitch in Time was commissioned for the Lumiere light festival in Derry, and installed on top of the old Rosemount Shirt Factory. The work comprises a 23 metre long and 2 metre high sign made with white LED bulbs.

In 2014 Etchells was invited to be part of Lisbon biennial Artist in the City program.

In 2019, And Other Stories published Endland, a collection of short stories by Etchells.

Collaborations

Etchells regularly collaborates with artists, including photographer Hugo Glendinning, with whom he worked on the 1999 exhibition Void Spaces and the ongoing series Empty Stages. Empty Stages has been exhibited widely, including as part of Etchells' solo show at Jakopic Gallery in Ljubljana in 2013.

Other collaborations include writing essays for performance artist Franko B's Still Lives publication, for the visual art duo Elmgreen and Dragset's project Drama Queens and working with the pair on their later project Happy Days in the Art World. An Art in America article on Happy Days in the Art World said "Etchells is an experimental British playwright of some fame whose work is Beckettian, not Beckett-esque. His work is mocking and meandering but can really get under the skin, and prick at latent feelings of abjection, loneliness, the inability to communicate, futility."

Etchells collaborated with interactive performance maker Ant Hampton on two projects Lest We See (2013) and The Quiet Volume (2010) which has been produced in English, German, Spanish, Slovenian, Japanese, Polish, Dutch and Portuguese. The Quiet Volume won a 2013 Bessie Dance and Performance Award for Outstanding Sound Design following presentations by Performance Space 122 and PEN World Voices Festival. The citation for the award ran as follows: "For their use of intimately whispered text in a work in libraries across the city and for a score which heightened the experience in a space at once public and private".

Awards and honours

  • 2006: Honorary doctorate by Dartington College of Arts, in recognition of his writing for and about contemporary performance.
  • 2008–2013: Etchells was the recipient of The Legacy: Thinker In Residence Award, a joint initiative by the Live Art Development Agency and Tate Research. Within the framework of this award, he produced a new publication, While You Are With Us Here Tonight (2013).

Bibliography

Forced Entertainment performances directed by Etchells

  • Jessica in the Room of Lights (1984)
  • The Set-up (1985)
  • Nighthawks (1985)
  • (Let the Water Run its Course) to the Sea that Made the Promise (1986)
  • The Day that Serenity Returned to the Ground (1986)
  • 200% and Bloody Thirsty (1987)
  • Some Confusions in the Law about Love (1989)
  • Marina & Lee (1991)
  • Emanuelle Enchanted (1992)
  • A Decade of Forced Entertainment (1994)
  • Speak Bitterness (1994)
  • Hidden J (1994)
  • Showtime (1996)
  • Pleasure (1997)
  • Dirty Work (1998)
  • Disco Relax (1999)
  • Scar Stories (2000)
  • First Night (2001)
  • Instructions for Forgetting (2001)
  • The Travels (2002)
  • The Voices (2003)
  • Bloody Mess (2004)
  • Exquisite Pain (2005)
  • The World in Pictures (2006)
  • Spectacular (2008)
  • Void Story (2009)
  • The Thrill of It All (2010)
  • Tomorrow's Parties (2011)
  • The Coming Storm (2012)
  • The Last Adventures (2013)

Solo visual art exhibitions

  • 100 People and 3 People, The Gallery at Sketch, London, 2007
  • Tim Etchells, Gasworks, London, UK, 2010
  • Fog Game, Künstlerhaus Bremen, 2010
  • From Afar, Bunkier Sztuki, Kraków, 2011
  • Shouting Your Demands, Curtain Road, October 2013. Curated by Make-Room in collaboration with Duggan Morris Architects
  • What is, and What is Possible, Jakopič Gallery, Ljubljana, Slovenia, 2013
  • A Stitch in Time, old Rosemount Shirt Factory, Derry, part of the Lumiere light festival, 28 November – 1 December 2013, during Derry-Londonderry City of Culture 2013.

Video works with Hugo Glendinning

  • Starfucker, Down Time.
  • Kent Beeson is a Classic & an Absolutely New Thing.

References

References

  1. "Tim Etchells born 1962".
  2. (26 January 2013). "Interrupting the Narrative: A Talk with Tim Etchells".
  3. "Interview with Tim Etchells of Forced Entertainment". Aesthetica Magazine.
  4. Kaye, Nick. (1996). "Art into Theatre: Performance Interviews and Documents". Psychology Press.
  5. (26 November 2003). "Bittersüße Geständnisse: Tim Etchells und die Theatergruppe "Forced Entertainment" in der Reihe "Porträt" im Mousonturm". Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
  6. "Lancaster Institute for the Contemporary Arts: People".
  7. "Tim Etchells The Presence Project". Stanford.
  8. "Storythings – Vacuum Days".
  9. "Tim Etchells – The Guardian".
  10. "Out of Now – The MIT Press".
  11. "Out of Now: The Lifeworks of Tehching Hsieh, Adrian Heathfield: Writer, Curator".
  12. "Pleading in the Blood: Art and Performance of Ron Athey, Publishing: Live Art Development Agency".
  13. "What? {{!".
  14. "Enjoy! {{!".
  15. "Live Forever: by Tim Etchells – Talk at Tate Modern {{!".
  16. "Collecting the Performative – Project {{!".
  17. "Nearly 180,000 at Lumiere festival - BelfastTelegraph.co.uk". Belfasttelegraph.co.uk.
  18. "2021 Artwork Programme - Lumiere Festival".
  19. "A Stitch In Time by Tim Etchells".
  20. "Lisbon - Artist of the City 2014 - Tim Etchells {{!".
  21. "Hugo Glendinning, Tim Etchells & Forced Entertainment".
  22. (6 August 2011). "The Making of Empty Stages by Tim Etchells and Hugo Glendinning LEA Magazine Article".
  23. "Tim Etchells: What Is, And What Is Possible".
  24. (4 November 2011). "Performa Playbill: Elmgreen & Dragset, News: Art in America".
  25. (1 September 1939). "lest". Anthampton.com.
  26. "tqv". Anthampton.com.
  27. "Winners of the New York Dance And Performance Awards-The Bessies". The Dance Enthusiast.
  28. http://www.dartington.org/newsletters/issue71_decjan07.pdf {{Dead link. (February 2022)
  29. "LICA > People". Lancaster.ac.uk.
  30. Keidan, Lois. (October 2013). "Tim Etchells (Legacy: Thinker In Residence Awards)". Tate.
  31. Keidan, Lois. (October 2013). "Legacy: Thinker In Residence Awards". Tate.
  32. "Legacy: Thinker in Residence Awards". [[Live Art Development Agency]].
  33. "While You Are With Us Here Tonight – Live Art Development Agency".
  34. (30 July 2011). "An Interview with Tim Etchells about Endland Stories".
  35. "Certain Fragments: Texts and Writings on Performance (Paperback) – Routledge".
  36. (23 June 2001). "Pick of the Week: The Dream Dictionary for the Modern Dreamer by Tim Etchells, Books: The Guardian".
  37. Jones, Thomas. (25 September 2008). "Loserdom". [[London Review of Books]].
  38. "Project Index". forced entertainment.
  39. Schmidt, Theron. (3 November 2007). "100 People and 3 People | Join in". a-n.
  40. "Tim Etchells". Gasworks.
  41. (23 July 2010). "Kilian Ruethemann and Tim Etchells". e-flux.
  42. (22 September 2010). "Presse " Tim Etchells // Fog Game " Künstlerhaus Bremen". Kuenstlerhausbremen.de.
  43. [http://krt-festival.pl/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/KRT_2011_program11.pdf KRT 2011 Program] krt-festival.pl
  44. "Duggan Morris Architects". Duggan Morris Architects.
  45. "Tim Etchells: What is, and What is Possible » Jakopič Gallery". Mgml.si.
  46. "Live Culture: Organisers and participants: Forced Entertainment". Tate.

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