NOTEPAD
MICRO-PRINTED TEXT DISGUISED AS ORDINARY PAPER, 2008
MATT KENYON (US)
Notepad is an act of protest and commemoration disguised as a stack of ordinary yellow legal pads. When the pages are magnified, each ruled line is revealed to be micro-printed text enumerating the full names, dates, and locations of each Iraqi civilian death on record over the first three years of the war in Iraq.
In 2010, a printed edition of one hundred notepads was covertly distributed to US representatives and senators. As a form of Trojan Horse, the effort injected transgressive data into the halls of power and put the pages into circulation around Capitol Hill. Eventually, many of these sheets will be memorialised in official archives where the names of Iraqi civilians will also find historical recognition.
BIO:
Matt Kenyon is an American artist based in the Metro Detroit area of Michigan, where he is also an Associate Professor in the Stamps School of Art and Design at the University of Michigan. Matt runs SWAMP (Studies of Work Atmosphere and Mass Production), which focuses on critical themes addressing the effects of global corporate operations, mass media and communication, militaryindustrial complexes, and general meditations on the liminal area between life and artificial life. Matt has participated in numerous collaborations with artists, architects, and technologists, including McLain Clutter, Tiago Rorke and Wafaa Bilal. Kenyon’s work has been exhibited internationally and collected by institutions including the Museum of Modern Art in New York. His work has received a number of awards including the distinguished FILE Prix Lux Art prize.