Talking about Bad Ideas

Please join the members of Bad Ideas Collective in live conversation with Corina L. Apostol, curator at the Tallinn Art Hall. The discussion will be held at Tallinn City Gallery on Sunday, 15 January at 2 pm. The event is free, open to the public and will take place in English.

A distinction needs to be made between bad artwork and bad ideas. Bad ideas do not always take the shape of bad artwork and vice versa: “good” ideas do not always take the form of good artwork. Is it ultimately just a question of deciding what is a good or bad idea? 

How are ideas evaluated and either used or abandoned in the creative process?

Can “bad” ideas tell us anything useful about the value systems we collectively impose on ourselves?

Occasionally, ideas previously considered and then archived or recorded as bad or unresolved ones may obtain new dimensions and become worth revisiting. Sometimes it may have just been the wrong time or place to develop them straight away.

This will be the last chance to experience the exhibition Bad Ideas by Bad Ideas Collective at Tallinn City Gallery. While searching for an answer to the questions what distinguishes a brilliant idea from a poor one and how big a role do different contexts play in contemporary art, the collective presents 17 short videos by individual artists and collaborators without direct authorial attribution.

Launched in December 2020, Bad Ideas Collective is an ongoing online project, giving exposure to art works that haven’t been realised due to creative doubt or other personal reservations. Conceived during the first weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic, under the severe limitations on artistic activity imposed by lockdown, the project was initiated with an invitation to reflect on other ways in which creative production is interrupted, calling on artists to describe a work that was never made for more personal reasons. The contributors include artists and academics based in Latvia, Italy, Mexico and the UK.