Albert Potrony is an artist with a participatory practice examining ideas of identity, community and language. Potrony is interested in generating social spaces through his projects, and participation from diverse groups and individuals is a key element of his work.
Recent projects include equal play (2021-2022), a play installation, reading space and participatory project looking at equality and care through the lens of childcare and men’s roles in it. La Bona Mort / The Good Death (2021), a collaborative project exploring end of life and grief, A 24-Hour Truce (2019), a public reading/performance on sexuality, anti-sexism and feminism, part of the ongoing Achilles Heel Project, A Gift (2018), a video and sound installation that reflects on the importance of charity shops in the current economic climate, and their ability to generate alternative communities of need, and Play As Radical Practice (2017), commissioned by Serpentine Galleries’ Changing Play programme, testing the subversive power of play within an evermore compartmentalised education system.
Other projects include:
Another Utopia (2015), a year-long project culminating in an installation and film exploring the squatting and housing co-operative movement of the 70’s and 80’s in London.
The Potential Space (2014), a film focusing on the power of making things in the company of others, developed with members of Friends of Cathja, a charity that supports people experiencing mental health issues.
He Who Hopes (2010), an itinerant sound installation constructed from the material gathered in dialogue with a group of male asylum seekers detained at the Dover Immigration Removal Centre and the volunteers from the local community that visit them regularly.
I Want You to Know (2009), a sound installation and LED display commissioned by Whitechapel Gallery examining the relationships between individuals and institutions.
In 2010 Potrony was awarded a Triangle Network International Fellowship at CCA, Lagos in Nigeria, to investigate the relationship between faith, gender and sexual identity. He then developed Faith (2010-2013) a multi-channel video installation based on the meetings and conversations he had during the residency in Lagos and in Whitstable, Kent – where he developed a second part of this inquiry.
He is currently developing The Achilles Heel Project, researching anti sexist men’s groups of the 70s and 80s, who were striving for a new type of masculinity that would embrace and support Feminism.
Albert has worked on participatory projects for galleries and museums including Tate, Serpentine Galleries, Whitechapel Gallery, South London Gallery, Gasworks, Camden Arts Centre, V&A’s Museum of Childhood and The Foundling Museum in London, Louisiana Museum in Denmark, Serralves Foundation in Porto, Fundación PROA in Buenos Aires and Centre d’Art La Panera, Lleida.