Loaded Bay, 2008

Liam Gillick began defining his artistic direction in the late 1980s and early 1990s; he studied at Goldsmith College during a period that saw the emergence of the first group of Young British Artists, which included Damien Hirst, Sarah Lucas, Angela Bulloch, and Gillick himself. He soon defined an autonomous path and became one of the most well-known examples of the tendency Nicholas Bourriaud has called “relational esthetics,” where the objective nature of the work is secondary to the manner in which it can potentially serve as a catalyst to encourage the public’s participation, dialogue, and the exchange of ideas. [...]