'A Needle Walks into a Haystack' was an exhibition about our habits, our habitats, and the objects, images, relationships and activities that constitute our immediate surroundings. It was about effecting larger questions facing contemporary life and art, from an intimate and tangible scale that’s within everyday reach.
The artists in this exhibition disrupted many of the conventions and assumptions that usually prescribe the way we live our lives. They attacked the metaphors, symbols and representations that make up their own environment, replacing them with new meanings and protocols: bureaucracy became a form of comedy, silence became a type of knowledge, domesticity became a place of pathology, inefficiency became a necessary vocation, and delinquency became a daily routine.
‘A Needle Walks into a Haystack’ included a group show, four monographic presentations (Jef Cornelis, Sharon Lockhart, Claude Parent and James McNeill Whistler), and a show curated from the Tate Collection with works by over 50 artists.
In this edition
Liverpool Biennial 2014: Highlights
From Michael Nyman’s powerful performance of Symphony No.11: Hillsborough Memorial at Liverpool Cathedral and The Companion performance weekend, to international contemporary art presented across Liverpool’s spaces, places, and galleries, Liverpool Biennial 2014 transformed the city for 16 weeks.
The 8th Biennial Exhibition A Needle Walks into a Haystack (5 July – 26 October 2014) was curated by Mai Abu ElDahab and Anthony Huberman. It included a group show at The Old Blind School, James McNeill Whistler at the Bluecoat, Sharon Lockhart at FACT, Claude Parent at Tate Liverpool and Jef Cornelis at St. Andrews Gardens. Also featured as part of Liverpool Biennial 2014 were the John Moores Painting Prize, Bloomberg New Contemporaries, a group show at Open Eye Gallery and Adrian Henri at LJMU’s Exhibition Research Centre.
The Making of Liverpool Biennial 2014
See exclusive backstage footage of the production of Liverpool Biennial 2014. Curators, artists, technicians and staff come together to transform multiple venues in the city, including The Old Blind School, Tate Liverpool and the Bluecoat, ahead of the opening of the UK biennial of contemporary art.
The 8th Biennial Exhibition A Needle Walks into a Haystack (5 July – 26 October 2014) was curated by Mai Abu ElDahab and Anthony Huberman. It included a group show at The Old Blind School, James McNeill Whistler at the Bluecoat, Sharon Lockhart at FACT, Claude Parent at Tate Liverpool and Jef Cornelis at St. Andrews Gardens. Also featured as part of Liverpool Biennial 2014 were the John Moores Painting Prize, Bloomberg New Contemporaries, a group show at Open Eye Gallery and Adrian Henri at LJMU’s Exhibition Research Centre.