Artwork as Social Model: A Manual of Questions and Propositions

Stephen Willats’ art practice addresses contemporary social and cultural issues. His polemic takes ideas beyond the norms and conventions of the object-based art world, to explore possibilities inherent within communal groups.

In many of his projects he has collaborated with members of diverse communities in a variety of everyday settings, initiating interventions that build on the richness and complexity of self-organisation to determine and reinforce a sense of identity.The result is a body of artworks with a dynamic, interactive, social function.

This manual, which includes texts, interviews and artwork from five decades of practice, is intended as a tool for any artist or practitioner looking to find a meaningful relationship with contemporary society. It proclaims, and argues for, a culture that promotes the fluid, transient, relative and complex society from which it stems.