By Daniel Simpkins and Penny Whitehead
One hundred and forty artists contributed an object that they bought or found with the intention of using in an artwork, a source of inspiration or a starting point for a work that was never made. Recently exhibited in Objects in Waiting, this abundant and diverse collection of unused objects and unrealised ideas was offered to the public as gifts in a week-long event at Museum MAN, Liverpool, 17-25 November 2006.
When gifts are given, as when goods or money exchanged, the giver places the recipient (albeit inadvertently) in his/her debt, with the initial act of giving setting in motion a series of exchanges not dissimilar to that of an exchange of goods or capital, yet the terms are less easily defined. The recipient is bound by an implicit duty to reciprocate, just as we are all aware of the social pressure to send greetings cards to those who send them to us. This process of exchange was revealed in the encounters activated by GIFT.
