One year of touring the UK, 16 week long shows, four galleries, several community spaces and 18 artists later, fig-futures are pleased to announce that 26 new art works have been acquired for the collections of the participating institutions.

fig-futures launched in January 2018 with the ambition to build both a new collecting model for the country, as well as artist and curatorial development opportunities for galleries and practitioners outside the capital. It built on the ideas developed by fig-2, where 50 consecutive week-long exhibitions took place in 50 weeks at the ICA, London in 2015.

Now, in 2019, as the final exhibition closes, fig-futures is pleased to announce this major set of acquisitions, benefiting several regions across the UK, from Lancashire to Cornwall, via East Anglia and the Midlands.
 
Artworks acquired range from performance works, films, large scale sculptures, photography and paintings to durational dance pieces, diversifying the collections the artworks will go to. The total sum of the acquisitions is in the region of £80,000.00.
 
Recipients and collection highlights include:
 

• Norwich Castle Museum acquires its first sound and performance art works: Passing through Metal (2018) by Oreet Ashery (created with a heavy metal band and knitters) and Singular (2011) a durational dance work by Joe Moran, respectively. They also acquire a new site-specific artwork by Broomberg and Chanarin and work by artist Eva Rothschild, who represents Ireland at the 58th International Art Exhibition in Venice this year.

• Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool, gains artworks that include two prints and a ceramic work by Allison Katz and an interactive library installation by Ruth Beale.

• The Box, Plymouth, sees a painting by Eva Grubinger and by Suzanne Treister join their collection and a slide projector installation by Charlotte Moth about post-war Plymouth.

• The Gallery at De Montfort University, Leicester, acquires a performance artwork by Swedish artist Annika Strom and a second by British artist Ben Judd. They also acquire a yet to be created video work by Kathryn Elkin filmed during her fig-futures exhibition, a collaboration with the students of the university.

fig-futures was initiated by Art Fund and Outset Contemporary Art Fund to develop a new collecting scheme for the acquisition of contemporary artworks into public collections, as well as artist and curatorial development opportunities for galleries and practitioners outside the capital. It saw sixteen, week-long exhibitions across four venues who, in turn, acquired works by the artists included in their respective shows. In the cases of exhibiting partners Kettle’s Yard and KARST, the organisations worked with collecting partners, Norwich Castle Museum and The Box, Plymouth, to acquire work.
 
As the week long shows have been presented, 20,000 people have visited or engaged with them in the four locations, seeing work as varied as an installation with knitters and a metal band, a large scale photography presentation, a maritime inspired sculpture, film projections and projects engaging with students and local communities. Institutions have also programmed talks and events to coincide with exhibitions to help audiences engage even further.
 
Artist Ruth Beale said: ​“I am really pleased that The Grundy has chosen to acquire Library of Future Societies (Blackpool). It’s a living, changing work, made for and by Blackpool. Each time the work is displayed, it will be remade with books held in Blackpool Libraries. I think that libraries - and galleries - can be litmus papers to what is valued in society, so it’s a reflection of the library service, the readers, the books that are in circulation."