This article will be going over the trials and tribulations of the gallery ‘Chance Encounters: Art Through Accident and Invitation’, a selection of pieces I curated for Fringe Arts Bath in 2026.
History and Before Applying:
I have participated in FaB before, but never as a curator. In 2025 I was in a handful of galleries for Fringe Arts Bath, including the ‘Free for All’ (Graffiti), ‘You are the Light’ (After Images + After Images (2)), ‘Dinosaur Land’ (diaDOGue), and I was included in the Shorts Film Screening (Gacha’nce). The year prior (2024) I was selected for the Bath Open Art Prize Exhibition with ‘Gacha’nce’.
So, I thought it would be fun to apply to be a curator this year. My motto really with my practice is apply first and figure out later — I feel like many creatives have the problem where they are always waiting until they are good enough to do the next best thing. Who you are or what you are doing cannot be seen with raw spiritual intentionality alone — by that I mean you need to actually have something to point at. People want their first ‘thing’ to be perfect, and often end up with ‘nothing’, because nothing is perfect. On top of that, no one (or hardly anyone) is really out there talent scouting like in a film or TV show where they go to a live concert and hold a phone in the air and say “I think this is the sound you’ve been looking for.” It is more of a Reddit mod situation in most cases. You get the position by literally putting yourself in it — create the subreddit — but applied to everything.
That brings me to the next bit of context. I am currently working on a magazine called “IF/THEN: Chance and Creativity” where I interview different artists who use chance as a deliberate choice in their creative practices and try to find shared themes among them. So, I was already in the headspace of thinking about chance externally to my individual journey.
Another connection is that as part of my PhD work, I am arguing that chance can be useful for creating discoveries in other fields. When arguing about the impact on other people, you need a lot of evidence, so I have been thinking a lot about how chance has been used more broadly. I don’t like how pigeon-holed I have been with film, looking externally has been rewarding and a breath of fresh air — especially seeing how a lot of the specific impacts of chance are more universally felt. To wrap this back to the beginning a bit — something which has stuck with me — is that at PhD level, every PhD student is very likely the most knowledgeable person in their institution about their specific topic. This does not mean they are ‘the best’, ‘the most well-written’, or even ‘PhD-worthy’, but that there is a limited amount of time on this earth, and they have spent it looking at a very small sliver of the world. So, if there was ever going to be anyone to do a chance exhibition, why not me?
So, who were the selected artists?
Patrycja Loranc with their film ‘VIII New Moon in Gemini’ — a flicker film made from 35mm multiple-exposure photographs. The images emerged through an analogue accident: the camera kept jamming, causing the film to be rewound and reshot over earlier exposures. Having Patrycja involved is great too, because her PhD workshop led to my film ‘Circles’, which ultimately led to the idea of ‘stickiness’ present within my PhD thesis. It comes FULL CIRCLE (ba dum tss).
Colin David Clarke with their piece ‘Bottom Feeder’. This is a looping animated 3D collage which got its own separate monitor. It is very cool and a bit creepy, and was formed via free association between ready-made images. The video is built from imagery found on the websites of cultural institutions around the world. I was meant to also have their piece ‘The Dreamer’ present as well, but this piece did not arrive.
Brenda Miller with their film ‘There and Back’. The film documents a chance encounter between Brenda and Melanie Manos during their residency at Fish Factory Art Space in Falmouth. The film is made from material gathered during a walk, while Brenda knitted a traditional Gansey sample. I like how mundane it is, which is a topic I have been thinking about a lot recently.
Charlotte Piper’s short film piece called ‘ASCII’. Her work is about creating systems which allow chance to develop — just like my work! I often think about the VLC extension that turns any film into ASCII art, and this work reminded me of that.
Sandy Creighton’s films: ‘Circle’, ‘The Box’, and ‘Purple Marks’ — In many ways, Sandy’s work is the most similar to my own in the exhibition. Each work feels like a small experiment where the narrative forms from viewing and engaging in the chance operation.
Mark Fearbunce had two very different pieces in the gallery. Firstly, there was a 54-page collage that restructures every word of Shakespeare’s ‘The Taming of the Shrew’ into alphabetical order, accompanied by a three-and-a-half-hour digital reading of the altered text. I particularly liked how the piece captured mistakes (both human and AI with the digital reading), and how time-consuming its construction was (collage) versus how instantaneous the AI element was. It is an interesting juxtaposition.
The second element was the performance ‘Tombola Tombola’, where tickets were drawn by members of the public, and each and every ticket won a prize. The prize was a painting which was a miniature version of the ticket. I got number 159! I would be very interested in seeing which numbers other people got, and where they end up.
Chufan Luo with her performance ‘Ghost Plays on the Remains of the Giants’ (2026). I will expand upon the specifics later, but the general idea is that Luo activates an installation through the movement of stainless-steel balls across a surface of used coffee grounds, while playing the theremin. She also submitted the film ‘event’, a piece that was shaped by return, uncertainty, and disappearance. It’s also very aesthetically satisfying.
Clare Newton with their ‘Organic Substitute’ pieces — a bunch of digital collage works which is a mishmash of different biological shots crossed with inorganic elements.
Nigel Goldsmith submitted an analogue photogram of three phone screens that were shattered — some nice destruction-based chance art. Nigel often looks at waste, pollution, damaged and/or obsolete technology in his works.
Kristina Hughes and their stunning sculpture series ‘The Sion Haunting Collection’. I was so worried I might break these! Personally, I am a massive ceramic and pottery fan (whenever I go to an art-selling event, this is what I buy), and Kristina leaned into the reasons why I love them so much. Each piece is bespoke, embracing the ‘imperfections’ created through interaction — something apparently quite apparent with porcelain.
Kelly Preedy’s paintings — ‘The Blinded Series’. These were my wife’s favourite pieces at the gallery (which is mean because my work was on the projector too!). The paintings were initially made spontaneously, using instinct and a blindfold, before Kelly gave herself five minutes of agency at the end. I think this is a wonderful way to work with chance, without removing yourself from the process.
Jenia Demchenko. Aesthetically my favourite pieces in the gallery (am I allowed to say that?). These works are part of a small series where the artist explores how drawing can sit inside painting, rather than just being a plan for it. By repeating simple marks across different surfaces, the works show how small changes in pressure, texture, rhythm, and placement can make something simple feel varied and alive.
Cameron Lings and their dice sculptures! It was very cool to work with Cameron, as I have been aware of their work from almost the beginning of my art journey. We were both a part of the magazine ‘Abstracted (Material Issue 5)’, and they have submitted work to my upcoming magazine IF/THEN. Their work is a way to visually represent random number generation. I felt so bad, because one of their sculptures (100 Rolls of a Transparent Dice with Colour) arrived in a few pieces… But it seems fine enough to reassemble. I honestly thought it was interesting though, because this became a new chance arrangement for the exhibition!
David Pereira with two pieces from their ‘The Frequency of Things’ project. This is a camera-less photography project that extracts colour from real objects, surfaces, and the visible world, and displays them as raw colours. The processes through which these are made are rife with chance operations. For some reason, these remind me of weird textures from older PC games like Garry’s Mod. There is something uncanny about them.
Zhaotian Wang and their film/dance performance ‘Instructions from Chance’ (2026). Originally, they were going to do a live dance performance, but due to scheduling conflicts this could not happen. The dance performance depicted in the film was shaped by random instructions given during the piece. Instead of following set choreography, the dancer has to react in the moment, showing how chance, hesitation, mistakes, and sudden changes can become part of the creative process.
Scarlett Anderman with their untitled photography series. A bunch of black and white photos which captured change over time, with a focus on the relationship between the natural and the man-made. When people were in the gallery, they spent a lot of time looking at Scarlett’s art, methodically going frame to frame, which was nice to see. I would definitely say the pieces are worth contemplating.
Nia Evans with their film ‘Pavement Dance’. The film is of improvised dances outside of Chinese takeaways across Bristol. There were so many technical issues with getting this piece displayed correctly, but it got there in the end!
Olga Ast with ‘Unformed Transformation’, a site-specific installation-in-process. It pretty much is a net that hangs from the ceiling, which invites members of the public to alter the work by adding what they want to the net. This means that each time the installation is installed, it takes on a unique appearance which is formed by both chance and agency, reflecting the materials, attitudes, and quirks of the location.
I also had three of my films in the film reel (Tinguely Feeling, Gacha’nce, and liCe), but who cares about that! This was a last-minute addition to space out the submissions within the reel.
And that is all of the artists summed up. Thank you so much to the artists for taking part in this exhibition!!
Now, let’s pivot to a different element of the story.
The FaB Token:
As part of my academic reading around chance, I read the wonderful book ‘An Anecdoted Topography of Chance’ by Spoerri and his peers (reading took place from 20/11/2025 to 08/12/2025). This book is particularly interesting to me because the way it is formatted is similar to my PHAs — using a small detail (an item on a table) to tell a story that is personally noteworthy and go on extended tangents. I love this book and everything around it.
One entry in this topography was ’75. Bronze token’
Here are my raw reading notes from the 8th of December 2025, at 07:51 (yes, I am serious):
“216 — Holy Shit — Tinguely Tokens. This may be a grail for me to try and find. I wonder if I would be able to give out tokens at my gallery for FAB. Maybe as a ‘draw on a postcard and get a token’ or something.
216 — One of these tokens is currently going for £185.05 on eBay. My soul.”
For some additional context, I am a big Tinguely fan — doing research into their practice is what led to the creation of my film ‘Tinguely Feeling’, which is one of my favourite pieces. For even more context, I have been a coin collector since I was a little kid, with a particular interest in exonumia. I have always liked that they are a gateway into learning about a particular moment in time.
And yes, I bought the coin.
Now I had a mission. I wanted a commemorative coin for my exhibition that linked to the idea of ‘chance’.
Yes, there is an inherent connection between coins and chance — flipping coins.
(There is a lot of heated debate on this topic — technically the FaB coin is a medal because it is not being used in exchange for something or to operate something like a token — but coin just sounds so much better.)
However, I wanted there to be an extra element. I wanted ownership of this coin to be up to chance — something you just stumble upon. Just like me as a kid, finding coins that were minted way before I was born, and then going on a deep dive — I wanted these to be the same. I would just let the world decide what happens with them. It would also give me the ability to make an article in 10 years’ time and do some investigating to see where they have popped up online (or if there is no data at all!).
Minting coins is expensive. I was able to have 200 created for £638.46, which my PhD money pool funded. Creating the setup was a pricey part of it, with the mould costing £130 per side, and the raw coin cost being £1.84 per coin. I made sure that the coins were 30 mm — the same dimensions as the Tinguely token.
The coins were minted by JM Band. What really sucked though was when these coins arrived, there was an additional import fee I had to pay (£100 if I recall correctly). Choosing to waste money on something stupid is one thing, but having an unexpected bill is another! I find it so funny though that this venture was so costly, and then I just ended up giving them away, or allowing the elements to destroy them if they were never found.
Let’s talk about the design!
The obverse has a shot from my film ‘Bones of Tyche’ on it (of the dice head character sitting in the chair, while the other dice head characters dance around them).
It also has the words ‘FaB 2026’ and ‘Chance’ — very important as I wanted to commemorate the time, occasion, and specific event. At the time of minting, we were unable to know the venue, which would have been great to add as well.
One thing I really like about this side of the coin is the steps of transformation and context:
1 — Filming some shots for my Fluxus Museum piece with a dice cat bed on my head. The lights of Roland Levinsky Building making the white pips appear blue.
2 — Contacting an old acquaintance SpongePierre (who I met through streaming years prior) to make a 3D model.
3 — Screen recording scenes in Tower Unite.
4 — This shot being used in lots of early FaB marketing.
5 — This shot ending up on a coin to commemorate a chance-based gallery.
6 — Out of my control — whatever happens now happens.
The reverse is of Cuatro, a character that makes its presence in many of my projects. It also has my surname, ‘Barnard’. I did a lot of thinking about coins, and a lot of it has to do with ego, power, and the want to not disappear. If you look at a coin, what do you see? Monarchs. Presidents. Famous events. Everlasting symbols. I decided to follow tradition — when in Rome.
Here is the raw drawing I sent to JM Band of what I wanted.
In terms of how these were distributed, most were left around Bath — benches, donation buckets, on the ground, slightly out of reach — wherever I could. I honestly felt very conspicuous doing this, like I was doing something wrong. It is technically littering! A handful were given to close friends, family, and my PhD supervisors. Some were handed to artists and curators at FaB too. I still have a handful, which I plan on scattering around in Japan — Gacha’nce was an important part of my journey, so it feels right to close that circle, or at least loop around. It also means that these will exist internationally.
If you end up finding one of these, consider listing it on Numista! It got the nice round number 583000 on the coin catalogue.
The Setup:
On the 21st of May I travelled from Plymouth to Bath. I had only been to Bath once before this as part of a work trip (maybe in 2016 — wow a decade ago!).
I remember being under a few pressures on the day — my PhD CoR, the IF/THEN publication being very behind, and a job interview which I had secured a few days prior and had to rearrange because it was meant to happen on the FAB setup day.
So yeah, I was a bundle of stress.
Not only that, but I actually was not as prepared as I hoped I would be! On the train, I was doing all of the artist information on my laptop — by this I mean ‘Art Piece’, ‘Artist’, ‘Piece information’, which would sit near each piece in the gallery.
I was only allowed to enter my Airbnb at 15:00, so I decided to hunker down at a Pret at 10:10 to continue getting these labels done on my laptop.
It was a very slow process. I was dealing with having no login for the FAB email, as well as none of the files on me, but I pushed on. Noteworthy events were a woman at Pret lost her phone, and the Pret staff were dealing with a pigeon that would not leave the store.
I also could not start setting up the exhibition until 16:00, so I couldn’t really rush forward with things even if I wanted to.
At 13:20 I finished the preparations and decided to start placing coins around Bath. I took off my dice fleece and put on my sunglasses when doing this to make sure I blended in more when doing this sneaky activity (and it was so hot).
It was so weird holding a handful of my FaB coins together, knowing that likelihood wise, this was probably the last time so many would be together in close proximity. I felt the same about the noise they made when they all jingled together.
Then at 14:49 I almost inhaled a bee and died.
After dropping things off at the BnB it was time to set up. Here is the space before we started putting bits together.
It was great to see that there was actually work waiting for me. I was having some stresses about the idea that I go there, and no one delivers their artwork.
One of the artists, Sandy, helped a bunch with setup. They built most of the frames and were pretty much the king of the drill. I really appreciate it, thank you.
I noticed that a lot of the curators came with friends in order to get their exhibits done, which I definitely would do next time. The more hands the better.
Most of the artists were great. There two artists which were very difficult, but to be honest, if I fixated on them the whole process would have collapsed. I had to compartmentalise it until it was appropriate to deal with.
It was fun walking to the other curators around me, asking questions, and helping out where I could. Simple things like holding something still, or offering some tape, or passing along info turns a stressful 15 to 20 minutes into a quick solution. Those stresses can stack quite quickly, so it was nice to nip them in the bud whenever possible.
One of the biggest issues I had was tech problems. I don’t blame the FaB bunch for this at all — they were pulled all across the city and bombarded each time they entered the room with questions and requests. It is what it is.
I am not sure how to summarise it… It was so much. Firstly, I stitched all the films in my exhibition together. This took a long time to render (I was waiting last minute for an artist to send their film). Then, hours later, I realised that I rendered ‘loop region only’, so I had to render it again as two of the films were cut off… Then, the media player I was using did not have its correct remote. So, with the remote, some of the buttons aligned, some did not. Eventually we had to abandon the media player, and connect the flash drive directly to the projector. The film (with all the films stitched together) did not appear. So, it was a lot of searching online of ‘how to get this to work’. It turned out that the .MKV file I rendered (second time at this point) had audio which did not play nice with the projector, so I had to render it without audio again (a third time). More time passes. I then thought — okay, since the projector cannot have audio, I will have a TV play it as well at a different start point, and with audio via headphones. Not perfect, but time was ticking till showtime, and we were only allowed in at 4PM the day before opening, so you do what you gotta do.
Cut to the future quickly, I head back to Plymouth. I get messages from an artist really upset with me — their film is being cut off and there is no audio. The projector had changed, the aspect ratio got fucked, and the TV with the audio was removed. So this needed a bunch of virtual tech support… Fun!
Okay, back to setup day and away from tech issues.
One fun thing I did with this exhibit was I stuck dice everywhere I could. Due to my gallery being in the same room as a bunch of the other galleries, it could be quite hard to see where ‘Chance’ ended and ‘Absurd’ began, for example. However, the dice added a sense of cohesion to it all, and separated the galleries quite nicely. The dice in the exhibit are the same ones which appeared in Bones of Tyche! Nice to get my money’s worth with them at least!
(the shared lore is cooler!)
Olga Ast’s piece ‘Unformed Transformation’ required me to head into town to buy a few odds and ends (scissors, newspaper, paperclips, etc.). While I was at Ryman Stationery, I cheekily bought myself 3 packs of Pokémon cards because that is my current money-wasting activity.
I was into them my whole life, but there has been a bit of a resurgence in my household. Small story — when I was a kid I laminated all my Pokémon cards because I wanted them to stay protected… This was during the Delta species stuff. It still hurts.
Here are our current binders…
My wife and I’s bank will not recover. I did manage to pull a Mega Greninja ex (CRI 100) at least.
I made sure to add an energy card to Olga Ast’s piece as tribute.
Opening Evening:
And then, the clock hit, and it was opening. There were so many people there, but I was not ready! I still had to print labels for all of the pieces. The printer was hell and a half, and I really think I spent an hour into opening dealing with it. Eventually it was sorted.
Throughout the day prior, another mission was trying to figure out what would happen with Chufan’s performance. Originally, they sent me a long list of desired equipment, but we were not really able to get most of it. The same with the venue. The hope was that we could do it in a dark room, but that was not available.
Eventually we settled on having the piece be outside which Chufan was interested in because it was a first for them and that performance. I was so worried because they travelled internationally to perform in my gallery, so I wanted to make sure they had a good time and a nice-sized crowd as well.
Before they were set to go live, I ran across all the different buildings to let people know they would be performing, but that was not necessary! The moment they started playing the theremin, people just stopped and watched, quickly accumulating. Instant audience.
In the evening before tech was to be shut away, I was given the opportunity to play the instrument as well, which was very cool. Thanks again you guys for participating, you both had great vibes.
At 23:53 I arrived back at the BnB. It reeked of weed.
The Teardown:
On the 6th of June 2026 it was the final day of the show, and when we had to do the teardown. My wife and I went together this time, and it was a lot more fun doing it together with someone.
We got to explore Bath before we had to dismantle everything. Since the show was still open, we could not just do the teardown right away. Originally, we wanted to start at 5PM, but the gallery was so busy, and people were enjoying it.
I left a notebook there, and it was nice to see that people left some notes.
All of them were nice!
Happy that my work got some praise, as well as the other artists.
As well as some nice comments from the artists themselves!
❤
Thank you all who took a moment to let me know what you thought. I appreciate it.
Plonked right in the middle of my gallery was a kid, watching all of the films being shown on the projector. Again, and again, and again. They noticed that I was one of the people in the films, and asked if I did film X, Y, and Z. Yes, yes, yes. I asked if they were not bored. No. It was nice to lore drop too. They asked why did one of the robots only appear once. It broke. Why did you do a film about a bug? Bugs are cool. Do you still have all of those colourful balls? No, I don’t. It was nice to see an old guy giggle at Tinguely Feeling too. It is so weird seeing people enjoy things I made for myself.
Thoughts:
Some external context. I had been job hunting around when this event was being planned. For months, and months, I had applied everywhere (mostly various academic adjacent roles).
The day I got the second interview for a job I really wanted, was the same day I had to travel to Bath to set up the gallery. I thought, “oh, what are the chances?”
I asked them to move the interview, as I had agreed to do the gallery far in advance, and did not want to disappoint the artists and planners involved. In my mind, I had lost the job — to be honest I would not have blamed them! It is competitive out there at the moment. They moved the second interview for me, but I thought it was pretty much over.
When I came back to Plymouth, I attended the moved interview, and it went well. Then the day after I came back from the teardown, they offered me the job. I am really enjoying it.
For FaB, in that moment in my life, I was mostly happy to tick it off the list. I know that sounds harsh, but a new job, a PhD, several side projects, as well as spending time with my family… I was so happy to be able to put something down without it breaking, or without everything else crashing to the ground in the process. I am so happy that I did it, and so happy it is done.
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