Janice Kerbel, Deadstar, 2007

Janice Kerbel
Deadstar, 2007 

06.07-31.08. 2006
Kunstverein Graz, Vienna
01.08-31.12.2006
Moderna Museet, Stockholm, Sweden
14.03-24.03.2007
Stephenson Works, Newcastle upon Tyne
09.05-13.07.2007
Montreal Biennale, Canada
11.11.2010 - 23.01.2011
The Drawing Room, London

Deadstar is the plan for a "new" ghost town. Taking the form of a town plan, it uses the conventions of urban planning and the history of abandoned settlements, the orientation of extinct celestial formations and the habits of the supernatural to envisage a timeless settlement for ghosts.

Deadstar is a large (1m x 3m) copperplate photogravure etching depicting a map of a town designed for ghosts.

Utilising the language of mapping and combining the architectural layout of towns with the structure of constellations, Janice Kerbel has fashioned a mysterious yet believable fictional landscape and map.

The 89 constellations that combine to create the hidden structure of Deadstar are illustrated individually in the publication Deadstar: A Ghost town , alongside essays by Mark Godfrey, Susan Morgan and Ghosts, an extract from Lyall Watson’s Supernature. This is an artist’s book in a signed and numbered limited edition of 250.

Deadstar and the accompanying artist publicationDeadstar: A Ghost town is the culmination of a three-year collaboration between Locus+, London based artist Janice Kerbel, Creative Partnerships Durham Sunderland and teachers and pupils at Broadway Junior School Sunderland. Deadstar was shown first in Newcastle upon Tyne before being exhibited in the Montreal Biennale in June 2007.