Designer, Director and Producer Anna Ridley was one of nine women Barbara Steveni included in her project Conversations Between Ourselves. In this series of interviews, she highlighted the often unacknowledged work of women supporting and administrating the Artist Placement Group and later O+I. Now, participants in the project share more information about their careers and work, as well as reflecting on Barbara Steveni and her work.
Six months after graduating with a B.A in Art and Design following 5 years of study, I was fortunate to join BBC Television’s Design Department.
Since then my work has run on two parallel lines: designing for a wide range of TV programmes from comedy, drama, current affairs and sport to arts and music, later I set up as an independent Director and Producer. This in tandem whilst working with artists in a variety of ways, Artist Placement Group (APG) as one example.
My greatest satisfaction came when I was able to merge these two lines together bringing artists into the arena of broadcast television to create new work using the context and the medium. Having been inspired by APG, I negotiated that the artists had an open brief, did not have to fill a pre-determined slot, could opt to make a one-off piece or a series and would be funded by the broadcaster comparable to other programme-makers. I was also able to agree with the programme scheduler of Channel Four TV, being the broadcaster and commissioner, to schedule the completed works on a date and at a time most advantageous for each individual work.
Along the way, I have passed on my knowledge and experience as a visiting lecturer and served on juries for a number of artists’ film and video festivals.
Barbara Steveni was remarkable: she conceived the idea of artists placement, helped shape it and then made it happen. Her powers of persuasion and determination were formidable. Having had first hand experience from participating, as an observer in the late 1960s, in the Artist Placement Group discussions later on I was able to contribute to the administration of the Group’s activities.
A number of placements were negotiated and successfully secured by Barbara on the principle that the artist should have a free brief and be paid for by the host organisation making the placement a joint enterprise. I was impressed at how Barbara was not deterred in keeping the principles of APG at the forefront despite the setting up of the Arts Council’s Artist in Residence project in the 1970s which undermined those principles particularly by the Arts Council funding the artist. She, together with artist John Latham, decided to change the name of Artists Placement Group to O+I, Organisation and Imagination, to avoid any confusion.
Her assertion that “context is half the work” is evident in her later work I am an Archive. I am sorry that she is no longer with us but am pleased that this exhibition will go some way to honouring her unique achievements as an artist.
– Anna Ridley
Barbara Steveni: I Find Myself is at Modern Art Oxford until 8 June 2025.