Unlike unrealized architectural projects, which are frequently exhibited and circulated, unrealized artworks tend to remain unnoticed or little known. But perhaps there is another form of artistic agency in the partial expression, the incomplete idea, the projection of a mere intention? Agency of Unrealized Projects (AUP) seeks to document and display these works. Whether censored, forgotten, postponed, impossible, or rejected, unrealized projects form a unique testament to the speculative power of non-action.

AUP follows the publication entitled “Unbuilt Roads: 107 Unrealized Projects,” collated by Hans Ulrich Obrist and Guy Tortosa after several years of international research conducted in the late 1990s. Twenty years later, the Agency of Unrealized Projects was formed in collaboration with Julieta Aranda and Anton Vidokle, and an open call for unrealized projects was issued for its first public exhibition at ArtBasel in 2011. The open call will continue until all unrealized art projects are compiled.

Monumento all'agricoltura 1969-70 - Alighiero Boetti

d'un projet dédié aux victimes de la Shoah. - Christian Boltanski

The World is a Theater and we each have a role - Louise Bourgeois

MAK - Wien  - Rosemarie Trockel

Attitudine Diplomatica - Hermann Pitz

Notebook Page: Home in the Form of a Banana with Garage,  - Claes Oldenburg

"400" - Manfred Pernice

Unrealized Turtles 1967 - Joseph Grigely

Chen H.V.O + G.T. - Bertrand Lavier

Visual Poem: Cap I Cua - Joan Brossa

Agency of Unrealised Projects
Logo by Liam Gillick
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Date
Title
Source
Description
Tags
W4519
25.05.2011
Gdansk, 2011-05-25 - Malgorzata Lisiewicz
WWW
Gdansk, 2011-05-25 In response to your call for unrealized projects I would like to submit the two from my archives: PROJECT no.1: The submission being as a response to the call for exhibition projects organized on the occasion of the Tenth Anniversar ...
Gdansk, 2011-05-25 In response to your call for unrealized projects I would like to submit the two from my archives: PROJECT no.1: The submission being as a response to the call for exhibition projects organized on the occasion of the Tenth Anniversar ...
W3824
19.05.2011
MARK PRIME
WWW
These installations are part of an ongoing series experimenting with light in 3 dimensional spaces. They are created using a high power laser, refracted in the space using mirrors. The effect is like drawing with pure light: intense, pure, random an ...
These installations are part of an ongoing series experimenting with light in 3 dimensional spaces. They are created using a high power laser, refracted in the space using mirrors. The effect is like drawing with pure light: intense, pure, random an ...
W5260
12.10.2012
snowball - Cristina d'eça Leal
WWW
Synopsis When a snowball slides down a hill, it gathers more snow, becoming bigger and bigger until it can, ultimately, start an avalanche. This analogy is used to explain the success of a certain action. In order to achieve the best result it is fundam ...
Synopsis When a snowball slides down a hill, it gathers more snow, becoming bigger and bigger until it can, ultimately, start an avalanche. This analogy is used to explain the success of a certain action. In order to achieve the best result it is fundam ...
W4049
22.05.2011
Geno project - Leo Morrissey
WWW
Ten years ago in a museum in Milan Italy it was pointed out to me that there was an uncanny resemblance between myself and one of the multitude of Roman marble bust sculptures in the museum… This moment got me thinking about the connections between peop ...
Ten years ago in a museum in Milan Italy it was pointed out to me that there was an uncanny resemblance between myself and one of the multitude of Roman marble bust sculptures in the museum… This moment got me thinking about the connections between peop ...
W4317
24.05.2011
LANGAGE - Tom Veeger & Ivo Schoofs
WWW
LANGAGE Proposition Neon construction cinétique Plaine de Plainpalais, Geneva Organisation Fmac, FCAC l'auteur Tom Veeger, MSc & Ivo Schoofs, BSc March 20th, 2011 LANGAGE La place est pleine de monde. Les hésitants regardent en l’air ...
LANGAGE Proposition Neon construction cinétique Plaine de Plainpalais, Geneva Organisation Fmac, FCAC l'auteur Tom Veeger, MSc & Ivo Schoofs, BSc March 20th, 2011 LANGAGE La place est pleine de monde. Les hésitants regardent en l’air ...
W3626
14.05.2011
Détente Reflection 195 - Jenny Zhe Chang
WWW
Détente Reflection 195 will be a series of 195 sculptures of intercut, deconstructed and reconstructed table tennis bats that uncannily explores cultural fusions and disconnections between East and West. The word détente of the title refers to the perma ...
Détente Reflection 195 will be a series of 195 sculptures of intercut, deconstructed and reconstructed table tennis bats that uncannily explores cultural fusions and disconnections between East and West. The word détente of the title refers to the perma ...
W5237
09.10.2012
Theater of the Heavy Clouds - Kim Miller
WWW
Theater of the Heavy Clouds ARISTOPHANES stands in makeshift toga next to table covered with multi-colored cubes. Off to side is a garment rack with glittering evening gown hanging. CHORUS' lines appear on projection screen at appropriate time behind ARIS ...
Theater of the Heavy Clouds ARISTOPHANES stands in makeshift toga next to table covered with multi-colored cubes. Off to side is a garment rack with glittering evening gown hanging. CHORUS' lines appear on projection screen at appropriate time behind ARIS ...
W3818
19.05.2011
Kelly Jazvac and Patrick Howlett
WWW
An abstract public sculpture that doubles as a large scale bike rack. Our proposal is for a large-scale, powder-coated steel sculpture to be installed in the outdoor sculpture garden at the SculptureCenter. The project will appear to be a prototypical ...
An abstract public sculpture that doubles as a large scale bike rack. Our proposal is for a large-scale, powder-coated steel sculpture to be installed in the outdoor sculpture garden at the SculptureCenter. The project will appear to be a prototypical ...
U9497
07.04.1997
Jake and Dinos Chapman's five proposals for an empty plinth situated on central londons trafalgar square - Jake and Dinos Chapman
Unbuilt Roads
commissioned by liberal daily broadsheet newspaper ironically suggesting the most unsuitable artists possible to produce the most unsuitable public sculpture never to be realized: ha ha ha, very funny we suggest one of the following: project 'Hawki ...
commissioned by liberal daily broadsheet newspaper ironically suggesting the most unsuitable artists possible to produce the most unsuitable public sculpture never to be realized: ha ha ha, very funny we suggest one of the following: project 'Hawki ...
U9478
01.01.1984
Projets non réalisés: - Daniel Buren
Unbuilt Roads
La liste non exhaustive qui suit correspond une á série de projets qui n'ont pas abouti. Ils sont de plusieurs types et les raisons de leur non aboutissement sont également différentes. Tout d'abord, tous sont liés des situations précises et dict ...
La liste non exhaustive qui suit correspond une á série de projets qui n'ont pas abouti. Ils sont de plusieurs types et les raisons de leur non aboutissement sont également différentes. Tout d'abord, tous sont liés des situations précises et dict ...
W4629
25.05.2011
Light Emitting Clematis - Ann LePore
WWW
Light Emitting Clematis for the NJ Bell Telephone building, now Verizon, 540 Broad St. Timed LED lights will "crawl' up the building, providing a beautiful, abstract flourish that hints at visual communication being "Beamed Up" from the Telecom building, ...
Light Emitting Clematis for the NJ Bell Telephone building, now Verizon, 540 Broad St. Timed LED lights will "crawl' up the building, providing a beautiful, abstract flourish that hints at visual communication being "Beamed Up" from the Telecom building, ...
W3611
13.05.2011
Atanas Atanasoski
WWW
W4074
23.05.2011
@Maarten141BOXES: Bilingual Digital Interactive Internet Artwork in Progress (Artist: Maarten van der Heijden, 1947) - Maarten van der Heijden (@Maarten141BOXES)
WWW
@Maarten141BOXES: Bilingual Digital Interactive Internet Artwork in Progress (Artist: Maarten van der Heijden, 1947) Introduction @Maarten141BOXES is a Bilingual Digital Interactive Internet Artwork in Progress. It is an egodocument: an autobiographi ...
@Maarten141BOXES: Bilingual Digital Interactive Internet Artwork in Progress (Artist: Maarten van der Heijden, 1947) Introduction @Maarten141BOXES is a Bilingual Digital Interactive Internet Artwork in Progress. It is an egodocument: an autobiographi ...
W4394
25.05.2011
MINILAND MANIFESTO  - Stephen Hobbs
WWW
MINILAND MANIFESTO Ongoing documentation of a number of our coastal cities’ incomplete highway networks has prompted a reading of the space between these structures. Aside from the parking lots and spectacular film settings they provide, they are pe ...
MINILAND MANIFESTO Ongoing documentation of a number of our coastal cities’ incomplete highway networks has prompted a reading of the space between these structures. Aside from the parking lots and spectacular film settings they provide, they are pe ...
W4299
24.05.2011
Polished Concrete (the dissolution of the work into its reflected conditions) - Ian Skedd
WWW
Polished Concrete (the dissolution of the work into its reflected conditions) • Prior to the opening of an exhibition, the concrete floor of a gallery space will be treated with a chemical densifier and sanded with progressively finer grinding tool ...
Polished Concrete (the dissolution of the work into its reflected conditions) • Prior to the opening of an exhibition, the concrete floor of a gallery space will be treated with a chemical densifier and sanded with progressively finer grinding tool ...
W4464
25.05.2011
FLOW - Jane Ball
WWW
FLOW My proposal is to use the Pen Museum, Birmingham as an investigative site for the production of new works that build on ideas initiated in the work entitled ‘Cut’ (shown at the Vaults, Birmingham, 2010); ideas relating to the sculptural act o ...
FLOW My proposal is to use the Pen Museum, Birmingham as an investigative site for the production of new works that build on ideas initiated in the work entitled ‘Cut’ (shown at the Vaults, Birmingham, 2010); ideas relating to the sculptural act o ...
W4352
25.05.2011
Palitos/Sticks  - Yanina Moroni
WWW
Palitos/Sticks Descripción / Description La obra es una instalación, disposición de diversos objetos en el espacio y el tiempo. Es una Estructura modular reubicable y/o adaptable, conformada por Módulos, pequeñas obras, partes de la obra genera ...
Palitos/Sticks Descripción / Description La obra es una instalación, disposición de diversos objetos en el espacio y el tiempo. Es una Estructura modular reubicable y/o adaptable, conformada por Módulos, pequeñas obras, partes de la obra genera ...
U9591
01.01.1987
The World Record - General Idea
Unbuilt Roads
A commission for the SkyDome sports stadium in Toronto, Canada. "General Idea's World Record takes the form of an Illuminated sign suspended overhead and running for the complete circumference of the SkyDome's circular interior street. It will display ...
A commission for the SkyDome sports stadium in Toronto, Canada. "General Idea's World Record takes the form of an Illuminated sign suspended overhead and running for the complete circumference of the SkyDome's circular interior street. It will display ...
W4332
24.05.2011
The Golden Pavilion - Xawery Wolski
WWW
The Golden Pavilion. 1993 What is essentially remote is the unapproachable. In fact, the main quality of an image used for worship is its inapproachability. By its very nature, it is always remote, as close as it may be. One can approach its material rea ...
The Golden Pavilion. 1993 What is essentially remote is the unapproachable. In fact, the main quality of an image used for worship is its inapproachability. By its very nature, it is always remote, as close as it may be. One can approach its material rea ...
W4780
03.06.2011
Emily Lockren
WWW
I have attached one collage and one edited image of unrealized artwork based around the idea of my paintings displayed on a bookshelf with only the edges visible like the spines of books. I envisioned a library of paintings, but never had the rescources t ...
I have attached one collage and one edited image of unrealized artwork based around the idea of my paintings displayed on a bookshelf with only the edges visible like the spines of books. I envisioned a library of paintings, but never had the rescources t ...
W5115
17.09.2012
Eine Ontologie des Paradies - Juan Fernando
WWW
Eine Ontologie des Paradies: die Kunst als Illusion. "Was verstehe ich unter Natur? Unter Natur verstehe ich, das erste innere Prinzip, des Seins eines Dinges. (...) Das ist was wirklich existiert". -„Kritik der reinen Vernunft“. Immanuel Kant ...
Eine Ontologie des Paradies: die Kunst als Illusion. "Was verstehe ich unter Natur? Unter Natur verstehe ich, das erste innere Prinzip, des Seins eines Dinges. (...) Das ist was wirklich existiert". -„Kritik der reinen Vernunft“. Immanuel Kant ...
W5411
20.10.2012
Jessica Miller
WWW
I have created a proposal outlining a beautification project beginning in the city of Atlanta. Participants in the agenda sign up to receive locations of seed bomb caches. They can then distribute the seed bombs and log the locations of the bombing.... ...
I have created a proposal outlining a beautification project beginning in the city of Atlanta. Participants in the agenda sign up to receive locations of seed bomb caches. They can then distribute the seed bombs and log the locations of the bombing.... ...
W4750
27.05.2011
l’Arc d’University Street - Jack Mackie
WWW
For the better part of the last 75 years, Seattle’s Alaska Way Viaduct has dominated Seattle’s Central Waterfront. Now scheduled for demolition, Seattle will, as apparently planned, simply clearcut the viaduct form the waterfront in as attempted exor ...
For the better part of the last 75 years, Seattle’s Alaska Way Viaduct has dominated Seattle’s Central Waterfront. Now scheduled for demolition, Seattle will, as apparently planned, simply clearcut the viaduct form the waterfront in as attempted exor ...
W4852
08.08.2012
Ada Muntean
WWW
These are 2 photos of 2 experimental works which consist in the process of the reconstruction of possible realities from former realities. Basicaly they are stripes (cut from photos and drawings) reordered and sticked in a different way from the initial.. ...
These are 2 photos of 2 experimental works which consist in the process of the reconstruction of possible realities from former realities. Basicaly they are stripes (cut from photos and drawings) reordered and sticked in a different way from the initial.. ...
W5009
30.08.2012
Structure for Formal and Material Imagination - Scott Massey
WWW
Structure for Formal and Material Imagination Travel to another dimension has long held our fascination. From Alice’s tentative leap down the rabbit hole, Wade Davis’ experients with the world’s psychotropic flora, or teleporting from the bridg ...
Structure for Formal and Material Imagination Travel to another dimension has long held our fascination. From Alice’s tentative leap down the rabbit hole, Wade Davis’ experients with the world’s psychotropic flora, or teleporting from the bridg ...
W3909
20.05.2011
Unrealised proposal for Saatchi New Sensations, 2009 - Petra Swais and Najda El-Amriti
WWW
Having worked for three years alongside one another, but never producing work collaboratively, we have come to realise the strong connection between our individual practices. The most prominent link between our works is the notion of manipulation. By mani ...
Having worked for three years alongside one another, but never producing work collaboratively, we have come to realise the strong connection between our individual practices. The most prominent link between our works is the notion of manipulation. By mani ...