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.

The World Record - General Idea

Double Exposure 1995-6  - Dan Graham

Museum - Katharina Fritsch

Catwalk - Sylive Fleury

The Rosetta Garden - Gary Simmons

2 Architecture Towers - Robert Irwin

Eislandschaft - P. Fischli und D. Weiss

Uncompleted 1966 - and on  - John Armleder

Engel-Detektor - Jakob Gautel & Jason Karaïndros

AUSSICHTSTURM, HOLZHAUS (WOHNHAUS), SCHWIMMBECKEN, FREIE FAHRT - Maria Eichhorn

Agency of Unrealised Projects
Logo by Liam Gillick
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Date
Title
Source
Description
Tags
W5905
18.10.2013
Temp - Matthijs Muller
WWW
Temp (pronounced: Temp-io) is a pavilion that offers protection against sun and rain. The only way to reach the pavilion is by crossing a circle of sand and inevitably leave your traces in the sand. Visitors are invited to erase their traces by rotatin ...
Temp (pronounced: Temp-io) is a pavilion that offers protection against sun and rain. The only way to reach the pavilion is by crossing a circle of sand and inevitably leave your traces in the sand. Visitors are invited to erase their traces by rotatin ...
W4221
24.05.2011
alhena
WWW
W10431
22.04.2014
Digital Lacuna - Nicolas Barrette
WWW
The aim of this project is to offer a new way of perceiving the internet and its influence on the physical environment. WIFI points across the city are mapped in a GIS across the city of Toronto. Where the points of highest density exist, pneumatic dom ...
The aim of this project is to offer a new way of perceiving the internet and its influence on the physical environment. WIFI points across the city are mapped in a GIS across the city of Toronto. Where the points of highest density exist, pneumatic dom ...
W4167
24.05.2011
Outopia - Eloise Kirk
WWW
Outopia ‘Outopia’ (meaning no place) is an on-going, fragmented project based on a fictional landscape. This landscape is neither here nor there; it exists only as representation of the internal self, in perpetual relation with the world. ...
Outopia ‘Outopia’ (meaning no place) is an on-going, fragmented project based on a fictional landscape. This landscape is neither here nor there; it exists only as representation of the internal self, in perpetual relation with the world. ...
W4953
20.08.2012
Monika Drożyńska
WWW
Laznia Centre for Contemporary Art is an animator of a new artistic project whose aim is to create a permanent collection of artworks in the urban space. It is supposed to act as a stimulus to change the character of the district, where the institution ...
Laznia Centre for Contemporary Art is an animator of a new artistic project whose aim is to create a permanent collection of artworks in the urban space. It is supposed to act as a stimulus to change the character of the district, where the institution ...
W3542
12.05.2011
Nathan Danilowicz
WWW
The working title for this yet to be realized sculpture is "untitled (covered bridge)." It is based largely on covered bridges found in Pennsylvania and the surrounding Mid-Atlantic United States. These historic bridges are predominantly red. This sculptu ...
The working title for this yet to be realized sculpture is "untitled (covered bridge)." It is based largely on covered bridges found in Pennsylvania and the surrounding Mid-Atlantic United States. These historic bridges are predominantly red. This sculptu ...
W5350
18.10.2012
Mariano Del Rosario
WWW
An art installation with mirrored tunnels connecting three derelict industrial buildings as transitory laboratory space for art experimentation. A permit to contain, wrap, and occupy three toxic and derelict industrial buildings in Brooklyn, New York, ...
An art installation with mirrored tunnels connecting three derelict industrial buildings as transitory laboratory space for art experimentation. A permit to contain, wrap, and occupy three toxic and derelict industrial buildings in Brooklyn, New York, ...
W5447
20.10.2012
Caution work in progress - Geraldo Zamproni
WWW
Caution work in progress Passively invites the viewer to turn to touch in order to satisfy an inevitable curiosity about what is being done. There is a strong sense of this logic does not work, it will foam that wall? ...
Caution work in progress Passively invites the viewer to turn to touch in order to satisfy an inevitable curiosity about what is being done. There is a strong sense of this logic does not work, it will foam that wall? ...
W3508
11.05.2011
Karin Schaefer
WWW
Attached are images of a model for a large scale public work that has not been realized. The making of this work started a few weeks after 911 as I needed to find a way to process and work with the reality of the event. Models have been exhibited in vari ...
Attached are images of a model for a large scale public work that has not been realized. The making of this work started a few weeks after 911 as I needed to find a way to process and work with the reality of the event. Models have been exhibited in vari ...
W3964
21.05.2011
THE LIBRARY - Liliana Gelman
WWW
The library is a project about books and readers. It consist of two parts, one is the photographic register of books rescued from the street, the beach, or even from the garbage, over my years of immigrant in Israel. los libros de la biblioteca no tie ...
The library is a project about books and readers. It consist of two parts, one is the photographic register of books rescued from the street, the beach, or even from the garbage, over my years of immigrant in Israel. los libros de la biblioteca no tie ...
W4234
24.05.2011
Elise Lammer
WWW
This work is an homage to the lost artwork by John Baldessari "Untitled (after Palm Tree (for Charlemagne)" 1975. This unrealized project aims to collect similar postcards as the ones displayed in Peter Kirby's documentary and recreate Baldessari's lost ...
This work is an homage to the lost artwork by John Baldessari "Untitled (after Palm Tree (for Charlemagne)" 1975. This unrealized project aims to collect similar postcards as the ones displayed in Peter Kirby's documentary and recreate Baldessari's lost ...
W3642
15.05.2011
cara judea alhadeff
WWW
Since the early 90s, my photographs have been publicly defended by freedom of speech organizations such as artsave/People for the American Way, the Electronic Freedom Foundation, and the ACLU. By witnessing first hand people's reactionary tendencies and ...
Since the early 90s, my photographs have been publicly defended by freedom of speech organizations such as artsave/People for the American Way, the Electronic Freedom Foundation, and the ACLU. By witnessing first hand people's reactionary tendencies and ...
W4429
25.05.2011
The Snow Leopard Garden - Yutaka Sone
WWW
Yutaka Sone The Snow Leopard Garden Project for the wood of sculptures of Vassivière island, France July 2009 In the meadow, in the front of the Centre international d’art et du paysage and the dam In the framework of his solo exhibition for t ...
Yutaka Sone The Snow Leopard Garden Project for the wood of sculptures of Vassivière island, France July 2009 In the meadow, in the front of the Centre international d’art et du paysage and the dam In the framework of his solo exhibition for t ...
W5428
20.10.2012
The Line  - Bindu Mehra
WWW
The Line In 2002, there were communal riots between Hindus and Muslims in the city of Ahmedabad in India. According to official estimates, 1044 people were killed in the violence. Another 223 people were reported missing, 2,548 injured, 919 women widowed ...
The Line In 2002, there were communal riots between Hindus and Muslims in the city of Ahmedabad in India. According to official estimates, 1044 people were killed in the violence. Another 223 people were reported missing, 2,548 injured, 919 women widowed ...
W5280
15.10.2012
Hypermoi - David Guez
WWW
THE HYPERMOI David Guez http://www.guez.org Introduction The Hypermoi sets the hypothesis of the existence of a 'numerical ego' linked up to the internet network. This special ego would be a construction linked to our more and more 'emotional' and 'intens ...
THE HYPERMOI David Guez http://www.guez.org Introduction The Hypermoi sets the hypothesis of the existence of a 'numerical ego' linked up to the internet network. This special ego would be a construction linked to our more and more 'emotional' and 'intens ...
W3738
18.05.2011
The Body - Felippe Moraes
WWW
“The Body” is an installation in which a 1,80m x 0,5m pile of salt rests over a rustic wooden table. This work brings the discussion of the presence of an almost immaterial and spiritual body evoked by the size and by the symbolic character ...
“The Body” is an installation in which a 1,80m x 0,5m pile of salt rests over a rustic wooden table. This work brings the discussion of the presence of an almost immaterial and spiritual body evoked by the size and by the symbolic character ...
W5475
21.10.2012
FROM RAPHAEL TO MOHAMED - Mo Abd-Ulla
WWW
The transformation of aesthetics and politics A practical research explicitly distinguishes between what is beautiful and what is interesting, exploring the differences between representation and reality. The project tackles the religious, social, c ...
The transformation of aesthetics and politics A practical research explicitly distinguishes between what is beautiful and what is interesting, exploring the differences between representation and reality. The project tackles the religious, social, c ...
W5008
30.08.2012
And the Girls with their Roller Skates - Julia Brodauf
WWW
"And the Girls with their Roller Skates" was a proposal to do an installation in combination with an edition at the Heizkraftwerk Moabit in Berlin where Vatenfall sometimes shows art exhibitions. While the edition was accepted an will be realised in octob ...
"And the Girls with their Roller Skates" was a proposal to do an installation in combination with an edition at the Heizkraftwerk Moabit in Berlin where Vatenfall sometimes shows art exhibitions. While the edition was accepted an will be realised in octob ...
D10807
01.01.2003
ÉCOUTE - Bethan Huws
DAAD
To film a colony of coots on a small, dark pond, recording their daily and seasonal life. The film (image) would put equal emphasis on sound. The only word in the entire film is the title: Écoute (French, “listen”), which forms a homophone wit ...
To film a colony of coots on a small, dark pond, recording their daily and seasonal life. The film (image) would put equal emphasis on sound. The only word in the entire film is the title: Écoute (French, “listen”), which forms a homophone wit ...
W5295
17.10.2012
Tomb of the Unknown Broker - Andreas Kopp
WWW
To the unknown Broker / Tomb of the Unknown Broker ( Dem unbekannten Broker ) a monument about artistic vision as social comment The installation (Tomb of an Unknown Broker) is dedicated to the virtual character of an Unidentified Broker. It highl ...
To the unknown Broker / Tomb of the Unknown Broker ( Dem unbekannten Broker ) a monument about artistic vision as social comment The installation (Tomb of an Unknown Broker) is dedicated to the virtual character of an Unidentified Broker. It highl ...
W5257
12.10.2012
Unseen Connections - Andrei Sidorkin
WWW
This is a project concerning social and institutional critique both. It is the play with the problem of localization of the place where art should happen, but suddenly it appears in another place than it was expected. And also this project reveals conform ...
This is a project concerning social and institutional critique both. It is the play with the problem of localization of the place where art should happen, but suddenly it appears in another place than it was expected. And also this project reveals conform ...
W5435
20.10.2012
ART FOR THE CITY - Matej Metlikovič
WWW
Unrealised projects ART FOR THE CITY, 2008 I'm sending you two photos of the unrealised projects created in 2008 on the theme »Art for the city«. The Society of Ljubljana's visual artists invited artists of Ljubljana to contribute ideas how to make ...
Unrealised projects ART FOR THE CITY, 2008 I'm sending you two photos of the unrealised projects created in 2008 on the theme »Art for the city«. The Society of Ljubljana's visual artists invited artists of Ljubljana to contribute ideas how to make ...
W3947
20.05.2011
lucciola.net - Beatrice Crastini
WWW
Project to create a bright jewel, presented to the "Trieste Contemporanea International Design Contest", 2006 Name: lucciola.net Lucciola.net is an jewel whimsical assembled and balanced. Feature: vision in motion. In a little piece of glass ...
Project to create a bright jewel, presented to the "Trieste Contemporanea International Design Contest", 2006 Name: lucciola.net Lucciola.net is an jewel whimsical assembled and balanced. Feature: vision in motion. In a little piece of glass ...
W4338
24.05.2011
Untitled (Paper Cuts), - Raluca Popa
WWW
RALUCA POPA Untitled (Paper Cuts), paper, glue, dimensions variable (2011) No one to talk. This work is in progress. This work addresses the subject of failure – the failure of the object and the failure of the event. This work might create ...
RALUCA POPA Untitled (Paper Cuts), paper, glue, dimensions variable (2011) No one to talk. This work is in progress. This work addresses the subject of failure – the failure of the object and the failure of the event. This work might create ...
W3919
20.05.2011
Art at the service of … Short history - Alina and Jeff Bliumis
WWW
2010-present “Art at the service of …,Short history”- a series of 5-7 sculptures represents monuments that were destroyed at various times around the world. Each sculpture consists of a scaled down replica of a monument on a pedestal. A short not ...
2010-present “Art at the service of …,Short history”- a series of 5-7 sculptures represents monuments that were destroyed at various times around the world. Each sculpture consists of a scaled down replica of a monument on a pedestal. A short not ...
W4963
21.08.2012
At Knifepoint - Art Van Triest
WWW
At knifepoint is an interactive installation that moves with the body of the spectator. the knives all stay at 10 cm from the body http://youtu.be/7ELCRr9fBGw ...
At knifepoint is an interactive installation that moves with the body of the spectator. the knives all stay at 10 cm from the body http://youtu.be/7ELCRr9fBGw ...