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.

To Two Too; Hypothetical Monument for a Natural Disaster - Jeffrey Wisniewski

Eislandschaft - P. Fischli und D. Weiss

Merci, Thank you, Danke: Les 2 sujets  - Thomas Hirschorn

MAK - Wien  - Rosemarie Trockel

The insurer - Fabrice Hybert

Engel-Detektor - Jakob Gautel & Jason Karaïndros

PROPOSALl + VOORSTEL - Guillame Bijl

Milan House (AC/DC & Joy Division) - Liam Gillick

Relatum (Iron Plate and Stone) - Lee Ufan

Fax Transmission - Raymond Pettibone and Jason Rhoades

Agency of Unrealised Projects
Logo by Liam Gillick
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Date
Title
Source
Description
Tags
W4280
24.05.2011
Vision and Vernacular: Eight African American Artists in Venice - Martha Henry
WWW
American Folk Art Museum Presents Vision and Vernacular: Eight African American Artists in Venice Four Self-Taught Visionaries: Lonnie Holley, Mr. Imagination, Charlie Lucas, Kevin Sampson American culture, values and spirituality c ...
American Folk Art Museum Presents Vision and Vernacular: Eight African American Artists in Venice Four Self-Taught Visionaries: Lonnie Holley, Mr. Imagination, Charlie Lucas, Kevin Sampson American culture, values and spirituality c ...
W4379
25.05.2011
“Shifting Images of Marseille”  - Srinivas Mangipudi
WWW
Project Proposal: “Shifting Images of Marseille” The urban city areas are often filled with cars and vehicles of all kinds parked in different places, like parking lots, on the streets, or just moving on the road. These can be turned into dynamic ...
Project Proposal: “Shifting Images of Marseille” The urban city areas are often filled with cars and vehicles of all kinds parked in different places, like parking lots, on the streets, or just moving on the road. These can be turned into dynamic ...
W5247
10.10.2012
Iain McPherson
WWW
Project: Create art work for a series of bus shelters (P-Stops) in Perm, Russia. Work must be strong enough to compete with graffiti. One panel (not shown) was accepted for the project. The last email I had said that this had been delayed to due fin ...
Project: Create art work for a series of bus shelters (P-Stops) in Perm, Russia. Work must be strong enough to compete with graffiti. One panel (not shown) was accepted for the project. The last email I had said that this had been delayed to due fin ...
W5023
31.08.2012
Rooted - John Gayer
WWW
ROOTED This unrealised project primarily exists in the imagination. It involves an extended performance that demands stasis and proposes an evolutionary shift. This shift could take centuries to happen. The idea, in part, derives from a time when I produ ...
ROOTED This unrealised project primarily exists in the imagination. It involves an extended performance that demands stasis and proposes an evolutionary shift. This shift could take centuries to happen. The idea, in part, derives from a time when I produ ...
U9988
01.10.1987
City Hall Tower Night Ilumination - Krysztof Wodiczko
Unbuilt Roads
"In the name of "progress" our official culture is striving to force the new media to do the work of the old." -Marshall McLuhan "For the city of today does speak to us, but it is also at certain points and in certain orders remarkably silent. There a ...
"In the name of "progress" our official culture is striving to force the new media to do the work of the old." -Marshall McLuhan "For the city of today does speak to us, but it is also at certain points and in certain orders remarkably silent. There a ...
W3551
12.05.2011
Gretchen Smith
WWW
I started a project that focused on the idea that we all project our thoughts, beliefs, ideas and values onto those that come across our paths in our daily lives. Sometimes tihs is a positive experience and sometimes it is a negative experience. I c ...
I started a project that focused on the idea that we all project our thoughts, beliefs, ideas and values onto those that come across our paths in our daily lives. Sometimes tihs is a positive experience and sometimes it is a negative experience. I c ...
W3577
13.05.2011
DIMENSIONS VARIABLE: a proposal 07.2010! - Raul J Mendez
WWW
CONTEXT My work reads as a reconciliation of opposites between the private and the public. In other words, it is a codified puzzle of images that continues to grow and develop, drawing from my personal experience as well as from the public domain. There ...
CONTEXT My work reads as a reconciliation of opposites between the private and the public. In other words, it is a codified puzzle of images that continues to grow and develop, drawing from my personal experience as well as from the public domain. There ...
W4678
26.05.2011
Two Propositions for Participation and One Prognostication  - Mel Chin
WWW
Two Propositions for Participation and One Prognostication (One Page of) Preparatory Notes: Ask the least, so the most can be included. As a scriptor, conceive parts the performers (the participants) can easily follow yet allow them to understand how th ...
Two Propositions for Participation and One Prognostication (One Page of) Preparatory Notes: Ask the least, so the most can be included. As a scriptor, conceive parts the performers (the participants) can easily follow yet allow them to understand how th ...
W3718
17.05.2011
Thomas Koole
WWW
The installation was removed just prior to opening by curator without explanation (space given to another artist) -as the work depended upon viewer interaction for realization it remains un-actuated. Us and Them wood, copper, toy soldiers, red candl ...
The installation was removed just prior to opening by curator without explanation (space given to another artist) -as the work depended upon viewer interaction for realization it remains un-actuated. Us and Them wood, copper, toy soldiers, red candl ...
D10808
01.01.2003
The House of Language - Bethan Huws
DAAD
To print this phrase on a relatively large number of (bird) nest boxes – the German concrete cylinder type which are not analogous to human houses, unlike their French and British counterparts – and then to install these in an area of a forest that do ...
To print this phrase on a relatively large number of (bird) nest boxes – the German concrete cylinder type which are not analogous to human houses, unlike their French and British counterparts – and then to install these in an area of a forest that do ...
U9798
01.01.1972
Prima del 73 - Fabio Mauri
Unbuilt Roads
see my letter (eventually reasons why the work has not been realised) Anxiety Previous Publications (?) This thing is mentioned in "Fabio Mauri Opere e Azioni 1954-1994" Giorgio Mondadori Ed. Exisiting Documents (photos, drawings, models): ...
see my letter (eventually reasons why the work has not been realised) Anxiety Previous Publications (?) This thing is mentioned in "Fabio Mauri Opere e Azioni 1954-1994" Giorgio Mondadori Ed. Exisiting Documents (photos, drawings, models): ...
W10947
11.08.2015
Conduit - A.V. Ryan and Malin Abrahamsson
WWW
Conduit is many things: a recycling project, a purification ritual, a reclamation, a gift. One of the communities we aim to reach is the one that the gallery-going public habitually overlooks in Chelsea – the network of auto body shops and gas stati ...
Conduit is many things: a recycling project, a purification ritual, a reclamation, a gift. One of the communities we aim to reach is the one that the gallery-going public habitually overlooks in Chelsea – the network of auto body shops and gas stati ...
W4484
25.05.2011
Phobos self-degradation  - Toby Huddlestone
WWW
Phobos self-degradation – the artist sends a form of self-degrading archival document to the Mars moon Phobos. Stickney crater, Phobos. Imaged by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, March 23, 2008. Place Phobos, the largest of Mars' two moons, and th ...
Phobos self-degradation – the artist sends a form of self-degrading archival document to the Mars moon Phobos. Stickney crater, Phobos. Imaged by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, March 23, 2008. Place Phobos, the largest of Mars' two moons, and th ...
U9853
01.01.1972
Progetto per Gerry Schum - Guiseppe Penone
Unbuilt Roads
Ogni anno un giro di 60" attorno ad un albero seguendo un cerchio fisso. Le riprese montate in successione anno per anno testimoniano la crescita concentrica del tronco. Progetto per Gerry Schum. Novembre 1972. Giuseppe Penone ...
Ogni anno un giro di 60" attorno ad un albero seguendo un cerchio fisso. Le riprese montate in successione anno per anno testimoniano la crescita concentrica del tronco. Progetto per Gerry Schum. Novembre 1972. Giuseppe Penone ...
W5184
30.09.2012
Relative Music - Augustin Maurs
WWW
RELATIVE MUSIC An unrealized economy, by Augustin Maurs À propos unrealized projects, it could be amusing to consider that, in the perspective of Albert Einstein's theory of relativity, almost the totality of the music written in the western cultures f ...
RELATIVE MUSIC An unrealized economy, by Augustin Maurs À propos unrealized projects, it could be amusing to consider that, in the perspective of Albert Einstein's theory of relativity, almost the totality of the music written in the western cultures f ...
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 ...
W5162
25.09.2012
Heather Lewis
WWW
An installation that mimics the rising and setting of the sun, condensed to perhaps 5 minutes – a lamp moving in a 30 ft arc (15 ft radius). It shows the effects of variable light and therefore shadows, on various objects and situations. ...
An installation that mimics the rising and setting of the sun, condensed to perhaps 5 minutes – a lamp moving in a 30 ft arc (15 ft radius). It shows the effects of variable light and therefore shadows, on various objects and situations. ...
W4830
07.08.2012
Carbonsphere - Evelyn Rosenberg and Anthony Hyde
WWW
Black balls represent carbon atoms. They are piled in the bottom of the container at their present accumulation in the atmosphere. Each time an equivalent amount of carbon is released in the atmosphere a ball would be dropped. Each time a carbon reductio ...
Black balls represent carbon atoms. They are piled in the bottom of the container at their present accumulation in the atmosphere. Each time an equivalent amount of carbon is released in the atmosphere a ball would be dropped. Each time a carbon reductio ...
W4016
22.05.2011
UNVEIL - Alessandro Rolandi
WWW
action-performance for Caochangdi Village project, spring 2011 1) With the help of several artists and local people from Caochangdi village,the message would be spread around of an artistic action involving the local people 2) After having bought arou ...
action-performance for Caochangdi Village project, spring 2011 1) With the help of several artists and local people from Caochangdi village,the message would be spread around of an artistic action involving the local people 2) After having bought arou ...
W4456
25.05.2011
Heaven on Earth: A room for reflection. - Leila Peacock
WWW
Heaven on Earth: A room for reflection. Lucretirus rendered his scientific theories in epic poetry, an intellect of extraordinary vision he imagined many things that would later be proved. He was the master of the thought experiment, staging complex pr ...
Heaven on Earth: A room for reflection. Lucretirus rendered his scientific theories in epic poetry, an intellect of extraordinary vision he imagined many things that would later be proved. He was the master of the thought experiment, staging complex pr ...
W4661
25.05.2011
"Panic Eternal" - David Hanes
WWW
"Panic Eternal", Single Channel Video Projection Loop, 16:00, 2011 Panic Eternal is a projection artwork that plays with both the emotional and visual stimuli of a viewer in its emphasizing of slapstick found in cinematic parody. Using found footage (f ...
"Panic Eternal", Single Channel Video Projection Loop, 16:00, 2011 Panic Eternal is a projection artwork that plays with both the emotional and visual stimuli of a viewer in its emphasizing of slapstick found in cinematic parody. Using found footage (f ...
W4322
24.05.2011
Laboratory for Perfecting Fear - Transidency
WWW
Laboratory for Perfecting Fear (working title) Proposal for the II Moscow International Biennale for Young Art Contents Proposal Proposed Installation Background Theory Possible problems and Possible Solutions Methodology Locations Support About Trans ...
Laboratory for Perfecting Fear (working title) Proposal for the II Moscow International Biennale for Young Art Contents Proposal Proposed Installation Background Theory Possible problems and Possible Solutions Methodology Locations Support About Trans ...
W3615
13.05.2011
In the Realm of Self - Shaun David Myles
WWW
Sculptural installation: This installation is an offshoot from a project developed over a number of years using the symbol of the heart, explored through multiple materials, for an investigation of the human condition. The two sculptures here, each ...
Sculptural installation: This installation is an offshoot from a project developed over a number of years using the symbol of the heart, explored through multiple materials, for an investigation of the human condition. The two sculptures here, each ...
W4916
15.08.2012
Phobos self-degradation  - Toby Huddlestone
WWW
Toby Huddlestone Unrealised Proposal Phobos self-degradation – the artist sends a form of self-degrading archival document (time-capsule) to the Mars moon Phobos. Stickney crater, Phobos. Imaged by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, March 23, 2008. ...
Toby Huddlestone Unrealised Proposal Phobos self-degradation – the artist sends a form of self-degrading archival document (time-capsule) to the Mars moon Phobos. Stickney crater, Phobos. Imaged by Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, March 23, 2008. ...
W4806
07.08.2012
We Don't Even Know How to End This Misery - Kristin Tårnes
WWW
The text is the voiceover of a film I made about an unrealized collaborative project while I was an exchange student in Berlin in 2007. The two images are stills from the same film. Even though the original project was unrealized, a work about the unreali ...
The text is the voiceover of a film I made about an unrealized collaborative project while I was an exchange student in Berlin in 2007. The two images are stills from the same film. Even though the original project was unrealized, a work about the unreali ...
W4159
23.05.2011
Asymmetric Flight - andreas kopp
WWW
Asymmetric Flight Concept for a mobilé in public space. With attached documents I would like to introduce a concept (from 2009) which I so far have not been able to realize. ...
Asymmetric Flight Concept for a mobilé in public space. With attached documents I would like to introduce a concept (from 2009) which I so far have not been able to realize. ...