Surplus of requirements, Lucy May Schofield

Lucy May Schofield - Surplus of requirements
An offset-litho printed edition of 20 books were printed and bound by M Collective, 190 x 220mm, 2010.

« In collaboration with Sarah Jane Lawton living in rural France, I analysed areas within past relationships that had been described as traits lacking in my character. I made a list and sent it to Sarah, my unofficial herbalist. She researched and gathered the medicinal herbal ingredients from the Provencal countryside, dried and posted them to England. I fused the herbs to create 20 sachets of remedies, to be taken with hot water in order to make me more 'girlfriend-able'. I hot foil blocked the remedy on accompanying card to form my part of the collaboration.»

The artists of 'M Collective' conducted research at the Manchester Herbarium, guided by head botanist Leander Wolfensholm. A unique, insightful and vast Victorian collection of plant specimens are housed in the large attic laboratory of the Manchester Museum. The collection is stunning but much underused and under accessed by scientists and scholars. The M Collective (Lucy May Schofield, Nick Fleming, Elizabeth Machin, Tony Eve, Joan Beadle, Hilary Judd, Sylvia Waltering, Jacqueline Butler and the Centre for Fine Print Research staff at UWE, Bristol - Sarah Bodman, Tom Sowden, Paul Laider, Guy Begbie, Andrew Eason, Helen Allesbrook, teri Makassih, Angie Butler, Natalie McGrorty), were invited to respond to the Herbarium collection in an edition of 20 works to fit within the dimensions of re-appropriated specimen glass-fronted boxes.

Source: Lucy May Schofield