Discussion Island Negotiation Plates (1997) is a two-part work by Liam Gillick (b. 1964, Aylesbury) composed of sheets of blue, brown and ivory coloured acrylic behind aluminium that are screwed onto the wall. The order of the materials is prescribed by the artist but ‘the plates may be arranged in any way upon the chosen wall(s)’, the arrangement here is true to the original presentation at his gallery in Paris. The formal vocabulary of the work is characteristic of the artist’s simple, modular structures that are fixed together in a precise and deliberate way. Its sculptural presence, despite being decisively two-dimensional and wall-based can also be seen as part of a broader intention to make objects that remain open and ambiguous.

To quote Gillick, ‘The work has to have this rather rough seduction but also a degree of uncertainty about it’. The Discussion Island series proposes a set of ‘environmental tools’ for considering the future through ‘fundamental processes – discussion, delay, negotiation, routine and ambience’. The overall impression of blankness, or what the artist describes as an ‘emptied out quality’ within this work anticipates ‘a potential overload of content’. This ‘disjunction of form and content’ can be connected to Gillick’s interest in communication through design, a recurrent theme within the artist’s work.