Exploring the exhibition as a cruising ground, this project considers the connections between cruising and viewing art in a public space.
This is the first exhibition of Cruising Archaeology, an ongoing artistic project by Jack Scollard that involves a meticulous process of selecting and curating discarded objects collected from queer cruising sites. Scollard’s practice engages with archival methodologies and is rooted in photography, print and publishing, and often considers how queer life is recorded, circulated and preserved. Their work is particularly concerned with sites of suspended or altered realities; spaces in which normative behaviours are disrupted, reconfigured or temporarily dissolved.
First presented as an Instagram account and later as a book published by SMUT Press, Cruising Archaeology has documented hundreds of unique objects. Using methods taken from the field of archaeology, these items, often discarded or overlooked, are repositioned as relics of a subcultural sexual practice. By applying the rigour of archaeology to the ephemeral nature of the cruising ground, Scollard explores the tension between preservation and disappearance.
Over the course of a two-month-long residency, Scollard has researched cruising sites and their strong links to LGBTQIA+ history, alongside Studio Voltaire’s archive of commissions exploring queer pleasure. Cruising Archaeology: The Pleasure Archive Research Centre functions as a material analysis of queer lives and the spaces they inhabit. The exhibition considers how to present ephemeral histories, inviting visitors to treat the space as a critical cruising ground.
The archive becomes a site of pleasure and permanence, offering a tangible record of practices and ideas that persist beyond the usual historical narrative. The exhibited objects serve as physical witnesses to private desire in public terrain, testifying to moments of intimacy and anonymity.
