You Can't Cheat an Honest Man

Organised by Sarah Pierce as part of Romantic Detachment, curated by Sarah Glennie and Adam Sutherland at PS1/MoMA, New York (16 October - 7 November 2004) and funded by the Grizedale Foundation. A lecture on confidence tricks (or con games) in collaboration with the NYPD Crime Prevention Unit, followed by a screening of the film Midnight Cowboy directed by John Schlesinger, 1969. Friday 29 October 2004 at 2:00 p.m.

The Con

The attribution of competence (or ability, capability, proficiency etc.) under normal circumstances thus always involves issues of confidence. The trick is to gain, maintain and sustain such confidence, shared by all parties to the process. As in all normal social processes, this requires conventions through which claims to be acting reasonably may be made and accepted.

(Sarah Pierce, "The Con", New York 2004.)