Fired books. Jawbone.

Time out. Thinking. Modern British Sculpture at RA

I finally made to the Modern British Sculpture exhibition at The Royal Accademy. I have read and heard very mixed reviews about it: certain areas underrepresented, some obvious artists omitted, jumpy, sketchy. BBC has an interesting video here. However, I went there not for the fundamental overview of British Sculpture. I have been feeling "stuck"for a little while now. Going to this exhibition was my attempt to plunge into something different.

So what did I make of it.
I did enjoy it. So did my kids, aged 6 and 11. We had audio-guides. I can only assume that we were the right audience for the exhibition: a bit educated in arts, but not experts on sculpture.
Jaob Epstein, Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth and Anthony Caro kind of steal the show. I thought the pairing of Epstein's Adam  and Henry Moore's Snake was fantastic. However, I felt like the next room (the one with Phillip King) would have benefited from an Anthony Gormley figure, that would have put Epstein, King and Gilbert into a different kind of conversation (anyway, where was Anthony Gormley?) Three Forms were well set against the backdrop of Chinese ceramics - so painterly!The Duck Weight,  neo-sumerian (below) looked unbelievably modern.  Early One Morning was beautifully filling the room.  Anish Kapoor was missing. I finally liked Richard Long. The last two rooms were a bit crowded for my linking. Gary Webb, Martin Boyce, Rose Finn-Kelcey. Richard Wentworth was showing film Making Do and Getting By, a Selection of Everyday Encounters 1970-85, - a currious documentary of everyday sculptural inventions, which cast a completely new light onto the whole exhibition.

Drawing. Thinking again. I do not forget.

I do not remember; I do not forget.

Fired books. Birds eye view.

 

 

 

 

One of my books did not shrink in firing - little bugger! It fused flat, forming a beautiful desolate white landscape.

Time out. Thinking. Drawing again.

Undressing the book: inside the old bindings 2

 

 

 

Alvaro Sanchez-Montanes, Andrew Friend and others at I Am Solitary@Gift

 

Gift gallery is holding a group exhibition I AM SOLITARY.

Their first exhibition only happened about a year and a half ago. Gift featured a large group of young artist's: many of them were fresh graduates from Chelsea MA Fine Art. Honey Im.  Xenofon Kavvadias. Reiko Matsubara. Andrew Salgado (also in this present show). And others.
Here's some of the bits I liked in this show:

 Lindsey Bull has dreamlike painted illusions almost asking for psychoanalysis.  

 

Grace Kim is showing large glossy prints of monocolour images, that look like life-after death stills from Paranormal channel. The prints are highly reflective: they blur the boundary between me and her and the work.

 
Alvaro Sanchez-Montanes photographs "desolate landscapes" of almost "unnerving tranquility". I saw no contemplative isolation in them. I was drawn by their echoing silence. Their coldness. The air of absence, the air of abandonment.

Andrew Friend is a fascinating one. Device for Disappearing (at sea) sounds and looks functional and useful. It's there between reality and imaginary, true and pretend, literal and metaphorical.

Beautiful things, art as a message and displaced reality of Abigail Box @ Degree Art

 

 

 Abigail Box is showing her surreal paintings of displaced animals/locations at Degree Art.

As I walked in, I had this bizarre feeling that I really liked what I saw. Even before I read the press release about existence, perspective and belonging, I was attracted by the aesthetics of the paintings - they look like something I would really like to have on my walls (dear Abigail, would you fancy a swap, please!). They are bright and white, eclectic, gently disturbing (but not so freaky, you would need to keep kids out of the room). User friendly.

Every time I see something pleasing to my eye, I feel guilty for liking it.  Can aesthetics of an artwork stop the viewer from reading into the message?  Grayson Perry said, in one of his lectures this autum - he is an artist and he makes nice things. Sure, his work deals with complex and sensitive social realities. But - God! - it is beautiful too! It gives me a tingle. Reading New Scientist gives me a buzz too. But surely not for the aesthetic beauty of it! It does often deal with complex and sensitive issues, with displacement and existence. However, we would all agree that New Scientist is not a piece of visual artwork. I do not buy it for an aesthetic experience.

A work of art encountered as a work of art is an experience, not a statement or an answer to a question. Art is not only about something, it is something. A work of art is a thing in the world, not just a text or commentary on the world. (Susan Sontag, On style)

DegreeArt.com Presents:
'A REALITY OF THEIR OWN'
New Work by Abigail Box

12a Vyner Street, London, E2 9DG
3rd - 31st March 2011 12-6pm DAILY
Private View Thursday 3 rd March 2011 6-9pm, R.S.V.P. vj@DegreeArt.com

A Reality of their Own is not only an iridescent-like juxtaposition of imagery, but also an examination of the spectator vs. the visual vs. our known reality.

Abigail Box's recent work forms part of her ongoing exploration into the curiousness of existence and toys with the contradiction involved in feeling both a sense of belonging and displaced.

These visual analogies are harmoniously presented and allow the spectators to ask themselves questions regarding their affiliations with their space, cohabitants and themselves.

A Reality of their Own catalyzes this experience by introducing wild animals into a series of human environments to provoke a fresh and inquisitive perspective onto something familiar. Attempting to reflect on our everyday surroundings along with our conventions and behaviour and in part making us feel outside what we consider our own space.

The work approaches the difficulties associated with confronting and comprehending our own reality through a remarkably captivating blend of painterly techniques and collaging of found imagery.

www.DegreeArt.com - 020 8980 03395 - vj@DegreeArt.com 
12a Vyner Street, London, E2 9DG

Time out. Drawing. Wittgenstein again.

The world is my world: this is manifest in the fact that the limits of language (of language which alone I understand) mean the limits of my world. (Wittgenstein, TLP: 6.52)