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    contemporary art, fashion, installation art, sculpture, Uncategorized

    Matthew Stone, Propaganda (2012)

    September 18, 2012

    This piece floats on a perilous sea of style mags; they buoy up a marble-effect plinth. Matthew Stone is not cool, he is stone cold.

    But these publications have more gravity than usual. Their covers are stuck to blocks of wood, giving each more permanence than a sheaf of glossy pages.

    A muted printing technique fades and dates the titles (i-D and Dazed), so what they gain in cultural validation they lose in terms of timeliness.

    This is always a trade off. One surely cannot be both hip and profound. The typography and styling which threaten to swallow this plinth have been frozen mid trend.

    And yet those headlines  (“Love changes everything” and “Everything is possible”) may be deep. But they mean next to nothing when packaged up as content.

    Fashion magazines are detached affairs, the last place to go in search of wisdom. But new trainers change everything; everything is possible to those with cash. Too true.

    Stone is said to be a favourite of the titles presented here. So his reification of the hands that feed is brave and yet, oblique; it is hard to say where he stands.

    Some of the magazines are sawn in two up and fixed with hinges. This is surely an act of love as much as destruction. It is as if everything hinges on fashion here, it seems, even art.

    Matthew Stone: Everything is Possible can be seen at La Scatola until October 5 2012. See gallery website for more details.

    Uncategorized

    Photo blog: Toledo, Spain

    September 13, 2012

    Criticismism has just got back from warmer climes. The excuse to visit Toledo was a family wedding. So I headed to Spain for the party and stayed for the El Greco.

    Doménikos Theotokópoulos, the painter known to art history as The Greek, plays a large role in the identity of this historic city. Here is a shot of the outside of his museum.

    This institution might not exist were it not for aristocrat Don Benigno de la Vega-Inclán y Flaquer. It was his mission to recreate the artist’s living conditions. Eg; comfy fireside stools:

    After several rooms, I was beginning to doubt whether the Museo del Greco actually had any paintings by its namesake. But in fact a long gallery was given over to a set of the painter’s apostles.

    Here is Saint John the Evangelist holding the original poisoned chalice. According to Christian belief, the poison didn’t kill him. But surely the sight of that evil looking lizard would have put him off.

    There are more of his paintings in Toledo’s cathedral. Catedral Primada Santa María de Toledo took more than 200 years to build and is a superlative example of medieval gothic. See interior…

    But despite its origins in the middle ages, this place of worship is anything but po-faced. As you can see it is full of opulence and includes the cheeriest statue of the virgin you will ever come across.

    Half a day was spent hunting for Toledo’s Museo del Arte Contemporaneo, but in a sign of the times it has closed down. Fortunately, the Museo de Santa Cruz, across town, was open.

    Yet again, there was a fiesta of El Greco in full swing. Reproductions had not prepared me for this altarpiece, nor given me the chance to get right up close and follow the composition upwards.

    Elsewhere, this may be a bit kitsch, but if I’m not mistaken Ricardo Arredondo has taken realist painting into 3D and HD with highlights made by building up flecks of crumbly paint.

    The Museo de Santa Cruz also gave me the chance to discover Marian Kratochwil. The Ukrainian painter’s agricultural scene pictured here is ten times more psychedelic than it has any right to be.

    Meanwhile, Alberto Sanchez flexes some bronze to make a very Spanish bull with a pronounced prance. While influenced by futurism, this calls to mind Walt Disney rather than Marinetti.

    No visit to Toledo would be complete without checking out the available swords, cleavers and knives available freely over the counter. This CSI-themed shiv was a particular worry.

    Finally, you’re never too young to crusade. Despite the conditions of harmony in which Christians, Muslims and Jews lived for many centuries here, you can now tool up your little ones against jihadis.

    The wedding was excellent, by the way. There were no knife related mishaps, and I managed to tack on a trip to Altamira and Bilbao of which more later.

    excuses

    Hiatus

    September 4, 2012

    Just a note for anyone pondering the meaning of my absence over the next fortnight. Fact is, I’m off on holiday. Apologies for lack of links and posts, but plenty due on my return. Yes, I am going to Bilbao.

    black music, contemporary art, performance art

    David Blandy, From the Underground (2001)

    September 3, 2012

    This film by David Blandy is to my mind haunted by the suspicion culture changes nothing. You can sing all the songs in the world, but you may never be a different cast of singer.

    From the Underground is nevertheless a well rehearsed feat, a perfect lip-synced rendition of one of the Wu Tang Clan’s most hectic and profane tracks.

    And it is an act of daring. Most of us would shrink from the prospect of filming a journey into the depths of the underground, all the while performing an aggravated rap.

    But Blandy is deep in character and maybe this is what carries him through the potential risk of humiliation which seems to come with all performance art.

    Had he filmed this in his bedroom or with less conviction, it would not be half so interesting. You get instead a clash between its North London setting and its soundtrack from a US ghetto.

    And of course, the artist is white, the music black. You might say Blandy is very white, in a nerdish sort of way. While gangsta rappers are, for better or worse, another racial stereotype.

    But the artist’s youth is important too. This is a very early work by a performer and filmmaker whose latest work Anjin is a many layered and more deeply resounding piece of anime.

    In the intervening years Blandy has fully assumed a wide range of personae. Yet the man who introduced his own show on Friday appeared to be neither rapper, nor samurai.

    It brings us back to the suspicion that what we love leaves us just as we were. Our occupation of other people’s creative spaces is, sadly, temporary. I was reminded of this:

    “You’re the sort of person who, on principle, no longer expects anything of anything,” writes Italo Calvino in his remarkable book If on a Winter’s Night a Traveller.

    “There are plenty . . . who live in the expectation of extraordinary experiences: from books, from people, from journeys, from events, from what tomorrow has in store, But not you.”

    From the Underground can be seen at Blandy’s solo show Odysseys, at Phoenix(as part of the Brighton Digital Festival) until 23 September 2012. See gallery website for more details.

    Brighton, contemporary art, galleries

    Farewell Grey Area

    August 29, 2012
    Rostan Tavasiev, Ghost (2008)

    It is oft said things have to get worse before they can get better. And with news of this Friday’s vacation of Grea Area, the Brighton gallery scene couldn’t get much worse.

    In the past, usually after one or two libations, I have opined that quality of life is already good enough here on the South coast. Limited art seems like a trade off for a vibrant music scene.

    But enough is enough. The closure of Grey Area’s will perform a spleen-ectomy on a patient already weakened by loss of, perhaps, wisdom teeth with the recent closure of Permanent Gallery.

    Another promising space closed last year. That was literally called A&E. We are left with a tatty heart (Phoenix), a distracted mind (Brighton Uni) and an echoing ribcage (Fabrica).

    Some of the spirit of Grey Area should live on in nearby Mingus Calypso, perhaps a pineal gland. But the Neue Froth Kunsthalle, as it is also known, is in semi-legal possession of its premises.

    Mingus has taken the bold move to begin acquiring a permanent collection. But without a permanent space, it should prove tricky for them to secure funding and higher profile shows.

    No one ever died for want of an art gallery. But the same could be said of a football stadium. And look how councillors moved heaven and earth to secure funding and permission for the Brighton Amex.

    Since there’s now a bit less to blog about, I hope you’ll forgive me for posting a handful of links to a few past shows. As can be seen, Grey Area was great. Let’s hope it’s back soon in some form.

    Grey Area is having a closing bash this Friday. Details on ArtRabbit here.

    aggregation, contemporary art

    Found Objects 28/08/12

    August 28, 2012

    It’s been an eventful week, eventful in particular for a certain amateur art restorer.

    • Here’s the main story from Art Info, and here’s some of the inevitable meme fallout (link courtesy @sheerinability).
    • And here’s another costly art world cock up, this time by a Norwegian gallery who lost a Rembrandt.
    • Slate discuss the real threat Pussy Riot and others of their ilk pose to the Russian government.
    • Will Gompertz has a new book out. A good new book, if this yarn about Marcel Duchamp is anything to go by.
    • Speaking of Duchamp, Brain Pickings posted audio for a seven minute talk he gave in 1957.
    • Hyperallergic is allergic to the heteronormativity of this artist’s restaging of the Sleeping Beauty fairytale.
    • Paul Kindersley paints himself 67 shades of acryllic on Vimeo. Don‘t worry, he‘ll talk you through it (via @LukeStephensMUA).
    • Philosopher Simon Critchley calls for more monstrosity in art in a digestible piece for the Brooklyn Rail (hat tip @thebenstreet).
    • David Kefford from Aid & Abet in Cambridge is building a poetic collection of mobile photos.
    • This should be art: a New Yorker fakes a celebrity walkabout in Times Square and Animal blog carries the footage.

    aggregation, contemporary art

    Found Objects 20/08/2012

    August 20, 2012

    It has been an eventful week in the world of art. Here’s all the news and more…

    • Pussy Riot become the most famous punk band in existence at a cost of 2yrs imprisonment. Chess grandmaster Kasparov is also a fan.
    • Interesting speculation about the future of an early Picasso. The Guardian weighs up the options of the UK’s leading galleries.
    • The Chapman Brothers will not presumably be losing any sleep about this outcry regarding their Hitler themed crazy-golf hole.
    • Can’t understand why Tate won’t take all of Saatchi’s works. The Telegraph remind us that a £30m gift is still going begging.
    • This would make a great short story: the bittersweet memories of a studio assistant to Jeff Koons.
    • Speaking of assistants, Yukinori Yanagi enlists ants to make an eloquent point about social decay and/or the erosion of power.
    • Frieze magazine have posted a film about brands in art and digital aesthetics. Worth a look.
    • Keith Haring’s journals have their own Tumblr feed now, a very worthwhile project..
    • As promo films go, this is one of the strangest. Hind Mezaina blogs about a male voice choir doing New Order.
    • And finally a bit more music, since Animal Collective are back and their new video is a nightmarish cracker.

    contemporary art, installation art, relational aesthetics

    Alex Bowen, This is How I Roll 24/7 (2012)

    August 18, 2012

    To give this work it’s full title: This is how I roll 24/7…Not Just On A Satrday Night in a Shit Basemnt (sic). And the shit basement in question was Brighton’s Grey Area.

    It was indeed Saturday night when this work both previewed and closed. The artist was nowhere to be seen. We still cannot be sure how he rolls.

    Yet Bowen did leave us with a few clues as to his style of comportment. Ropes bolted to the wall turned the space into a fight ring. In the centre were a crateload of beers. No nonsense.

    With varying degrees of daring or innebration, visitors were lounging off the ropes. The DJ explained that the structure was inspired by a detail taken from George Orwell.

    Down and Out in Paris and London reveals that ropes like this were once employed as beds or minimal hammocks for the hobo classes in the French capital.

    Although the beers were gratis, the want of money hemmed us in on all sides. Grey Area, which in reality is a fantastic basement, is going through a phase of transition. It too might be on the ropes.

    This is not the first time Bowen has cried off from a private view. He was notable by his absence from the launch of the most recent show at his nearby gallery, Mingles Calypso (sic).

    On that occasion visitors turned up to find the space occupied by an unmanned bar. You get the feeling he is goading us with our thirst for alcohol rather than art.

    But those arty drinks won’t pay for themselves, so if any philanthropists are reading this (and according to prevailing wisdom there are plenty of you out there), please step in the ring.

    This work was at Grey Area, Brighton, on August 11. See gallery website for future events.

    aggregation, contemporary art

    Found Objects 15/08/12

    August 15, 2012

    Better late than never; this week’s art links…

    • The bravest art critic we ever had…some memories of Robert Hughes by his producer Nicolas Kent.
    • Art Fag City advances the theory that art world success is a direct correlative of the curved edges of your spectacle frames. Oh dear.
    • The dust has barely settled on this archive but it sounds amazin’. Marvin Taylor is collecting ephemera from the NYC Downtown scene.
    • Find out how to (easily) make your own glitch art in this brilliant PBS video on Animal NY. And check out Yung Jake below.
    • White Cube Bermondsey is showing the haunting work of Zhang Huang. That’s the insence ash you can almost smell.
    • Guardian Artist of the Week is the incredible Pushwagner, currently at MK Gallery. Warning: dystopian video content.
    • And here’s a unicorn chaser. L-Magazine presents part one of a list of said creatures in art. Can’t wait already for part two.
    • Follow that up with a cheery film about book binding with an awesome theme tune via Paris Review.
    • Forgive the esotericism, but artist Annabel Dover linked to these Ipswich milk floats on Twitter (@Captainpye) and they are something.
    • You can’t really blame Damien Hirst for not wanting to roll up his sleeves for this creepy crawly collage. Watch his assistants instead (thanks @ARTnewsmag).

    contemporary art, film installation, installation art, music

    circa69, What was wood will be glass (2012)

    August 10, 2012

    This is not a simple work but it is easy to enjoy. It is easy to enjoy if your idea of fun is lying back in bed listening to breakbeats and watching a movie on the ceiling.

    The footage shows scrambled data on a VDU, followed by a delapidated caravan in a clearing with a burning wheelchair alongside. Hard to make sense of, but visceral.

    And when the bass drops, you feel yourself coming up as if on drugs. With speakers on the bed posts the vibrations shake the whole bed. I did this twice for another legal hit.

    But circa69’s installation does funny things to your guts before you even follow the printed instructions to lie back on the squalid looking mattress.

    A wall is covered in children’s drawings and somehow these are not sweet, but owing to their repetitive quality also somewhat creepy. They have run amok.

    Then there is the wheelchair, present here as a sculpture too, destroyed by fire and sitting redundant amidst clods of earth. It is hard not to believe something terrible has happened here.

    The brain struggles to construct a narrative around these elements: who occupied the chair?; did the children start the fire?; who lives in the caravan?

    Half of the sense of danger here comes from the unknowability of these things. But thanks to the visual, aural and tactile impact, you really feel the backstory matters.

    So you are left with radical doubt. It is tempting to say if David Lynch made art it would be art like this. But of course the film director does make art and it looks like this.

    This work is part of the show Invisible Bridges at Phoenix, Brighton. Run ends Sunday 12 August. See gallery website for opening times and directions and check out more work by circa69 here.