conceptual – criticismism ii

August 10, 2010

12 pieces of conceptual art that would probably work as tweets

From the 20th century onwards, the beauty of much art is it has no need for the eye of a beholder. Conceptual works, in theory, place as much importance on the idea as the finished visual object. And while lots can be said about the dozen pieces below, the kernel…

August 6, 2010

Giorgio Sadotti, Went To America Didn’t Say A Word (1999)

A 24-hour recording of ambient city noise is, on the face of it, boring. Few people will ever sit through all of the 1999 Giorgio Sadotti piece currently on show at Milton Keynes Gallery. Behind the soundtrack, however, is an amazing story. Sadotti flew from London to New York, stayed…

July 25, 2010July 27, 2010

Ignacio Uriarte, The History of the Typewriter Recited by Michael Winslow (2009)

Skill and accomplishment are at the forefront of this unusual work. But instead of technique with a brush or a chisel, we are treated to the novel and maybe useless vocal imitation of 32 typewriters. This is representational art of the highest order. Each sequence of hammer strikes does sound,…

May 12, 2010

Feature: Soundtracks for an Exhibition

Art is getting noisier. Galleries echo with moving image installations. The quieter ones provide you with audio-guides. Sound is now such a vital dimension of art, some artists are making art about that very phenomenon. In a boxlike construction at Ikon in Birmingham, you can pull up a beanbag and…

April 2, 2010

Review: Ron Terada – Who I Think I Am

Exhibition: Ron Terada â€“ Who I Think I Am, Ikon, Birmingham, until May 16 2010 A brief digression on Vancouver may be needed. Thanks to a generation of artists that includes Jeff Wall, the third largest city in Canada has become an unlikely art world capital. So Ron Terada has…

February 22, 2010

Review: Richard Grayson at De La Warr Pavilion

The end of the world is nigh in the art of Richard Grayson. But we might just be saved by work like this. It has a light touch, which never gives way to despair. There is irony even in the title of Ways The World Ends. Competing prophecies are ranged…

January 29, 2010

To bin or not to bin? A journey into Michael Landy's Art Bin

Put work in a gallery and it becomes art. Put it in a bin and it becomes rubbish. But put work in a bin in a gallery, and you may find it becomes both. Such is the strange new context for the many damaged pieces already piling up in the…

January 26, 2010

Preview: Michael Landy – Art Bin at the South London Gallery

Â Exhibition: Michael Landy â€“ Art Bin, the South London Gallery, January 29 â€“ March 14 2010 Michael Landy, who famously destroyed all his possessions in the name of art, is set to dispose of a whole gallery of art, perhaps in the name of destruction. For six weeks Landy…

November 26, 2009

Fortress of Solitude by David Blandy at 176 / Zabludowicz Collection

Published on Culture24 David Blandy â€“ Fortress of Solitude, 176 / Zabludowicz Collection, London, until Summer 2010 Strap on the artificial guitar and fire up the games console and you are ready to enter David Blandy’s world. It is indeed, as he demonstrates, a stage. We find our truth in…

October 30, 2009

Keith Tyson at Parasol Unit

Written for Culture24 Exhibition: Keith Tyson â€“ Cloud Choreography and Other Emergent Systems, Parasol Unit, London, until November 11 2009 It goes something like this: n pigeons/a non-graceful tree of 2n generations where each gen has r vertices and then has r+1 edges and r and n are random integers…