We’re delighted to start 2019 with a solo exhibition by photographer and filmmaker Dick Jewell.
Now & Then will be Jewell’s most significant solo show in recent years, bringing together a wide range of works produced over a 30-year period – spanning film, photography and photo-collage. In the meantime, check out this documentary commissioned by Dazed & Confused (directed by Jamie Roberts), which explores Jewell’s incredible archive of dance footage, with a cast including Vivienne Westwood, Neneh Cherry, Grandmaster Flash, skinheads, B-boys, drag queens and rave dancers – to name just a few…
Dick Jewell: Now & Then opens Friday 18 January. RSVP to join us for the preview on Thursday 17 January, 5 pm – 7 pm.
For our exhibition, The Serving Library v David Osbaldeston, we have highlighting just a few of the 100+ framed objects that make up The Serving Library (TSL) collection, along with the accompanying text from TSL’s website.
The exhibition will feature the collection its entirety, with items as diverse as record sleeves, watercolours, woodcuts, polaroids, drawings, screen-prints, airbrush paintings, a car number plate, and a Ouija board. Together, these varied objects decorate the walls of the library to serve as a toolbox for teaching.
“The sleeve was one of those lovely gifts. We wanted a neutral image and I’d done a rough of a big flagpole and a flag and nothing else. We’d done a gig in Plymouth and were walking along the Hoe and there it was. We all dropped to the ground and looked at it. When you lay on the ground there was nothing else to see, apart from the pole against the sky.”
“Equation for a Composite Design (2): Best Of,” Stuart Bailey, Dot Dot Dot #8, 2004
Dear Paul,
I am the daughter of Richard T. Ganyon. Inventor of all Votrax voice synthesizers in the 1970s and 1980s. He was very much a part of your “Detroit as Refrain” lecture given in Detroit in 2010. I would have loved to have been there to listen to what you had to say about Votrax and Detroit music. You are the only person I’ve found to make the connections that you have in the brief description that I read about it, and I don’t know how to thank you for trying. If you want additional information about the Votrax and things you might not know about regarding its use, please email me. I might surprise you with a story or two.
“I am the Daughter of Richard T. Ganyon,” Paul Elliman, Bulletins of The Serving Library #8, 2014
Dear Philomene, As you know, I’d like to reproduce that deceptively modest painting of yours — the one whose primary colors combine to spell out their composite and form their own frame—on the cover of this last Dot Dot Dot.
“A Word on the Cover,” Stuart Bailey, Dot Dot Dot #20, 2010
This is a RECORD COVER. This writing is the DESIGN upon the record cover. The design is to help SELL the record. We hope to draw your attention to it and encourage you to pick it up. When you have done that maybe you’ll be persuaded to listen to the music — in this case XTC’s Go 2 album. Then we want you to BUY it.
“On Graphic Design, 1979,” Stuart Bailey, Dot Dot Dot #2, 2001
A few years ago a friend of mine said she had just been introduced to Josef Albers. The idea that he was still around was compelling — artists have always tried to keep in historical contact through works from the past. Why not make contact with Albers directly? Adding the words YES and NO to an Albers-designed stencil typeface turned it into a kind of Ouija board, and it’s also an Albers material — his square paintings were made on this board, in 16, 24 and 40 inch sizes.
“A–Z, 0–9, YES/NO,” Paul Elliman, Dot Dot Dot #13, 2006
Is it good enough? Is it even art? I don’t know. It might look like art, it might even look like contemporary art, but I really don’t know if it will be. And to be frank, I don’t mind if it isn’t, it doesn’t change the fact that to me it needs to be done.
“Another Shadow Fight,” Andrew Hunt & David Osbaldeston, Dot Dot Dot #16, 2006
So we were already cutting up our mutual identities and, as we did that, we started to think about why it was so appealing to us. And one of the things that we decided was that we were both at war with binary culture, the idea of male and female, black and white, Christian/Muslim, good/bad — all these different either/ors that you mentioned, which are embedded in most cultures. Again, as Burroughs would say, “Look for the vested interest …”. To control people, to make people behave as stereotypes in order for things to be simple and easy to control. Anarchy and confusion are not necessarily friendly towards control! So, we began to look at that aspect of it. Why be male or female?
“Vested Interest: Mark Beasley in conversation with Genesis Breyer P-Orridge,” Dot Dot Dot #16, 2008 / Cover of Dot Dot Dot #17, 2009
Born awkwardly between eras — drawn by hand in order to be better read by machines — the fälschungserschwerende Schrift bears the marks of both 19th-century guild-enshrined handcraft and 20th-century anonymous automation. And like any technology, it is bound by the political determinants of its design: while its original “tamper-proof ” premise may have proved a Macguffin, these weird-looking letters are an early product of our contemporary surveillance state. What reads to us as a clumsy lack of formal continuity is exactly what makes it legible to a computer. It is an alphabet whose defining characteristic is precisely that it has no defining characteristic, other than having no defining characteristic.
“Fälschungserschwerende Schrift,” Benjamin Tiven, Bulletins of The Serving Library #3, 2012
January 17, 2006. As it turns out, today is Benjamin Franklin’s 300th birthday. Writer, typographer, printer-publisher-politician, inventor, statesman, gentleman, scientist, lover, linguist, librarian and the first Postmaster General of the United States, Franklin was the consummate networker — distributing his ideas far and wide through a dizzying range of practices.
“Post-Master,” David Reinfurt, Dot Dot Dot #12, 2006
For over a decade police forces across the world have been hunting a criminal cartel with a licence to print money. They’ve been distributing the highest quality counterfeit notes ever produced. The forgeries are so realistic that even the experts can’t tell the difference. They’re known as superdollars.
“Superdollars,” David Reinfurt, Dot Dot Dot #14, 2007
This is a deep dive into a selection of the artists from our Video Days Exhibition, exploring their work alongside showing their films in the gallery.
Forensic Architecture (FA) is a research agency, based at Goldsmiths, University of London, who undertake advanced architectural and media research on behalf of international prosecutors, human rights organisations and political and environmental justice groups. Forensic architecture is also an emergent academic field developed at Goldsmiths, which refers to the production and presentation of architectural evidence – buildings and urban environments and their media representations.
In recent years FA has successfully tested its methodologies in a number of landmark legal and human rights cases undertaken together with and on behalf of threatened communities, Non-governmental organisations (NGOs), prosecutors and the United Nations (UN).
77sqm_9:26min, 2016, (27:23 mins)
Screening: Saturday 21 April, 11 am – 3 pm
Showing every 30 mins (free, no prior booking required).
Commissioned by the ‘Unraveling the NSU Complex’ people’s tribunal; Haus Der Kulturen Der Welt (HKW); Initiative 6 April; and documenta14.
Shortly after 17:00 on the 6 April 2006, Halit Yozgat, 21 years old, was murdered while attending the reception counter of his family run Internet café in Kassel, Germany. His was the ninth of ten racist murders committed by a neo-Nazi group known as the National Socialist Underground or NSU across Germany between 2000 and 2007.
At the time of the killing, an intelligence officer named Andreas Temme was present in the shop. Temme was at the time an employee of the State Office for Constitutional Protection (Landesamt für Verfassungsschutz), the domestic intelligence agency for the German state of Hessen. Temme did not disclose this fact to the police, but was later identified from his internet records.
In his interrogation by the police, and in the subsequent NSU trial in Munich, Temme denied being a witness to the incident, and claimed not to have noticed anything out of the ordinary. The court accepted his testimony. It determined that Temme was present at the back room of the internet café at the time of the murder. It also accepted that from his position in the shop it was possible not to have witnessed the killing.
Within the 77 square meters of the Internet café and the 9:26 minutes of the incident, different actors crossed paths — members of migrant communities, a state employee and the murderers — and were architecturally disposed in relation to each other. The shop was thus a microcosm of the entire social and political controversy that makes the ‘NSU Complex’.
In November 2016, eleven years after the murder, an alliance of civil society organisations known as ‘Unraveling the NSU Complex’ commissioned Forensic Architecture to investigate Temme’s testimony and determine whether it could be truthful.
Karen Cunningham is an artist based in Glasgow whose practice incorporates moving image, sculpture and photography. She studied photography at Edinburgh College of Art, including a study exchange to the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore USA, and completed her MFA at Glasgow School of Art. Her film and video works have been shown throughout the UK and Europe including Tramway, Glasgow; Collective Gallery, Edinburgh; Forum Stadtpark, Graz, Austria and the Malmö Konsthall, Sweden. Interested in the ideas progress and attribution Karen’s work explores the overlapping of emergent and residual aspects within culture and technology often drawing on disciplines such as Science-Fiction and Anthropology which utilise speculative approaches to knowledge and interpretation.
Karen also curates exhibitions, organises events and writes texts. These include the symposium ‘An Endless Theater: the convergence of contemporary art and anthropology in observational cinema’ featuring works by Karen Cunningham, Edward S. Curtis, Geoffrey Farmer, Rosalind Nashashibi, Jean Rouch, Sterling Ruby and John Smith at University of Edinburgh (2013) the online screening and essay series ‘The Anthropology Effect’ for MAP magazine (2013-14) and ‘Viewfinders’ a curated selection of artists film & videos as part of the artists moving image programme at Tramway, Glasgow for ‘Generation’ (2014).
Karen’s film Movable Type; Under Erasure, 2016 will be looped all day on Saturday 28 April.
Commissioned by Legion TV, it was first shown at The Showroom, London in 2016. Filmed largely on location at Writing-on-Stone, Canada the work features an original monologue written and read by the eminent theorist and cultural critic Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak.
Images: Courtesy of Karen Cunningham
Rollo Jackson is a London-based director whose work spans music videos, commercial work, and documentary filmmaking.
Jackson grew up immersed in the UK’s dance music culture. His music films for James Blake, Tate Britain and Warp Records all bear the subtle traces of mid-90s escapades spent clad in Versace prints and box-fresh Reeboks and soundtracked by crackling pirate radio or booming warehouse speakers.
His short film Gang Signs & Prayer will be looped in the Gallery on Wednesday 2 May.
A visual testament to Stormzy’s life and upbringing, the film chronicles Stormzy’s inner battles and temptations as he becomes master of his own destiny. Return of the Rucksack, Bad Boys and 100 Bags, taken from Stormzy’s award winning debut studio album Gang Signs & Prayer, serve as the soundtrack to the film of the same name.
The film has also recently been nominated for a Webby Award. You can vote for Gang Signs & Prayer here.
Slimzee’s Going On Terrible will be looped in sequence with Gang Signs & Prayer on Wednesday 2 May.
Slimzee (‘Godfather of Grime’) was the co-founder of Rinse FM and DJ in the UK Garage collective ‘Pay As You Go Cartel’. Slimzee’s Going On Terrible charts his life, following his early days in pirate radio to receiving a career-threatening Asbo. Features old & new footage and interviews from fellow DJ’s & MC’s and even his own mother.
Emily Richardson is a UK based filmmaker who creates film portraits of particular places. Her work focuses on sites in transition and covers an extraordinarily diverse range of landscapes including empty East London streets, forests, North Sea oil fields, post-war tower blocks, empty cinemas and Cold War military facilities. She is currently doing a practice-led PhD on modern architectural space in artists’ film and video at the Royal College of Art in London.
Richardson’s film Beach House, 2015 will be screened in the gallery on Tuesday 8 May (looped all day).
Beach House is a film about a unique example of rural modernism, built on the UK coast of Suffolk by architect John Penn. Penn was an architect, painter, musician and poet whose nine houses in East Suffolk are all built with uncompromising symmetry adhering to the points of the compass in their positioning in the landscape they use a limited language of materials and form that were influenced by his time spent working in California with Richard Neutra. They are Californian modernist pavilions in the Suffolk landscape.
Beach House is John Penn’s most uncompromising design in terms of idea as form. The film combines an archive film made by Penn himself on completion of the house with experimental sound recordings made during the same period and material recently filmed in the house to explore a convergence of filmic and architectural language and allow the viewer to piece together Beach House in its past and present forms. More info…
http://emilyrichardson.org.uk/
Images: courtesy of Emily Richardson and LUX, London.
Bringing the Video Days event programme to a close, we’re excited to welcome Elijah for a talk and Q&A on Tuesday 15 May, from 6.30 pm – 8.30 pm.
Elijah is a DJ and promoter, and along with Skilliam, co-founder of the grime record label Butterz. In these various roles Elijah has travelled the world and shared stages with some of grime’s biggest names. For six years he hosted his own grime show on Rinse FM. Over the past year Elijah has been Associate Artistic Director at Lighthouse Arts, Brighton, an arts and culture agency producing, supporting and presenting new art, film, music, design and games. Supported by Arts Council England, this initiative promotes diversity in the arts, of which, in the UK, only a small percent of artistic directors are black and minority ethnic.
In 2014, grime began to dominate popular music. In 2015, the Tottenham-based MC Skepta beat both David Bowie and Radiohead to the Mercury Prize. When Stormzy re-recorded the single “Shut Up”, originally a viral YouTube video, it entered the 2015 Christmas UK Singles Chart at number eighteen. Since then, grime has soundtracked the so-called ‘youthquake’ that, among other things, has been credited with blocking Theresa May and the Conservatives’ hoped-for landslide in last year’s general election. Grime is the music of a generation.
As well as plotting his own experience of working in grime, by which a history of grime will emerge, Elijah’s talk will address the interrelations between visual art and music culture. He will discuss the importance of inquisitiveness and creativity in work and explore how applying organisational skills learnt in the arts and culture sector could be used in music programming, and vice versa.
Elijah’s lecture will be followed by a Q+A, hosted by Jonathan P. Watts.
Ashley Holmes’ film Everybody’s Hustling will be played on loop all day on Tuesday 15 May, from 10 am to 5 pm, then played once at the start of this event.
» Find out more about Video Days Week Five screenings.
Images: courtesy of Elijah / Butterz
In the lead up to Ruth Angel Edwards’ solo exhibition Wheel of the Year, we made a series of blog posts containing material forwarded to us from Ruth, that offered insight into what informs her practice, and more specifically the work she’ll be presenting here at Bonington.
29 November 2017
Our first post below relates to the modern day phenomenon of ‘Ghost Nets’. Please click onto the image or link below to be taken to the article:
‘What are Ghost Nets?’ [online] Available at: http://oliveridleyproject.org/what-are-ghost-nets/
30 November 2017
Second post from Ruth Angel Edwards, referring to the MS Moby Dada cruiseferry. Click the image to sign the petition:
‘Stop the use of Looney Tunes on Military ships’ [online] Available at: https://www.change.org/p/stop-the-use-of-looney-tunes-on-military-ships
12 December 2017
Ruth Angel Edwards [Evening] post 3, click the image or link to read the report.
‘Investigation launched after one of the ‘worst’ cases of fly-tipping’ [online] Available at: http://www.nottinghampost.com/news/local-news/investigation-launched-after-one-worst-284790
3 January 2018
‘Mutoid Sam and The Notting Hill Carnival’ [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Izel6F8d1qg
3 January 2018
‘Profundal Zone’ [online] Available at: https://aquaticbiomebreakdown.weebly.com/profundal-zone.html
10 January 2018
Ruth’s 6th blog post links us to the the essay: Ghosts Among the Ruins: Towards a Haunted Phenomenology by Mark Horvath & Adam Lovasz
10 January 2018
‘The Lorax (Original)’ [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8V06ZOQuo0k
Juliana Sissons spoke to BBC Radio Nottingham’s Alan Clifford about her ‘London’s Calling’ Vitrines exhibition and wider creative practice. It’s available to be listened to on the iPlayer for 28 days from today, here.
A selection from our blog of posts relating to Jason Evan’s exhibition, You’re Gonna Need A Bigger Boat.
21 April 2017
Mark Patterson reviews Jason Evans’ exhibition, You’re Gonna Need a Bigger Boat for the Nottingham Post.
11th April 2017
The installation for Jason Evans’ You’re Gonna Need a Bigger Boat is currently underway. Check out some sneak peeks from inside the Gallery below.
As promised by Jason in the Q&A, you can expect to see some narrowboat painting in the Gallery. All painted by hand in traditional style by the talented Robert Naghi. Join us at the preview to see the finished painting, Thursday 13 April, 5 pm – 7 pm.
A large part of the show involves prints from the Clark Brothers extensive catalogue of promotional materials. As well as the simple one or two-colour ‘Sale” prints, there are also some interesting details to look out for…
29 March 2017
Volunteers wanted to participate in a t-shirt project as part of Jason Evans’ ‘You’re Gonna Need A Bigger Boat’ exhibition which opens here at the Gallery on Wednesday 19 April. Read the brief from Jason below:
I am looking for volunteers to wear specially produced t-shirts; made to extend the reach of my exhibition ‘You’re Gonna Need a Bigger Boat’ at Bonington Gallery, Wednesday 19 April – Friday 19 May 2017. More information about the exhibition can be found here on the exhibition page.
I am looking for willing individuals who work in public facing roles to wear the shirt that features a wood-engraving by artist Philip Hagreen (see below). While I am in Nottingham I will attempt to make a portrait of as many of the participants as possible, in their place of work, and would encourage ongoing sharing of images of the shirts online/in social media, with the accompanying hashtag #youregonnaneedabiggerboat and/or #philiphagreen. The intention is to build up an inventory of images of people wearing this t-shirt during the exhibition dates and beyond.
In recognition of your contribution to the project all participants can keep their (limited edition) t-shirt.
T-shirts are available in standard sizes ranging from small to x-large. In your email, please indicate the size you would like.
Jason Evans
www.jasonevans.info
Image: Wood engraving by Philip Hagreen, courtesy of Ditchling Museum of Arts + Craft
Here is a selection of photos of a workshop that was delivered by Giorgio Sadotti’s as part of Shapeless Impact Not Time Slow Is (Flits By).
The history of painting will be explored in a new exhibition of four contemporary artists whose work broadens and challenges our understanding of the traditional medium. All Men By Nature Desire to Know – at Bonington Gallery from Friday 13 January to Friday 17 February – will present a variety of works which examine the evolution of the art form and reflect how it’s been influenced over time. The exhibition – curated by Nottingham-based artist Joshua Lockwood – features works by Stefania Batoeva, Flora Klein, Audrey Reynolds and Alan Michael. There will be an accompanying text by Rachal Bradley.
“Painting is the world’s oldest art form and hasn’t died out by any means,” says Josh. “It has changed considerably through history and is used in different ways today than used to be. Today there are many ways to create an image, instantly and with more simplicity than by painting. Contemporary painters adopt these new modes of image making to inform their painting, opening up dialogues of their position within the present.
“Technological development, such as photography and more, has made painting more indefinite, allowing the movement of painting towards abstract art, transgressing Western painting historically of being the art of representation.
“Painting is quite a difficult medium as it demands your full attention. You can look at a painting for five seconds or hours in the action of analysis. As such it can be hard for viewers to unpack for we are used to seeing imagery taken through a lens.
“This exhibition brings together four contemporary practitioners who are working today, adding to the continuing narrative of the medium of painting. Influences from the past are absorbed and rejected creating a fresh reality for each painting.”
Here is a selection of artists and their works for our exhibition All Men By Nature Desire to Know
Stefania Batoeva (b. 1981 Sofia, Bulgaria) is a London-based artist who graduated from the Royal College of Art in 2014. Her paintings cross between the traditional form of painting and sculpture – often created as site specific work.
Batoeva’s work also blurs the line between abstract and figure-based painting, exploring ideas around the subconscious and memory.
The paintings are difficult to categorise – as Batoeva captures moments in vivid colours which feel similar to distant memories; almost-recognisable figures obscured by heavy brush-strokes, smears and scratch – or the figures themselves represented through loose brush-stokes themselves, almost disappearing into the background.
Stefania will be producing new works specifically for All Men By Nature Desire To Know. Find out more:
Recent solo exhibitions include:
Recent group exhibitions include:
Audrey Reynolds lives and works in London and Folkestone, and studied at Bath College of Art and at Chelsea College of Art, London.
Reynolds’ work is a mix of sculpture, installation and painting – all of which incorporate seemingly random objects and materials including modelling clay and household paints, as well as fitted carpets, ribbons and brass letters.
Layers of paint are built up and scratched away, with the found objects embedded into the surface of double-sided paintings, creating sparse but carefully arranged compositions. On the other hand, installations of rugs and carpets blur the line between a functional object and an artwork. In her writing, Reynolds exposes fragments of everyday life, reflecting on the ordinary before slipping into more abstract passages where it isn’t clear quite who or what is being written about, while still conveying a sense of something personal… in a way, something quite similar to her paintings.
Audrey will be producing new works specifically for All Men By Nature Desire To Know.
Solo exhibitions include:
A collection of her writing will be published by AkermanDaly in Spring 2017.
Flora Klein was born in 1988 Bern, Switzerland, she currently lives and works in Berlin. She Graduated with a BA in Fine Arts at ECAL, Lausanne in 2013.
Layers of acrylics are used to build up abstract blocks of colour with contrasting strands spreading across the top of the base layers like ribbons. Although Klein’s work is easy to identify in style (the paintings often share a palette of bold oranges, browns and reds, and recurring lines and shapes can also be found between the works), none of the works have a clear subject or even a main focal point.
As a result, a lot of the meaning is left up to the viewer – the paintings don’t immediately suggest a clear emotion, are neither masculine or feminine, and the titles don’t give many clues either.
Find out more about Flora’s recent exhibitions:
For this exhibition, Flora will be showing new works which have not been seen in the UK before.
Alan Michael was born in 1967 in Paisley, Scotland, he now lives and works in London.
Michael’s paintings are often photorealistic renderings of everyday objects, taken from obscure reference photos – or film stills as is the case with his latest work included in All Men By Nature Desire To Know.
The other side to Michael’s work includes text-based paintings which also borrow from varied reference points – including brand names and pop culture references – as well as referring to other artworks and art movements.
All of Michael’s work seems to hone in on meticulous details, but the meaning behind the paintings is harder to pin down. The mix of text and imagery sometimes seem to be at odds with each other, or at least have little obvious links. Still, the works draw the viewer in; inviting you to try and unpick them and the intentions of the painter.
Alan Michael has produced new works specifically for All Men By Nature Desire To Know. Here are a couple of sneak peeks:
Recent solo exhibitions include:
Recent group exhibitions include:
Ahead of the preview of All Men By Nature Desire To Know next Thursday, check out some install shots for a sneak peek at the new work in the show.
Here you can find a selection of blog posts about the exhibition Performing Drawology
RECAP DAY ONE
Taken from Monday 8 February: John performs ‘durational drawing’ in the space, using charcoal and a black marker.
Join us from 2 pm – 3 pm today in the Gallery, for an open discussion with John.
Last week, 80 five and six year old’s from West Bridgford Infant School contributed to a collaborative drawing, inspired by our current exhibition, Performing Drawology. Led by Holly Mills, Ana Souto and Anja Bendix (academic staff from the School of Architecture, Design and the Built Environment at NTU), there were three drawing sessions, consisting of 20 minutes each and approximately 25 children.
The first class used black pen to draw on four pieces of paper four metres long. Classical music was also played, which some of the pupils responded to:
The second class then used oil pastels to colour in some of the shapes drawn by the first class, and the third group used paint sticks to colour in the shapes and add more lines:
These drawings will be exhibited in the Atrium Space at the Performing Drawology closing event on Thursday 11 February 2016 from 5 pm – 8 pm, along with drawings created by Architecture and Interior Architecture students from NTU. If you’d like to attend the Performing Drawology closing event, simply RSVP via email to confirm your attendance
Recently, we invited our invigilators (who are all current students here at NTU) to contribute to the blog. Here’s the first piece – written by third year BA (Hons) Fine Art student, Reece:
This remnant artwork has existed OVER my head for nearly three years.
(‘If these walls could talk’)
My Fine Art degree spans OVER three years.
(‘If these walls could talk’)
It is nearly OVER.
(‘If these walls could talk’)
This corrugated ceiling, belonging to the fine art studios at Nottingham Trent University (NTU) has seen many things.
Realisations, celebrations, accidents, reflection, tears, conversation, break downs, friendships, relationships, hard labour, scolding, disaster, enjoyment, perseverance, triumph… All connected to the OVERarching landscape of Fine Art.
Each individual journey, of each student, each member of staff, each technician and each visitor has been charted by this roof.
(‘If these walls could talk’)
Due to the cycle of presenting work throughout each of the years on the course, artwork remains very temporary when in the studios. Any work that survives the annual degree show set up, becomes rather special, dodging the fresh paint, the wood filler and sandpaper. These hidden works are reminders of the past students’ expedition through their practices’, mirroring my own current exploration here at NTU as its end draws ever closer.
I have had three years to solely explore my concepts and discover contexts, constantly working alongside other artists working in every different media and area available. This adorned light enclosure, and the ceiling it hangs from has housed this voyage, watching OVER us, each struggle, each encounter, each accomplishment. To that I owe it something.
The inanimate, unfeeling metal, I owe it.
Asking the question of why we instinctively look up for answers, towards something higher. In this case this is interrupted by the ambiguity of the ‘OVER’ light shining down from the lofty heights of the Fishbowl (a nickname for a space that stuck, its origin also forgotten). A relic of an artist’s legacy that has long left the nest, spread their wings and took flight onto the next journey.
(‘If these walls could talk’)
(‘If these walls could talk’)
(‘If these walls could talk’)
Reece Straw
IMAGE: Reece Straw 2016
Artists will work to an open brief and create a unique and unplanned artwork in a novel drawing exhibition here at the Gallery.
Performing Drawology – which takes place between Friday 15 January and Friday 12 February – will see the creative process unfold live as eight artists undertake separate residencies to create a collaborative drawing on the gallery walls.
The exhibition – which will evolve from one practitioner to the next – is curated by humhyphenhum, a collaboration between Nottingham Trent University lecturer Deborah Harty and Phil Sawdon, an honorary fellow of Loughborough University.
“It’s very experimental, and we have no way of being able to foresee what’s going to happen,” said artist Harty, a researcher in what drawings say about a person’s mind and movements, who also works on her own projects.
“Phil and I asked each artist to bring their drawing toolkit with them, but have left it completely open as to how it manifests in the gallery.
“It could be a major success or a complete disaster – that’s the risk we’re taking. We’re not sure what’s going to be left behind when it’s all finished.”
The artists include Deborah Harty and Phil Sawdon (as humhyphenhum) Lorraine Young, Catherine Bertola, Maryclare Foa, Andrew Pepper, Martin Lewis and John Court. They were invited on the basis of being open minded to collaborating in an experimental way.
The drawing will be initiated and completed by humhyphenhum. There will be a closing night celebration on Thursday 11 February during which visitors can view the final artwork.
“It’s an incredibly exciting project and we hope that the entire space is engaged in some way,” added Harty.
“In many ways it could be daunting to be faced with what is essentially a considerably large blank sheet of paper. But we’re sure it’s going to be a great success.
“We’re hoping that people will enter the space once the project is completed and see it as a walk-in drawing.”
Sitting in the Gallery today I have had time to reflect on the evolution that has occurred here over the last few weeks. As I had to be knowledgeable when on shift, I made time to visit and revisit the exhibition, and have watched the changes, which at first seemed subtle, explode outwards.
For me what began as simplistic has become anything but. I was unsure how I would feel when returning to the space each time. The first few weeks, I remember wanting, craving almost a mark to be made upon the clear skin of the white gallery walls, a blemish to appear on the pale rolls of paper. I had enjoyed the feeling of wonder when stumbling on the snail shells and small drawings pinned to the walls like an insect in a specimen tray. But despite this, I have struggled with feelings that the activity was too stuffy or reserved for such a large open space.
I understand the title of the exhibition “Performing Drawology” to mean the actions or performance of drawing, the strokes and movement. Like a dance. With the marks made the evidence of the action. As a Fine Art student we are always reminded to question: “what is the work? Is it the drawings? Or the act of making them?”
I feel my stance on this issue shifted during the continuation of the exhibition. I at first saw the appearance of the sculptural snails and the miniature drawings as the work, only now realising that in the later weeks, I found watching the workings of the artists to be the work and the results almost a by-product.
When returning to view Joe Graham in residence in the exhibition I had the chance to not only be part of the work by assisting him but was able to observe the decisions being formed. Despite what I felt to be a fast-paced approach to the space, I could see each movement made with his body as calculated; each mark made, each incision, each drip. When turning up for my shift, I first felt uncomfortable as the level of change from the almost sleeping state of the exhibition over the weekend of rest had awakened in to a very big and playful scene. I did not think I would like the changes, as someone who does not like change I felt almost anxious seeing the carefully folded concertina paper installations altered, cut up and strewn across the floor.
I did not think I would like exhibition after this but I was wrong. I quickly got in to the groove of Graham’s work and left my shift with a smile on my face, having enjoyed having fun in the gallery.
I return to the act of reflecting. Actively absorbing and thinking. Adjective, doing word. Today, on the last day of the exhibition, I see the finished gallery and conclude that I am among a stage set, an active space. I feel it is impossible to do nothing here now, my eyes wonder around the space in continuous movement. I watch the time-lapse video, noticing the moment where I am present. The sped-up movement return my thoughts to dance. I spin around to look at more of the room, more of the projection.
I take away my conclusion as to what the work is. For me, ultimately, I was the work. The way I now move around the Gallery in response to the performance of the artists is almost as if they had written the play and I am the dutiful performer.
Dominique Phizacklea
BA (Hons) Fine Art, Year 2.