Supervisor's Note

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#SUPERVISOR’S NOTE

Two years ago we launched a pilot venture from within the programme in Modern and Contemporary Art at Christie’s Education in London. Our aim was to initiate a student-run publication that would gather together critical writing, features and interviews exploring aspects of the ecosystem that makes up contemporary art and its varied practices. Before you is C#14 -- the third issue in the series.

As in previous years, students formed an editorial board and proposals for submission were received. Designers came forward from within the cohort and copy editors pored over texts, returning queries and suggested changes. Deadlines were set and inevitably bent to the demands of production schedules. As I write here, the C#14 is nearing the final stages before it goes live and reaches out to a global constituency of readers.

This has been a remarkable year for our programme and this particular cohort of students have been largely responsible for creating a supportive and collegiate atmosphere with no small amount of hard work, but a great deal of laughter and fun too. For this and more, they have our thanks. We are very proud of our students in Course C from the year 2013-14 and I hope something of the unique qualities they brought to the collective experience of this year shine through in the writing and design of these pages. As originally conceived, this is entirely their venture and venue. As they make the transition from course work to fashioning their own professional practices, we wish them well and know they go out into the world as excellent ambassadors for Christie’s Education, London.

John Slyce

Senior Tutor, Modern and Contemporary Art and Art World Practice C# 2 C# 3

#STAFF

SUPERVISOR COMMISSIONING EDITORS JOHN SLYCE HANIA AFIFI [email protected] [email protected] MARITZA MELANIA LACAYO [email protected] PROJECT MANAGERS TONI SLOANE LAWRENCE ERICA WENNERHOLM [email protected] [email protected] GIULIA TURBIGLIO ROBERTA GUIDICCI [email protected] [email protected] SORANA SERBAN [email protected] NATALIA TAYLOR [email protected] LAYOUT/ DESIGN BINYIN HU ARZU KIRANER [email protected] [email protected] BU YI WU TAYLOR JANE LE MELLE [email protected] [email protected] ANDREA HERRADA MAIZ [email protected] COPY EDITORS MARCY KENNEY PHOTO EDITORS [email protected] JOANNA HATTAB STEPHANIE RAO [email protected] [email protected] ARZU KIRANER NINA MALHERBE [email protected] [email protected] ANDREA HERRADA MAIZ BINYIN HU [email protected] [email protected]

SUPPORTED BY ADVISORS DEMILO ART MICHELE ROBECCHI www.demiloart.com [email protected] KIRI KRAGIN [email protected] #COVER IMAGE MANAGING EDITORS ANNIE JACKSON MIHUT BOSCU KAFCHIN [email protected] Father Energy I, 2013 MORAG WALSH BARNES Disco Ball Synthetic Beard, Spraypaint, Variable [email protected] Dimensions Image Courtesy of the Artist and Sabot Gallery Jemma Harrison Deutsche Telekom Collection Our Conversations Are All So Boring Who Would Want to Hear Them?, 2014 42 x 42 cm Image Courtesy of the Artist ISBN 978-0-9570054-9-5 C# 4 C# 5

#CONTENT

CRITICAL REVIEWS MUSEUMS & PRIVATE COLLECTIONS

making the work of art a link between the the importance of that moment, they created Martin Creed gallery and its surroundings. the Scotsman Steps, an octagonal tower of 104 What’s the Point of It? steps leading to the building. The artist had The curation of the show almost brings the covered each step with a different colour, to visitor in a meditation about material, and confer an aesthetic aspect to the place. He had Hayward Gallery, London the sense of some commonplace objects. also participated in the creation of billboards 29 January - 5 May 2014 The plurality of meanings, and of ways to for the 2012 Olympic Games and had created by ELISABETH LIMIDO experience this exhibition, makes it worth an extended versions of the podium by debating around the ideas presented by the painting five of them. artist. The first room for example, with the monumental Work No. 1092, can be thought The playfulness in Martin Creed’s work is key of as a temple, where you can sit and be to the understanding of it. The curation in impregnated by the tone of the exhibition, the Hayward made it even more apparent, by before moving forward to the rest. However at placing works outside the gallery, by blocking several points in the exhibition the visitor will the entrance door with a couch, and in the re-encounter the installation, it being from essence of the works of art. For example, the third room, or from the top of the stairs. the room full of balloons will necessarily Each time it will give a new dimension to the engage the visitor, even if he decides not to work and enrich the general meaning of the enter it: it creates an interaction between the body of works exposed. visitors themselves, and the experience of the exhibition is shared. Creed’s minimalist works are also characterized by the spirit within it, his When asked about the retrospective, Creed humour and the astounding effect almost seems to be removing himself from the present in each piece. The extravagant ensemble, by giving an insight on the pieces, dimensions of the works, and the way they but with some humour, not totally explaining interact with each other by their medium, them. The mystery and individual experience content or size gives another meaning to the are important parts of how the visitor should title of the show; the artist does not seem to encounter the body of work. Martin Creed name or hint at what ‘it’ would be in the title Work No. 1092 Mothers, 2011, White Neon, Steel of his exhibition, but makes it a playful idea The show was initially due to end in April, Martin Creed: What’s the Point of It?, Installation View Image Courtesy of Hayward Gallery, London to work around. Although knowingly removed but has been extended, due to very popular by him, the presence of the artist is striking in demand, especially towards the end of the each piece, and the result (it being a sound, a show. The family-friendly environment Martin Creed’s first retrospective at the a different world than the very urban scene movement, an idea) is marked with the artist’s brought together people who might not be Hayward Gallery brings together a variety just outside the gallery walls. identity. the Hayward’s usual contemporary shows of works from different format and media, visitors. There is no right way to experience which gives a rather complete overview The spaces at the Hayward seem to perfectly In June 2011, the English artist was selected the show, but it is all centred on the plurality on the minimalist artist’s practice over accommodate the works on display, from by the Fruitmarket Gallery to participate of experiences that Martin Creed offers to the the years. The juxtaposition of paintings, the adjusted space at the entrance, where in the restoration of the locals of Scotsman visitor. sculptures, lights, installations, music and the piece, Work No. 1092, 2011, turns and Steps, the old headquarters of Edinburgh’s videos gives the visitor the chance to enter fills the room, to the three outside spaces, news publisher, The Scotsman. To underline Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 8 C# 9

letter. The profile of a face looks back to David Robilliard another in the top third of this square The Yes No Quality of Dreams canvas, implying a separation or fleeting glance. The sense of chance and potential ICA, London present in the subject and aesthetic of the work, shows the romantic sensibility of 16 April - 15 June 2014 the artist, living in an open and thriving by NATALIA TAYLOR cultural scene within the capital, but in exile from his past. Although British law decriminalized private intercourse between two men in 1967, it was still considered David Robilliard, born in 1952, took the lives one lit by daylight, the other artificially. illegal in the Crown dependency of and loves of the gay scene in 1980s London A latecomer to painting, as he only took it Guernsey, the artist’s place of birth, until as his muse. He was appointed the epitaph up in 1985, Robilliard used acrylic paint: a 1983. The style of this artist, unschooled ‘the new master of the modern person’ by fast-drying, easy-to-use option.1 The cheap and unbound by convention, echoes the Gilbert & George, his greatest advocates, and simple materials employed by the artist freedom presented by the sub cultures of and early employers when he came to live in show the efficacy of his visual language: David Robilliard Life Isn’t Good, It’s Excellent, 1987 London at this time of great social change. Hoxton in 1975. there is no sense of hesitation. Occasional Acrylic on Canvas traces of a pencil underdrawing are visible, Photo by Paul Knight ------The past eight months have seen the artist’s but rare, and are always followed through. Image Courtesy of Collection Michael Neff, Frankfurt am Main © The Estate of David Robilliard. work return to London after a twenty- Text dominates the compositions, as does All rights reserved. DACS 2014 1 A Roomful of Hungry Looks, What’s on in year hiatus. The ICA’s show is preceded the artist’s signature and date, present in Amsterdam, 1993, p.10 by last year’s David Robilliard: Paintings, the lower third of each canvas. Robillard’s 2 Benjamin Buchloh, Why Joseph Beuys is Drawings and Poems at Rob Tufnell, an signature is actually his auto-portrait in at the bottom alongside his real signature. the worst ‘The Poignancy of Stuff’, Kari exhibition that recognised that while he was these images, and in the signature line, There is certainly an interdependency Rittenbach, 032c, May 2009 a self taught artist, his painting, drawings the date is marked with equal prominence, between Robilliard’s paintings and his and poetry existed symbiotically. However, suggesting an awareness that these almost- written work. He would often send out the show at the ICA focuses exclusively on instant drawings were a record of himself in poems on postcards, eventually publishing paintings from the last few years of his life, a particular era. The linear profiles of men them in A Box of Poems, 1987, which he which ended suddenly in 1988 as a result of and women in A Roomful of Hungry Looks, used to send to friends in envelopes also contracting an AIDS-related illness. Keep 1987, resemble alphabetical characters, marked Life isn’t Good, it’s Excellent.2 Tomorrow Free, 1988, the first painting showing the fluidity between the artist’s The title for Wondering What to Do this to confront the visitor open entering the relationships with people and with words. Evening, 1987, similarly grounds the work intersectional corridor in the upper gallery, in carefree immediacy which is typical of is an instruction that hits upon the freedom In an age before instant online youth, and of the later YBAs who would be of young adulthood and a defiant attitude communication became ubiquitous, the the most obvious heirs to this irreverent, but taken up in the midst of the AIDS scare. textual and social immediacy in Robilliard’s sometimes melancholy attitude. work is evident from the mantra that is The painting from which this show takes This freedom is implicit in the confident the title of the work Life isn’t Good it’s David Robilliard way pure colour is idiosyncratically applied Excellent, 1987, a depiction of a double- its title, The Yes No Quality of Dreams, The Yes No Quality of Dreams on the bright white expanse of canvases, all headed male figure. Perhaps this image was 1988, appears to particularly play with Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, 2014 Photo by Paul Knight. © The Estate of David Robilliard synesthesia; ‘no’ is written in red, whilst averaging in size at around 150 x 150 cm, too literal a metaphor for the artist, who, All rights reserved. DACS 2014 and evenly spaced apart in the two rooms: in a self-effacing manner, wrote ‘Robilart’ ‘dreams’ is afforded a new colour for each Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 10 C# 11

Pangaea guide explains that they represent displaced is unique to developing urban sprawls. people and social organization. However, While there has been controversy regarding Saatchi Gallery, London the installation also explicates themes of Murillo’s works and their performance in 2 April - 2 November 2014 infestation, colonization and community the contemporary art market, the pieces fit – not to mention, very literal illustrations within the framework of Pangaea; they also by TONI SLOANE LAWRENCE of exotic creatures. As the first room in the identify with the Saatchi collecting aesthetic show, this sets the tone for the exhibition. which includes, but is not limited to, large scale works by young artists, many of whom The rest of the artists come from various incorporate the notion of rawness or an places, both rural and urban, throughout anti-aesthetic into their work. Latin America and Africa. Each of the artists plays with notions of representation, Pangaea comes to London at an interesting appropriation, identity and space. Boris time. First and foremost, contemporary Nzebo’s painting Auberge du Boulot Noir, Latin American and African art are 2013, is reminiscent of Francis Picabia’s niches that continue to be neglected by transparency paintings of the later 1920s contemporary art collectors. This, in turn, – imagery heavy with symbolism painted affects the visibility of these artists within an in layers, suggesting a fragmentary and institutional context. Second, Saatchi has a cinematic approach to assembling the reputation for ‘discovering’ artists. Although two-dimensional space. Nzebo takes this debatable, he does succeed in facilitating approach to painting and puts it into a shows that seem cutting-edge. This has a contemporary context; he layers brightly- positive effect on the visibility of lesser- coloured drawings of urban housing in known artists due to the central London Douala with portraits of women who have location, international visibility and high intricate hairstyles, commonly advertised at number visitors. Third, Pangaea is open Cameroonian beauty salons. when the tourist season is in full swing and also coincides with Pinta London, a Latin Rafael Gómezbarros Oscar Murillo has become an emblem American contemporary art fair held in Casa Tomada, 2013 Resin, Fiber Glass, Madera, Screen Cotton, Cuerda Arenas, Cerrejón of currency in today’s contemporary art central London. Also, it arrives on the heels 50 x 20 x 50 cm; Legs 90 x 50 cm market; his assemblage installations and on the first contemporary African art fair © Rafael Gómezbarros, 2013 (Sam Drake 2014) paintings made of found objects shed held at Somerset house in October 2013. Image Courtesy of the Saatchi Gallery, London light on his Columbian heritage through the eyes of a young man who immigrated The most important questions to ask is does This Spring, the Saatchi Gallery opened style: grandiose and eye-catching. The first to London as a boy. At Pangaea, there Pangaea work? Also, does this exhibition Pangaea: New Art from Africa and Latin room of the gallery is filled with sculptures is an entire room dedicated to Saatchi’s breathe life into an under-valued sector of America; ten of the fifteen rooms of the of ants that reach to nearly 1.5m each; upon collection of his works with the focal point contemporary art? Not entirely. However, former County Hall in Duke of York square further investigation it is mentioned that being Dark Americano, 2013, which hangs it succeeds in a way that visitors who would are sparsely hung with large-scale, gritty they are, in fact, made of human skulls. opposite an untitled work that incorporates have never been exposed to these artists works from non-Western artists. Upon Gomezbarros’ piece mimics the natural posters, shelving brackets and broken now have the opportunity to see them in a entering the show there is a work by Rafael patterns of an ant colony; the insects seem footballs. Like Nzebo, Murillo’s works are large-scale gallery space. It doesn’t because Gomezbarros entitled Casa Tomada, 2013, to crawl in a widely spaced, but highly an amalgamation of unlikely factors that the curation of Pangaea suggests that these which starts the show off in true Saatchi organized set of clusters. The exhibition suggest a multifaceted environment that artists have been plucked from obscurity, Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 12 C# 13

Marina Abramović 512 Hours

The Serpentine Gallery, London 11 June – 25 August 2014 by Alice Surer

Four years after The Artist is Present, she is performing in a new context; the artist Museum of Modern Art, New York, Serbian is occupying the gallery six days a week – artist Marina Abramović is having her first 10am to 6pm over the course of 64 days – by improvised performance in the United herself, vulnerable, employing her being as Kingdom. Abramović is residing at The the subject. The entrance is free, however Serpentine Gallery in London over the tickets are given out on a ‘first-come, first- summer – for 512 hours – until the end of serve’ basis allowing a restricted number of August. visitors at any one time. After standing and waiting in queue – it is part of the adventure Marina Abramović was born in Yugoslavia – visitors are guided and invited to leave in 1946. Since the beginning of her career all of their personal belongings, including in the early 1970s she has developed the bags, coats, mobiles and watches in provided practice of performance as visual art using metallic lockers. They may then enter the Boris Nzebo Auburge du Boulot Noir, 2013 her body as a medium. Abramović explores gallery divided into three illuminated, empty Acrylic on Canvas, 150 x 130 cm her physical and psychological limits rooms. Spectators rapidly experience a © Boris Nzebo, 2013 overcoming suffering, risk and exhaustion feeling of loss in space and time. They are Image Courtesy of the Saatchi Gallery, London while seeking for emotional and spiritual now becoming ‘active’, taking part in the so- alteration. Her work has been presented called creation of the artwork and may enjoy discovered and now held within the highly According to this show, Latin American and with performances, photography, sound, the experience as long as they wish. esteemed Saatchi collection. These artists African art seems to only include symbols of sculpture and video in exhibitions held in represent a microcosmic view of what is immigration, war, and poverty. Pangaea does significant institutions all over the globe. As soon as I got into the crowded area, happening in non-Western art today; Saatchi give a glimpse into an art world that is just my first impulse was to come upon the has been brilliant at capitalizing on the timing being noticed by Westerner viewers, but it During her three-month happening at ‘queen of performance art’. Marina was of the show which suggests that his (or his certainly does not tell the whole story. MoMA in 2010 spectators were invited to there: standing and staring at a white wall, collectors) buying sense remains insightful sit silently opposite the artist confronting wearing a black outfit. People around her and cutting edge, even after all these years. her gaze for a limitless amount of time. In appeared nervous, excited and calm. After Pangaea succeeds as a vehicle to feed non- 1997, she was awarded the Golden Lion for a short moment, she wandered humbly and Western contemporary art to visitors passing Best Artist at the Venice Biennale and in interacted silently with the audience. She through the impressively high-ceilings and 2008 she received the Austrian Commander has the fascinating power of distributing white walls of the Saatchi Gallery. However, Cross.1 strong energy; some visitors followed every it fails at deconstructing stereotypes – all ten gesture she made. The performance carried rooms of the exhibition share similar themes. Abramović’s show at the Serpentine offers a on as she selected a young man and took him departure from what she has done before as by the hand to walk around the space. She Critical Reviews - London C# 14 C# 15

Marina Abramović Photograph © 2014 Photo by Marco Anelli guided him to a second room where they both experience the event fully. However, the looked at the wall. The exercise went on with experience is interesting and worth it. other members of the public. ------Furthermore, four to six gallery assistants – dressed in black as well – contributed to 1 The Serpentine Gallery, Marina Abramović: 512 the performance as they were supporting Hours (2014) http://www.serpentinegalleries.org/ exhibitions-events/marina-abramovic-512-hours. Abramović in her improvisation. Their role Accessed 09/06/14; Sean Kelly Gallery, Marina was to choose individuals, take them by Abramovic (2014) http://www.skny.com/artists/ the hand and move around to reach a wall. marina-abramovi/ Accessed 08/06/14 and Marina Abramovic Institute, About (2014) http://www. They would then face it – sometimes with mai-hudson.org/about/ Accessed 09/06/14 closed eyes – hand in hand. The relationship between the performer and the audience is 2 Marina Abramović and Charles Atlas. Biography. extremely strong. Each moment is unique and Ostfildern: Cantz Verlag, 1994, p.41. different for everyone attending the event. 3 Sidra Stich. Yves Klein. Ostfildern: Cantz Verlag, 1994, p.135. Marina Abramović’s interest in ‘less is more’ is emphasised in this event.2 One cannot 4 4 RoseLee Goldberg. Performance Art – From help but recall Yves Klein’s experience of Futurism to the Present. Singapore: C.S. Graphics, 1999, p.165. nothingness in his 1958 show Le Vide (The Void), Paris where he emptied the gallery space of all its furnishings.3 In contrast to Rhythm O, Naples, 1974, where the audience was allowed to abuse Abramović at their will during a period of six hours with diverse instruments that had been placed on a table, 512 Hours plays with the notion of material absence.4 By leaving their effects visitors are liberated and ‘nude’; they become subjects, performing simultaneously with the artist. Rather than being tangible and visible, the work of art is born from the connection between the performer and the audience in situ. The experience is ephemeral, yet a trace is left in our minds. Additionally, two video cameras are fixed in the area in order to document the happening.

How far can the interaction take us? Some might interpret it as a journey to a spiritual metamorphosis. Due to the considerable number of people, it may be difficult to Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 16 C# 17

Marina Abramović 512 Hours

The Serpentine Gallery, London 11 June – 25 August 2014 by da eun back

For nearly 40 years, Yugoslav-born first involves actions by her, usually involving performance artist Marina Abramović has extreme physical duration, observed by the been a pioneer and a legacy in the world of viewer. In many of her most notable works Body Art. In her most recent work, from the body’s endurance of physically painful 10:00 am to 6:00 pm from Tuesday to Sunday events is exploited as a medium to visualize for eleven weeks she will dedicate her time to psychological pain, time, and memory. interact freely with visitors at the Serpentine Marina’s performance pieces expose a history Gallery at Kensington Gardens in the work of emotional deprivation and distress that are

512 Hours. manifested through self-injury in the forms of Marina Abramović Conducting Rehearsal for ‘Bolero’, Paris, 2013 cutting, stabbing, hitting, scratching, burning, Image Courtesy of the Serpentine Gallery, London Visitors are asked to leave all of their personal and head-banging. The second form includes belongings in a locker before they enter the installations where there is a physical space performance space. This space is divided that is activated through sound or silence. and me and nothing else,’ Abramović stated, predicted that art in the twenty-first century into three rooms. On the first day of the ‘I’ve never done anything as radical as this. would be ‘Art without objects that would exhibition, each room had five to six chairs Throughout her career Abramović has had This is as immaterial as you can go.’ By directly use energy.’ Through this exhibition and in the center room there was a low plinth. an interest in the relational field between taking part in the ‘radical’ exhibition, Marina the relationship between artist and viewer The first day of the exhibition Marina and herself and the viewer. One of Marina’s has managed to create a pseudo-religious has been transformed into a complex form of her assistants walked through each room and most memorable performances that includes experience for visitors at the Serpentine energy exchange. approached various visitors. Holding that extensive participation of the audience is Gallery. Marina and her assistants encourage person’s hand, they would lead the visitor Rhythm 0, 1975, where she sat in passivity rooms full of people to turn inward through Although the physical endurance in the to the wall or plinth, or sit them down on as the audience used seventy-two props to basic interactions. This sits well with Marina’s exhibition 512 Hours is not as obvious as the wooden chair and often whisper things interact with her in whatever way they felt long interest in creating a dialogue about her previous works, it clearly pursues the into their ears. This resulted in three rooms suitable. One of her most popular recent our need to ritualize the simple actions of same goal. The mental endurance required of visitors at the Serpentine Gallery quietly works from 2010 is The Artist is Present, at everyday life. Some of these actions she for this exhibition is commendable. Most sitting, facing walls, and standing. the Museum of Modern Art, New York, where describes to include ‘walking, standing, importantly, through the deprivation of visitors would sit opposite to the artist and sitting, lying, eating, washing, drinking, technology and the uninterrupted interaction Marina Abramović graduated from the they would look into one another’s eyes for a dressing, undressing, sleeping, dreaming.’ amongst individuals, the audience can restore Academy of Fine Arts in Zagreb, Croatia in period of time. their perspective on the beauty in everyday 1972 and has been creating art, often using Much of Marina’s work can be interpreted life. This newest exhibition is a peaceful and the body as her primary form of visual Much of this most recent exhibition stems as a created genre that is an aesthetic form spiritual evolution as Abramović approaches communication, ever since. Marina’s work from Marina’s interest in the relationship of prayer that is empowered by her spiritual seventy. can generally be divided in two forms: the between art and ‘nothingness.’ ‘It’s the public interests and drives. In 1989, Abramović Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 18 C# 19

Hannah Maybank Bobhowlers and Blooms

Gimpel Fils, London 29 May – 5 July 2014 by Penny yeung

Bobhowlers and Blooms. The title of the in this new body of work certainly creates exhibition sums up Hannah Maybank’s a different dimension to Maybank’s work new body of paintings which, remaining despite revolving around a similar subject. close to Maybank’s practice, concentrate The three-dimensionality aspect of her on the beauty of nature. Known for her works has transposed through the use three-dimensional paintings in acrylic, of latex cut-out technique and her use Maybank decides to explore the breadth of of watercolour, creating sharp contrasts watercolour, instead of using acrylic for her between lightness and darkness, projecting new paintings in this exhibition, together the exquisiteness and beauty of nature. with her trademark use of latex cut-out It also helps to illustrate the delicacy of technique to outline her floral designs. flowers and of the moths, revealing as All of the paintings in this new series much detail as possible, as we can see from revolve around the central theme of the the sharpness of the thorns of the roses in beauty of nature, with paintings depicting Adeline, 2014, the luminosity of petals in blooming flowers and outlines of the British Kate, 2014. Her works signal the dynamic of Hawkmoth – the Bobhowler as it is called in nature on the one hand, and the fragility of this exhibition, which very much convey the life on the other hand. sense of new beginnings – both in nature as well as in Maybank’s works. One of her larger works, Bobolla, 2014 illustrates a British Hawkmoth outlined ‘If every petel was a second by her signature floral designs. This large If every petel was a year painting has combined the imagery of an If every petel was forever…’ 1 insect and floral designs, echoing Tussock, 2014, another painting in the exhibition, Flowers and nature have always been which also depicts a large moth however Maybank’s subject in her work. Echoing with cream and gold colours, illustrating the her previous paintings Fontus’s Posie, daintiness of the insect. One may be able to Hannah Maybank 2013, with no surprises, this subject of see two moths – as a mirror image in this Adeline, 2014 flower blossom is evidently depicted in each painting Interestingly, ‘tussock’ is a type of Orasol and Watercolour on Stretched Watercolour Paper Over Polyester, 115 x 100 cm painting. In contrast to her previous works woodland moth, and the word also relates to Image Courtesy of Gimpel Fils in acrylic, the exploration of watercolour bunch grasses. Maybank’s choice of naming Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 20 C# 21

this work can be explained as the type of moth magical about nature. The simplicity of the in the painting. In addition, it also helps to subject matter presented in these paintings Henri Matisse express the idea of the relationship between also signals new beginnings, of life and death, The Cut-Outs insects and nature. also implying the danger of beauty through the use of darker colours in some of her Tate Modern, London In addition, worth noting are the titles in most paintings such as Daphne and Katherine, 17 April - 7 September 2014 of her paintings, as they are each given a girl’s 2014. name such as Angela, Kate, and Catherine. by ROBERTA GUIDUCCI Adeline, for instance, shows a bouquet of Maybank’s new body of work – simple yet roses painted in two shades of blue. Whether also embeds deeper meanings underneath the or not the title of the painting relates to the beautiful outlines of floral designs certainly meaning behind the name ‘Adeline’ – of unveils the feminine side of the artist as she ‘I am for decoration … I put into it all the nature to language. Matisse’s ‘first life’ being noble or not, this painting certainly continues to work with the subject of nature, acquisitions of my life. In pictures I can only was made of nature. In wild colours, he does stand out amongst the others due to the presenting its beauty to viewers. go back over the same ground’.1 investigated a series of objects around brightness of the blue colours used to execute which he built his world for almost fifty the work. The choice of using royal blue in ------These words written by Henri Matisse in years such as interiors, windows, gardens, this work as the background does convey a 1 1945 in a letter to his daughter say almost landscapes, tables, nudes. Then, after 1941, sense of nobility, and the bouquet of roses An extract of a poem written by Matt Black in response to Hannah Maybank’s body of work everything about what is in the show he transformed his final years into his most in the foreground reinforces a perplexing yet Fontus’s Posie in 2013. Matt Black, Fontus’s at Tate Modern in London, curated by experimental period yet. mystical sensation, leaving viewers captivated Posie, from http://hannahmaybank.com/ Nicholas Cullinan and Nicholas Serota, in work/#page_425. Accessed 10 June 2014. as they proceed onto the show. collaboration with The Museum of Modern The primary element of the later works is 2 Matt Black, Fontus’s Posie, from http:// Art in New York. language, art being the moment at which Other works in this exhibition are very similar hannahmaybank.com/work/#page_425. Accessed one can become ‘aware of an unfolding’.4 10 June 2014. to Maybank’s previous body of work Fontus’s The show presents the works realised in Language is a game of juxtaposition and Posie, in terms of their colours, scale and Matisse’s ‘second life’. After being in a balance. Paper and scissors link together subject. As remarked by the English poet for wheelchair from 1941, he was extremely colour and form. The cut outs appear simple Maybank’s exhibition in 2013: unwell and unable to paint so he started and easy to do: Matisse cuts the shapes creating his works with paper and scissors. out, freehand with scissors, and saves both ‘But for now, for this moment, this rose is the cut out and the remaining paper. He yours, The book, Henri Matisse, a Second Life, then arranged and rearranged the coloured This painting is your garden,… written by Alastair Sooke talks about his cut-outs and he stopped at the point when This is your story, at this moment passion for life, that became even stronger he liked the results. This meticulousness Art and nature walk hand in hand, after he almost died in 1941.2 used to calculate number, size, colours Talking to each other, and saying and balance of the cut papers make them 2 Isn’t it strange, how we reflect each other…’ After his illness, he became like the dried absolutely ripe. The vastness of scale and leaves he loved, ‘able to catch fire as the lushness of colour is what makes them Perhaps the purpose of Maybank’s work is they pass from death to life.3 There is a so unique. for viewers to engage themselves with her mesmerising blaze of creativity in this paintings, to delve into the relation between seemingly effortless new way of making art. The artist’s technique also represents a art and nature. It is about finding, exploring connection to his family and his past: and appreciating the beauty of our everyday The shift from painting to decoration, descending from generations of French encounters, something so ordinary yet through the cut-outs, is also a shift from weavers, he appreciated texture and design, Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 22 C# 23

into stained glass windows and the daylight ------fires up the blue and yellow dynamic shapes.

1 T.J.Clark, The Urge to Strangle, London Review Over the course of fourteen rooms, the of Books, vol.36 n.11, p.3-6, 5 June 2014. journey is exciting for both the mind and the 2 Alastair Sooke, Henri Matisse a Second Life, eye. Penguin Books, London, 2014. 3 Henri Matisse wrote this phrase in a letter to Starting from the first approaches to the a friend in 1949. See T.J.Clark, The Urge to cut outs, along with films and two rooms Strangle, London Review of Books, vol.36 n.11, p.3-6, 5 June 2014. dedicated to Matisses’s illustrated books, the 4 Henri Matisse said these words about his work exhibition shows important late works: Jazz, The Snail, his most challenging experiment in 1947, Matisse’s book published by Teriade order to represent ‘an abstraction rooted into with his famous hand written notes; the large reality’, in Conversation with André Verdet, 1952. work Oceania, The Sky, 1946, a tender tribute 5 to one of his earlier trips to exotic places, with In the same room with Oceania, The Sea, 1946. 6 white paper cut outs floating on beige amber In http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate- modern/exhibition/henri-matisse-cut-outs/ screens; Zulma, 1950, which gives a sense of henri-matisse-cut-outs-room-11. depth in a cut-out, realised when Matisse was eighty years old.5

The famous Blue Nudes are compared to his sculpted nudes showed in the same room; Henri Matisse Matisse created them ‘cutting directly into The Snail, 1959 Image Courtesy of Tate Modern colours’, the cutting being bolder and more revolutionary, introducing white space into the blue of the bodies and being at the same and paper patterns were familiar elements movement and growth, with multiple shapes time both drawing and sculpture. The large from his childhood. tracing rhythms on the canvas. The Parakeet and the Mermaid, 1952, is his garden brought indoor, because Matisse His intentions was that the cut-outs, realised They depict exotic animals, leaves, flowers, wasn’t able to move any longer. The Snail, with his young assistant, Lydia Delectorskaya, dancers, mythological figures, Matisse’s 1953, is the most abstract and balanced of his were ‘paintings with scissors’ and they gave gardens, cut in pure, matte colours, without cut-outs. him a sense of freedom and liberation. Started brushmarks, and incisive forms. Each shape as an alternative way of painting, they became lives its own life and dances with the others. About Large Decoration with Masks, 1953, he something totally independent from it. The Together, they are like an orchestra in vivid said: “it is such a consolation to have achieved show is a journey in the world of the cut-outs colours. this at the end of my life”.6 presented as living creatures, exactly like Matisse used to see them. He was aware of The show is also a precious and moving This show in its totality is indeed an exciting their strong physical nature to the point of journey through Matisse’s studios in Paris consolation for the joyous creativity and the leaving them pinned to the wall in such a way and Vence, in the south of France, where boldness of works created by an elderly and Henri Matisse Blue Nude II, 1952 that they would flutter in a soft breeze. They he worked on the Dominican Chapel of the unwell man who remained incredibly alive Image Courtesy of Tate Modern are two dimensional and still, but they suggest Rosary. Here, the cut-outs are transformed and adventurous. Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 24 C# 25

Trisha Baga Engages All Dimensions

Zabludowicz Collection Exhibition, London 27 February – 11 May 2014 Trisha Baga Installation View at Zabludowicz by NICK COOMBS Collection, 2014 Photo by Andy Keate

In a society where much of one’s daily a central theme throughout the exhibition activity is reliant upon computers and other involving three dimensional and sensory electronic devices, we often find ourselves immersion of the viewer that many of the immersed in the image on the screen rather other works also attempt to convey. than our own surroundings. Trisha Baga’s solo exhibition at the Zabludowicz Collection Baga’s most recent work, Freaky Sunday, in London investigates how technology is the end product of the collaboration with impacts one’s reception and understanding fellow artist Jessie Stead. The installation of their positioning within an increasingly uses 3D loops of video accompanied by computerized society. audio and mixed-media sculpture shows how the artist has channeled the immersion Trisha Baga Taking place in the main gallery and the of the senses found in her previous work Installation View at Zabludowicz Collection, 2014 surrounding mezzanine of the former into a cross-disciplinary study of the creative Photo by Andy Keate chapel-turned-art gallery, Baga’s exhibit mind in fine arts and jazz music. The work involves the installation of ten video works. employs a similar audio-visual-physical With dates ranging from 2005 to the artists’ approach to The Story of Painting objects most recent work Freaky Sunday, 2014, featured which are laid out on a table at the works use sound as well as mixed media the center of the installation. The viewer installations to fully immerse the viewer in must wear 3D glasses in order to watch the content before them. the projections, however the soundtracks from the three videos are allowed to bleed continues to address the themes of technology mixed-media installations to address several The Story of Painting, 2012, involves a together into a reverberation of different and identity as expressed in the artist’s earlier different themes regarding life and art in half-hour 3D video loop (the viewer is given audio tracks vying for one’s attention while work. the twenty-first century. As the ten years 3D glasses upon entering the exhibit) of they watch the videos. While the audio worth of works in this exhibition show, the fragmentary images and abstract forms appears discordant at first, the viewer soon Freaky Sunday, along with the other combination of the physical with visual and of color accompanied by audio of a TV begins to pick out the sources of each, installations in the exhibition, create an audio elements in Trisha Baga’s installations program about the Impressionist masters. much like a jazz jam session where the environment for the viewer to surround force the viewer to become aware of their own The audio and visual loops are accompanied instruments are improvising while keeping themselves with the works. The exhibition, methods of perception and further challenge by paint bottles and modeling clay laid at to a certain form. This work, while being although fairly uniform in its selection of how technology has become such an integral the foot of the projection. These physical described in the press release as ‘detailing works, shows how the artist has used her part of contemporary society. items inclusion in the work seem to further the association of jazz with artistic creation’, Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 26 C# 27

Italian Colourism

Second Home Britannia House, London 1 June 2014 by YUYU CHEN

This year the London Contemporary Music peeps through the holes unexpectedly. The Festival 2014 was presented from 26 May accord comes separately from each string to 1 June, following the success of last year. in which, instead of following a traditional The festival encompassed multi-disciplinary composition, the melody floats tentatively, events, specialising in contemporary music, creating a spectral world of string art, and performance. This year it was harmonics. presented in the new space, Second Home, situated in Brick Lane. Sciarrino is a pioneer in dismissing the classical tradition. In 1999, Sciarrino took The final event was focused on three Italians the inspiration from the keyboard works who kept working on colour and clarity by by Scarlatti and transcribed them into the turns delicate, explosive, and cataclysmic. string quartet, presenting three from the Esercizi di tre stili (‘Exercises in three Michelangelo Pistoletto The 500-odd keyboard sonatas are Baroque styles’) by Quartetto Prometeo in this Performed by Lorenzo Fiaschi Ten Less One composer Domenico Scarlatti’s most famous concert. However, it cannot be blamed Image Courtesy of Aaron Halloway-Nahum works, which have been influential for the when the first piece of his was finished, one development of the classical style. The audience left without finishing the rest of composition reflects the light and movement the concert. The final piece of the concert is Ten Less of the capacities of vision and mind. This through each note played out by piano One, to be performed by the Italian artist performance was performed for the first virtuoso Mark Knoop. The programme The second half of the concert starts with and Arte Povera pioneer Michelangelo time in the UK. As Fiaschi smashes the contains four sonatas, including F minor, Sonata in A minor by Scarlatti, for which Pistoletto. However, due to unforeseen large and classical mirror that surrounds which uses folk melodies and changes of the clustered notes shifted with the changes circumstances, he was replaced by Lorenzo the space, the colour burst through into the harmonies from major to minor to minor, of rhythm. The lifting notes pair with Fiaschi, who had worked closely with room. It is conceived as a break from the and also E major sonata, a delicate and Sciarrino’s Fifth Piano Sonata, in which Pistoletto and has deputised for this piece conventional restrain in Modernist theory. shimmered vistas. the disaccords, percussive rhythm, and before. The reciprocal reflection represents the the silence hector the audience. The piece infinite generation of light and life. The After 250 years, the application of colour had been performed by Mark Knoop, in Ten Less One is from a series of mirror fragments of the glass were still impressed, and light takes a completely different which the end is called ‘definitive’ by the works; the first, Twenty Two Less Two, was which represents as the memory of a past direction in the music of Salvatore Sciarrino. composer. The music soon changes back performed at the Venice Bienale in 2009. event printed in the present. He described The concert contains his sonatas and to Scarlatti’s sonata, K159 in C major, in The mirror has always been essential in in an interview, ‘Each shard still has the quartets, including String Quartet No 9 which Knoop performs in a playful and Pistoletto’s work. It not only symbolises same reflecting quality as a whole mirror, and Quartet No 7 which were presented for liberated way. Following the piece, we again the artist’s search for his own identity, but so all mirrors are connected, smashed or the first time in the United Kingdom. In enter the darkness with the UK premiere of also emphasises the mirror’s universality. intact, just as all humans share the same his music, one finds oneself in a dark and Sciarrino’s String Quartet No 7. Used as a concept of totality, his mirror basic DNA. I see society as a kind of broken endless cave without exit while the light contains physical and intellectual extensions mirror.’ The interconnection between each Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 28 C# 29

polke/richter - richter/polke

Christie’s Mayfair, London 25 April - 7 July 2014 by HANIA AFIFI

Exploring the different approaches two Krone, 1965, rhythmically echoes Sigmar artists undertook in their art-making Polke’s black and white Bavarian, 1965, careers is nothing new. However, reviewing oil painting. Whilst Richter’s blur style will artworks in light of a friendship between progress onto his signature smudged photo- two iconic artists is fresh, insightful and realism and Polke’s exaggerated raster- bemusing. The visitor embarks on a journey dots will evolve into complete abstraction, where he/she is encouraged to mentally map they unmistakably started from common out the artists’ friendship status as they walk grounds. through the exhibition. As Francis Outred outlines in the Foreword This was the curatorial approach adopted of this exhibition catalogue, ‘these two by Christie’s auction house for the polke/ artists chose this moment to begin a richter – richter/polke exhibition currently complete and utter deconstruction of on display at their Mayfair showroom painting, to strip it back to its bare bones in London. With ambitions to embody and rebuild what could be conceived as the their slogan and truly become ‘the art ‘possibilities in painting.’ We may attribute people’, they set-up a chronological display this similar foundation of thought and early accompanied by an exhibition catalogue rich practice to their shared learning at the in archival photographs that enables visitors Dusseldorf Kunstakademia where they met to trace back the impact that Richter and in 1962, and their East Berlin childhood Polke’s waning relationship had on their upbringing. However, we should also factor Michelangelo Pistoletto individual art practices. in the strong social bond they had developed Performed by Lorenzo Fiaschi as evident in the archival photographs. Ten Less One Image Courtesy of Aaron Holloway-Nahum Indeed, Gerhard Richter and Sigmar Polke’s work has not been displayed together since The shared achromatic painting approach their 1966 joint exposition at Galerie h in is left behind as the viewer enters Room 3; piece of glass symbolises different culture and remind us of something even in today’s over- Hanover, Germany. The display in Room 1 dominated by 80s artworks where Richter’s human races, which is separated by geography consuming society. The movement of using a on the ground floor attests to their common figurative photo-realistic oil paintings like and politics. hammer to smash the mirror refers to the core artistic vision during the 60s; that of Kerze, 1982, are juxtaposed with Polke’s concept of Arte Povera. dissecting the painting practice and probing experimental abstract pieces such as As a founder of Arte Povera, he does not new possibilities within its medium as well Katastrophentheorie III, 1983. Yet, one of consider the term as poor art. He explains, as the similar formal qualities discernible Richter’s Abstraktes Bild paintings of 1986 ‘Povera means the essential energy of art.’ in their early works. The muted greyscale is exhibited in the same room to remind us He believes that the movement can still blurred painting of Richter’s Flämische that he had also embarked on the abstract Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 30 C# 31

Sigmar Polke and Gerhard Richter Sigmar Polke Taking a Bath Together: Sigmar Polke (in the back) and Gerhard Richter (in the front), 1966 Bavarian, 1965, Dispersion on Canvas, 159.4 × 124.5 cm Image Courtesy of Gerhard Richter Archive, Cologne Image Courtesy of Christie’s Ltd., London

route. Visitor’s cannot but compare the rich golden/orange hues demonstrate Polke’s mauve to create a vault-like surrounding in a financial side but it is also an interesting gestural green and yellow brush strokes in passion for experimentation and alchemy. the enclosed space. The room is dedicated exhibition.’ Richter’s Abstraktes Bild, 1986, to Polke’s to Polke and holds pieces from a large black and blue diagonal brush marks in The upstairs gallery marks a shift in the period span. One of the enticing creations is Indeed, the explorative journey undertaken Untitled, 1983. To the untrained eyes, they exhibition tone. On the top floor, there is an Untitled, 1988. where Polke demonstrates his by these two friends is presented to us by appear to be made by the same hand. explosive riot of vibrant colours, different painterly abilities from the controlled brush Christie’s - the very auction house who However, the Lanterna Magica, 1988-1996, sizes and varying format pieces of both strokes that manifest in a uniform wallpaper- favoured, a year ago in March 2013, the Transparent 10#, 1988, and Untitled of artists sporadically hung on the walls. The like pattern in the background to the fluid fast financial returns of its private sales 1987 and 1989, are indisputably Polke’s. exhibition takes the form of a parade in an swirls reminiscent of marble paper. department to the slow artist-nurturing Occupying a semi-boxed corner in Room 3, art fair where ironically the only figurative business of Haunch of Venison; its subsidiary two of these paintings are suspended from paintings presented belong to Polke. One The underlying commercial layer of the primary gallery they had acquired in 2007. the ceiling to showcase their ingenious may note that the curatorial aspect of the exhibition – this private sales exhibition was This profit-seeking arm, which evolved from recto-verso hang possibility. Presented as exhibition is side-stepped to give way to the skilfully conceived to coincide with Polke’s their former gallery, chose to continue Richter sculptural artworks where the viewer is able commercial aims behind the show. grand collaborative retrospective held at and Polke’s philosophic dialogue about the to rotate around the paintings, we realise MOMA, New York, Tate Modern in London medium of painting and engage with the art the degree to which Richter and Polke’s Arguably, the jewels of the show are displayed and Museum Ludwig of Cologne respectively world on a cultural level. friendship and painting careers have drifted in Room 2 in the basement gallery, where the – does not undermine its cultural significance. apart. The anarchic pieces dominated by curators chose to paint the walls in a regal As Christie’s Specialist, Darren Leak, remarked: ‘the exhibition has two functions; Critical Reviews - London Critical Reviews - London C# 32 C# 33

The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk

Barbican, London 9 April – 25 August 2014 by nina malherbe

The predicament of the museum is exhibition curation into the realm of its tendency to fall into the realm of a multidisciplinary spectacle, a concept which mausoleum. Too often objects on display has allowed the chief curator, previously depart from their purpose, a matter unknown Thierry-Maxime Loriot, to shoot especially pertinent to fashion-items that to fame. are to be worn and lived, completed by their bearer. The triumph of The Fashion World The viewer is taken upon a complete of Jean Paul Gaultier From the Sidewalk thematic journey of Gaultier trademarks to the Catwalk lies in its vitality. The and house codes. From Breton stripe to exhibition at the Barbican brings Gaultier’s the conical bra, through distressed double creations to life, celebrating the French denim and fantasies of science fiction, couturier’s four-decade long career and the garments on display have become exuberant persona. icons of their time. Self-taught and often referred to as fashion’s enfant terrible, An expansive show, the curation is dramatic Gaultier revels in notions of counter and indulgent. Custom-made mannequins culture and an alternative beauty. This Jean Paul Gaultier are given facial features and expressions rejection of the accustomed in favor of the Gaultier Conical Bra by means of projections. These almost- unorthodox is a defining principle of his Image Courtesy of the Author alive catwalk figures smile, laugh and talk, work and an ideology that can be strongly generating a highly evocative and immersive felt throughout the show. The full scope Despite the playful and humorous spirit Superficially, The Fashion World of Jean atmosphere. Sketches, video footage and of his oeuvre is emphasized and revealed of the exhibition, an appreciation of skill Paul Gaultier From the Sidewalk to the photography champion and substantiate through the referencing and inclusion of and technique is also brought into play. Catwalk is about clothing, but as Nathalie the couture pieces on show while sound and archival material in relation to numerous Closer inspection uncovers exquisitely made Bondil (Director of the Montreal Museum lighting are used to create a sense of the collaborative endeavors. The important roles garments of which the hand embroidery and of Fine Arts) notes: ‘It is not really about theatrical. Mirrors allow for multifaceted of photographers such as Richard Avedon, pleating, as well as the many hours of work, fashion, it is about his (Jean Paul Gaultier’s) viewing and the open plan, split-level spatial David LaChapelle and Mario Testino as are purposefully acknowledged. In Gaultier humanist vision.’ Exuberant perhaps, the configuration results in the exhibition well as models and muses (Dita Von Teese, we see a catwalk informed by the sidewalk substantial contextual depth behind the reading more like a superfluous fashionable Madonna, Naomi Campbell to name a few) whereby high fashion appropriates the low exhibition exemplifies a social awareness installation. Organised by the Montreal are highlighted in explanatory texts while and transforms subculture into luxury and that extends Gaultier’s designs beyond Museum of Fine Arts in collaboration the film and stage costumes on display haute couture. vogue. Fashion, art, craft, design all seem to with Maison Jean Paul Gaultier, Paris, the demonstrate Gaultier’s ceaseless, boundary- merge into one, a notion congruent with the show pushes the boundaries of traditional pushing design aesthetic. heterogeneity of the now. Critical Reviews - United Kingdom Critical Reviews - United Kingdom C# 34 C# 35

Andy Holden Maximum Irony! Maximum Sincerity 1999-2003: Towards a Unified Theory of MI!MS

Spike Island, Bristol, UK 3 May - 29 June 2014 by ARZU KIRANER

MI!MS, Maximum Irony! Maximum equal measure, while guarding oneself not to Sincerity, is an art movement established fall into disbelief from the effects of the late- by Andy Holden and his friends between capitalist world. 1999 and 2003. More than a decade ago, living in the East part of England in a Holden’s curiosity in this project follows the county town called Bedford, these teenagers formation and interaction in society, the use were studying in high school and taking of dialogues within the groupings, as well art classes. They were ready to experience as the idea of collective memory and how to what they had been learning from the four bring this memory together and present it. Andy Holden years of intense discussions and creating The decision to create this personal Maximum Irony! Maximum Sincerity, 1999-2003: Towards a Unified Theory of MI!MS, Film Still, 2013 Image Courtesy of the Artist artworks, and finally ended up writing a and genuine project was taken when he manifesto. acquired the Zabludowicz Collection Annual Commission for 2013. It took him In the following years, they moved on with eighteen months to prepare this large-scale their lives and their art-making process installation, which incorporates a film got detached from each other. Yet, seeing project, photography, drawing, painting, this project today, I believe Holden has not sculpture, text and music. There are also entirely been separated from his past. He life-size copies of the environments that still appreciates looking back and getting they used to spend time in, such as James inspiration from his youth and his old ‘Pups’ MacDowell’s bedroom, a member of friendships. the MI!MS, whose walls were covered with collage materials that acted as a source for The main interest of these teenagers and MI!MS, and the Poppins Restaurant, where MI!MS was to realise the relationship they used to meet and have long discussions between post-modernism and art, and about art, books, philosophy, and human how artists must communicate themselves relations. in this deprived moment in time without being engaged with it. Their suggestion was The film part of the project consists of seven that with the arrival of post-modernism, videos, with a combined length of eighty- honesty and sincerity in art communication five minutes that recreate the formation had replaced itself with a cynical and ironic of MI!MS. The story of the film has two Andy Holden attitude. In order to make art, the artist different narratives: one is presented by Maximum Irony! Maximum Sincerity, 1999-2003: Towards a Unified Theory of MI!MS Installation View must maintain both irony and sincerity in young actors selected from Bedford, acting Photo by Stuart Whipps Critical Reviews - United Kingdom Critical Reviews - United Kingdom C# 36 C# 37

The Skies Can’t Keep Their Secret

Turner Contemporary, Margate, UK 24 May – 21 September 2014 by MARCY KENNEY

The Skies can’t keep their secret! the skies revealing themselves to someone They tell it to the Hills – or something and trying to understand the The Hills just tell the Orchards – secret within the skies.’ It is no secret that Andy Holden M!MS Logo (Death of Chatterton), 2013 And they – the Daffodils! light plays an important role in Finch’s Image Courtesy of the Artist work, carefully studying the effects of light A Bird – by chance – that goes that way and colour and distilling natural phenomena the MI!MS members’ youth, re-staging the 2003, is displayed. This work is composed Soft overheard the whole. through an earnestly scientific approach. crucial moments of the movement; and the of collected reproductions of emotional If I should bribe the little Bird – Finch’s best-known work, The River that parallel story follows the original members paintings of children that you could buy from Who knows but she would tell? Flows Both Ways, was commissioned making the project, shot as behind-the- any charity shop. MI!MS’ interest in romantic for New York City’s High Line in 2009, scenes, while they put up an audition to find and clichéd imagery, as well as the idea that I think I won’t – however – sublimating the light of a 700-minute the actors to play their teen-selves. representation itself can change, an ideal It’s finer not to know; journey along the Hudson River. is not predetermined and could be easily If Summer were an Axiom – There is another level to the film production: operated, inspired this work. Holden tries What sorcery had Snow? Visitors enter into the North Gallery and are the original soundtrack consists of the songs to regenerate the forgotten feelings of these immediately confronted with one of Finch’s written by the two members of the team. objects while presenting these images to bring So keep your secret – Father! large-scale suspended ‘cloud’ sculptures. In the film, these songs were performed by out both the sincerity and the irony in them I would not – if I could, For first-time viewers the effect of Passing a children’s chorus and a school orchestra. by the play of time and re-staging. Know what the Sapphire Fellows, do, Cloud (After Constable), 2014, borders on Holden believes that these songs, such as A In your new-fashioned world! the sublime as translucent filters recreate Love Song by Johnny Parry and For Your Holden points out that the aim of the the light emitted by a cumulus passing Troubles by Roger Illingworth, are key to exhibition is not to bring back the manifesto The Skies Can’t Keep Their Secret, Spencer across the sky. However, those more familiar understanding what MI!MS was and is. They or to readdress these concepts as a challenge Finch’s major retrospective at Margate’s with Finch’s work will discern a certain posses the most sincere, as well as ironic, to art today. Instead, as the title of the Turner Contemporary, takes its title from generic-ness to this installation; Sunlight in lyrics about ‘Love’ and symbolise what it is to exhibition puts forward, it tries to take us the first line of Emily Dickinson’s 1896 an Empty Room (Passing Cloud for Emily write a song that is emotional and personal. back in time to a specific place in their lives, poem. The first solo exhibition in an English Dickinson, Amherst, MA, August 28, 2004), In addition to this, there are excerpts from the and link us to his youth where many genuine gallery in over five years, the American 2004 and Passing Cloud (394 L Street NW, concert footage of the reunion of Holden and and honest ideas originated. While doing that, artist worked closely with the museum to Washington, DC, July 20, 2010), 2010, both MacDowell’s band Brave Soldier. his challenge was to make a work of MI!MS, bring together new and old work, taking refer to a specific light on a specific day in a as well as about MI!MS, a work about youth inspiration from the changing light of the specific place. The cloud passing in Margate In the installation there is another section and adulthood while celebrating both the coastal English town. In a short video placed lacks this particular precision, leaving the where MI!MS’ work Last Stop for the Good ridiculous and the cliché. outside of the gallery, Finch mentions his viewer yearning for more substance. Old Times (after The Age of Innocence), 1999 use of Dickinson’s words: ‘I like this idea of Critical Reviews - United Kingdom Critical Reviews - United Kingdom C# 38 C# 39

Curated as part of the ‘Summer in Colour’ the other works feels tenuous. Sunlight in series at Turner Contemporary only two of an Empty Room (Studio Wall), 2014, is Finch’s works actually contain any specific a continuation of Finch’s ongoing series reference to colour. Atlantic Ocean (Coney recreating the changing natural light on Island), 2014, is a light box of abstracted his studio wall over a period of time using forms articulating the ever-present horizon watercolour and pencil. These two series, line of the Margate Coast. Finch speaks of along with Wave Study, 2014, crowd the Turner’s influence on this work, noting how gallery space that already feels too small to his painterly abstract forms slowly morph hold the cloud suspended in the centre. into subject matter. Arguably the strongest piece of the show, Back to Kansas, 2014, Seven works on paper by JMW Turner pays homage to the 1939 film, The Wizard of accompany the exhibition, all selected by Oz, by conceptually reversing the film’s shift Finch. Placed in a dark, narrow hallway from black and white into technicolour; all of outside of the North Gallery, the works go the colours except for twelve shades of grey against the key component that makes Emily are taken directly from the film. In this work Dickinson’s poetry so great: show, don’t Finch is interested in how colour disappears tell. An unnecessary addition, the selection when one is sitting in a room at dusk due to of Turner works provides a stale end to an the eyes’ sensitivity to different wavelengths already underwhelming exhibition. And as for in different darkness levels. The colours the skies’ secret that the artist has placed at with short wave lengths, blues and purples, the centre of the show? Following Dickinson’s disappear first, followed by long wave-length poetic advice, perhaps ‘it’s finer not to know.’ colours, orange and red, which disappear twenty-five minutes later. Conceptually, this piece stands high among the rest, however the execution falters: viewers can only witness this visual change once a month when the gallery is open until nine in the evening.

Spencer Finch Fittingly, Turner Contemporary uses only Passing Cloud (After Constable), 2014 natural light in the gallery, heightening the Light Fixtures, Filaments, Monofilaments and Clothespins Thank You, Fog, 2009 effects of Passing Cloud (After Constable) 60 Archival Inkjet Photographs and Back to Kansas. However, this causes Image Courtesy of Turner Contemporary; Photo by Stephen White the rest of the works to fade into the background, unable to compete for attention with the larger works that rely so heavily on the windows overhead. Thank You, Fog, 2009, takes selections of Finch’s sixty-piece photographic work shot from a static camera at one-minute intervals as a fog moved over the densely wooded landscape in Sonoma County, California whose relationship to Critical Reviews - United Kingdom Critical Reviews - United Kingdom C# 40 C# 41

Glasgow International

Various Locations, Glasgow, UK 4 – 21 April 2014 by TAYLOR JAYNE Lemelle

Recently it seems as if those who want to depictions of corseted and bound female prove they are ‘in the know’ talk about the figures appear as a sort of feminist art deco. Glasgow art scene. As has been the case, The only hierarchy in the festival program microcosmically, in neighbourhoods like is provided by the “Director’s Programme” Bushwick, Brooklyn or Bethnal Green, label, which denoted exhibitions that were London – the city of Glasgow seems to be specifically commissioned for GI. Among breeding a thriving art scene under the these was a survey of Jordan Wolfson’s radar – in spite of, or perhaps because of, video work from the last decade. I almost the lack of economic wealth in the area. This didn’t go, having been so repulsed by year’s Glasgow International, therefore, excitable spectators dubbing the exhibition might be seen as one of the signifiers of the as the young artist’s ‘retrospective’ (are you Christina Ramberg impending so-called cultural renewal that kidding?), but actually – his reductive 16mm Untitled (Torso with Pants) 1982, Acrylic on Masonite 33 x 29 cm might be on the horizon in Glasgow (the films such as Forest from Above in Reverse, Image Courtesy of Merlin James and Carol Rhodes Commonwealth Games, which will be hosted 2006, provided an interesting context for his in the city this summer, might be another well-known recent video animations such attempt at this). as Raspberry Poser, 2012, also on view and most recently shown in London’s Chisenhale Thought it is a biennial in the sense that Gallery. it happens every two years, Glasgow International is actually not technically a At The Modern Institute’s Aird’s Lane ‘biennale’ as we have come to know them. gallery space, Anne Collier’s solo exhibition Rather, the sixth edition of the ‘festival’ (as of critically self-aware photographs it is officially called) is set up like a citywide was aesthetically restrained and packed open house. Almost frustratingly egalitarian a conceptually dense reflection on in structure, the GI program gave equal photography and the gaze. Another billing to larger institutions like Tramway Glasgow-based commercial gallery, Mary as it did to smaller independent projects. Mary, hosted an off-site project by Alistair One of those small projects was 42 Carlton Frost in a nail salon. The exhibition, ‘AZQ Place, run by artist-collectors Carol Rhodes < $@L⋅^’., was simultaneously a show and Merlin James in the ground floor of of paintings based on archetypal clip-art their townhouse. The couple mounted a images and also a functioning nail salon strikingly sensitive, archival exhibition of that decorated viewers’ nails in these said small works by Christina Ramberg (1946- archetypal images. The meaninglessness Alistair Frost Installation View of Alistair Frost ‘AZQ < > $@?•^’, at 32 St Andrews Street, 2014 1995), a Chicago Imagist whose schematized of these graphic images was hyperbolized Image Courtesy of Mary Mary Critical Reviews - United Kingdom Critical Reviews - International C# 42 C# 43

as they were dislocated from painting and able to conquer Glasgow in a day. Although supplanted into the beauty industry. the egalitarian set-up made the festival I’m Still Here less navigable, it felt fresh seeing Anne Many of the compelling independent Collier in the same context as ‘overlooked’ Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall projects conceived for the festival were artists (such as Michael E. Smith’s show 15 February - 14 December 2014 situated in disused public edifices. Le at Tramway), emerging artists employing by ERICA WENNERHOLM Swimming, for example, was a group a variety of practices (Avery Singer’s exhibition presented by an organisation monochrome cubistic paintings at McLellan called Underground Car Park, named for Galleries), and artists who are, quite frankly, the abandoned structure within which they unknown (Becky Sik, who doesn’t seem present exhibitions and independent film to have a gallery or a website, showed an festivals. For the show, the car park is re- amazing architectural installation at the imagined as a different type of communal Pipe Factory that called for participants to space: a public pool. This re-imagining add corrugated plastic pieces to the ever- of disused public infrastructure was both expanding work). an engaging fantasy and evoked the (mis- guided?) utopianism of modernist urban After the festival I’m left wondering: is planning. this what an art scene looks outside of art market pressure (to be fair, Wolfson’s show For someone not as familiar with the barely escaped the stifling hype-beast)? Glasgow art scene as the cool kids are, it Perhaps not for long, as after the success of was eye opening how much compelling work this year’s GI cultural tourists will probably was on show. I went armed with a map, a flock, with good reason, to Glasgow in 2016. notebook, and a bus pass and still wasn’t

John Bock Im AtomeiterzinsKonflikt mit einer EierstockCapitalSaint, 2001 Mini-Max-Version, 2014 Photo by Christian Saltas, Image Courtesy Collection Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall

One of John Bock’s headless figures is The exhibition ‘I’m Still Here’, is particular placed in the ceiling above the staircase in the sense that it is compiled solely leading down to Pipilotti Rist’s large from Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall’s installation Gravity Be My Friend, own collection.1 This privately run space 2007. The placement indicates a shift of – located in a 1930s warehouse in one of perspective as Rist invites the viewer to Stockholm’s free ports – was founded in experience her video installation projected 1987 and has collected works of art since, in the ceiling by taking off their shoes and often by letting the artists produce new lying down on an artificial island. The works in connection to an exhibition or installation creates a space to lose oneself in, through acquisitions. Today the collection forget about all the social constructions that contains around 800 artworks. Phillippe Murphy shape us, dare to let go and reflect on the Composition in Blue, Red, and Yellow (detail), 2014, Mixed Media Installation fact that it is all about you. Image Courtesy of the Artist Critical Reviews - International Critical Reviews - International C# 44 C# 45

is inviting us to is a strange and puzzling encounter and at the same time beautiful. If familiar with Immanuel Kant and his theory of Ideal Beauty one can clearly see the references made in this work. It is fascinating to watch the Pipilotti Rist man jump up and down and exposing his body var min vän (Gravity, Be My Friend), in different positions, resembling a moving 2007, Video Audio Installation, Music by Greek sculpture with explicit anatomy. Anders Guggisberg and Pipilotti Rist Photo by Johan Warden Image Courtesy of Collection Magasin 3 The theory of the ideal beauty of the body Stockholm Konsthall is an old construction of mankind; even so, these ideas are highly relevant today. As are questions around basic needs and what happens to us when the elements that construct our identity and existence in relation to other people are taken away. These questions echo in the video installation Flock, where a group In ‘I’m Still Here’, the curators Richard Julin in terms of the architectural layout of the of people with their belongings gathered in and Tessa Praun have decided on showing rooms, as well as the hanging of the actual something that looks like a worn down parking works of twenty artists – both Swedish and works. As a viewer, one encounters the works lot. They just sit there, passive and mentally international – with varied practices, some on a sensible level, however in different isolated from each other, without anywhere shown before but most of them exhibited ways. Lars Nilsson’s The Triumph of Style, Lars Nilsson to go. They have been stripped bare of what The Triumph of Style, 1998 for the first time. The media represented in 1998, exposes the viewer to strong light and they once were and struggle with how to Photo by Christian Saltas, Image Courtesy of the show is also evidence of the broad range heat from a chandelier; it is impossible to Collection Magasin 3 Stockholm Konsthall identify themselves. It reminds me of Maslow’s of works in the collection as it consists of neglect the impact it has on one’s immediate Hierarchy of Needs, where we have to fulfil installations, videos, photography, sculptures encounter with the room and the other parts the basic need before successfully reaching the and works on paper. of Nilsson’s installation. In a narrow corridor There are many intriguing conversations higher ones, however if something changes – partially claustrophobic – a part of Bock’s between the artworks in this exhibition. within our environment we will fall back down Overall the mix of media is well balanced, work Im AtomeiterzinsKonflikt mit einer The exhibition questions what it is to again and have to start all over. Reflecting on however some works like Laurie Simmons and EierstockCapitalSaint, 2001, is presented by be human, dealt with through works these two works as well as the rest of the show, Allan McCollum’s Actual Photographs, 1985 misshaped headless figures in various textiles that examine identity, memories, social one realises how fragile we are as humans to and Tom Friedman’s I’m Not Myself, 2009, pushing themselves off the wall into the construction and hierarchies. Especially external influences. Even so, we often choose an inkjet print on paper, end up being slightly viewers’ space.2 The space on the other side is strong is the one carried out between Sam not to ponder upon it. forgotten in the crowd of three dimensional occupied by anonymous figures in black coats Taylor-Johnson’s Brontosaurus, 1995 and ------works and sound-spilling videos. This is a and tilted desk lamps indicating a head and Aernout Mik’s Flock, 2002. These two 1 The exhibiton includes works by Santiago Sierra, challenge the curators have to face when forward motion. They resemble contemporary works reflect on our cultural traditions Lars Nilsson, Christian Boltanski, Sofia Hultén, assembling works that are expressive and versions of Alberto Giacometti’s walking and ideals as well as basic needs. John Bock, Sam Taylor-Johnson (before Sam ground-taking with more quiet contemplative bronze figures. However, Christian Boltanski’s Brontosaurus is a video of a naked man Taylor-Wood), Tom Friedman, Moonspoon Saloon, Aernout Mik, Lara Schnitger, David Hammons, works. figures in Être et Avoir, 2008, will present dancing in his bedroom. When performed, Andrea Zittel, Erik Aalto, Geraldine Swayne, Oscar you with a statement about themselves – ‘I the man listens to upbeat techno; when Guermouche, Laurie Simmons & Allan McCollum While experiencing the exhibition, one have beautiful memories’ – but yet remain displayed, the motions have been slowed and Pipilotti Rist. realises that a large amount of thought undistinguishable as the information is down and applied with classical music. 2 The exhibited work is a part of the original work, a has been given to the curation of the show, general and could apply to anyone. This private moment that Taylor-Johnson Mini-Max-Version, 2014. Critical Reviews - International Critical Reviews - International C# 46 C# 47

Harun Farocki Serious Games

Hamburger Bahnhof - Museum Für Gegenwart, Berlin 6 February – 13 July 2014 by MADELEINE NORTON

Harun Farocki Ernste Spiele I: Watson ist hin, 2010, Videostill © Harun Farocki 2010

Immersion). Through this juxtaposition themes such as the cinema, technology, we are shown the poorer quality of the transparency and the media (to name a few). technology used to help veterans, as in these Through his meticulous editing and the way games the objects have no shadows. in which the films are installed, he creates a cinematic environment that centers on Born in 1944, Farocki has had an expansive the technologies of imaging and vision. artistic production, which over the course Cinema plays a huge role as our culture’s Harun Farocki Ernste Spiele I: Watson ist hin, 2010, Videostill of an almost fifty year career has produced prime story-telling medium and Farocki’s © Harun Farocki 2010 over eighty films.2 He is often considered obsessive focus with cinema allows him to to produce ‘critical cinema’ which focuses signal transformations in society in our ways Serious Games, on show at the 2009, depicts an American war veteran on the manipulation of the image, its uses of seeing and imaging.3 Nationalgalerie in Berlin (6 February – 12 undergoing psychological exposure therapy and abilities to exert control and the often July 2014), is a four-part video installation by recounting a traumatic experience whilst multiple and wide ranges of implications The use of technology both in society and in by German artist Harun Farocki. It wearing a virtual-reality headset, which that viewers can draw from his films. We the production of his works, is proliferate focuses on the use of video games and shows images controlled by a therapist on can see these wide and varied implications throughout Farocki’s practice. In Serious virtual realities in US military training a computer screen next to him. However in Serious Games. The range of reactions Games he uses the paradox that the same and rehabilitation. Serious Games I: at the end of the film we discover that to this installation are vast and often technology used to train soldiers for battle is Watson is Down, 2010, shows young this ‘therapy session’ was a marketing immediate perceptions can be shallow, now being used to treat their post-traumatic military recruits on large computer screens, demonstration for the United States Air such as believing the work is purely about stress. In other works, such as Eye/Machine practicing combat in a desert-like virtual Force psychologists and the war veteran violence or over-consumption of video III, 2003, and War at a Distance, 2003, reality. Serious Games II: Three Dead, in the film was just an actor.1 Finally, games or a comment upon the US military Farocki also makes reference to the use 2010, shows footage filmed during a ‘real’ Serious Games IV: A Sun With No Shadow, involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan. of relatively ‘new’ technology, however he military exercise conducted in a built set 2010, compares the technology used to However Farocki’s installation goes far hints that this technology has a history and in California, with scenery resembling prepare soldiers for war (that shown in beyond singular thematic agendas. He may reflect a psychological and economic that of a movie set. The third film in the Watson is Down) and the program used manages to weave together an intricate condition that has been forming for quite series, Serious Games III: Immersion, to help rehabilitate veterans (as shown in range of materials, touching upon broader some time. As Marcus Civin in ‘Visibility Critical Reviews - International Critical Reviews - International C# 48 C# 49

Fake and Loathing in Shanghai

Long Museum, West Bund, Shanghai 29 March — 31 August 2014 Harun Farocki Ernste Spiele II: Drei tot, 2010. Videostill. by YINGQING FU © Harun Farocki 2010

The recent exhibition of an 11th-century prove its authenticity. And this is what calligraphy work at the Long Museum West everyone will see today in the Long Museum Bund in Shanghai demonstrated just how West Bund in Shanghai. However, one has reverse psychology works. Preoccupied by to wonder if the need for approval in this Machines: Harun Farocki and Trevor Paglen’ Farocki doesn’t attempt to impress upon his controversy over authenticity, the show only case has cost the institution its credibility? (Afterimage [2013]: 22) mentions, Farocki’s audience a singular position on violence, war, led visitors to more questions. portrayal of this technology suggests ‘the way use of video game technology or politics but The Long Museum West Bund covers over that we are going, we have been going for rather convey a multitude of perceptions and Imagine this scenario: your current net 33,000 square meters. The newly opened some time.’ 4 misperceptions. The topic of war (although worth is £535 million. You manage to open facility sits on a long-ago deserted coal a favourite of his) is merely a vehicle by two massive private museums to stage transport site by the upper Huangpu River Each film in Serious Games has multiple which he allows us to see how our collective artworks you acquired in the past 20 years. bank. It is the second location to showcase layers for the viewer to explore, such as imaginations are constantly being shaped But now you have a problem, the artwork the enormous art collection that belongs to Farocki’s subtle mix of real footage he has and reshaped by technologies of imaging and you recently purchased for £4.9 million from China’s super collector couple Liu Yiqian shot for the purpose of the film with archival vision.7 a renowned international auction house was and his wife Wang Wei. The pair became the footage found elsewhere. He offers a far from publicly scrutinised for authenticity. From first collectors from Mainland China to be transparent view and invites skepticism about ------multiple academic reports, your country’s included in the ARTnews 200 Top Collectors the representation of reality in general.5 He best scholars claim the piece is a fake. What list of most active art buyers in 2012. The 1 Henriette Huldisch, Some Games Are More questions the degree to which our world Serious Than Others, Exhibition Guide: Harun would you do? couple lived a typical Chinese dream. Both is formed by recording and image-making Farocki. Serious Games, 2014. came from humble working-class families, machinery and encourages us to realize that 2 Antje Ehmann and Kodwo Eshun, Harun For the 50-year-old Shanghai investment and they made a fortune in the stock our minds organize incoming information into Farocki Against What? Against Whom? tycoon Liu Yiqian, this is now his reality. exchange, real estate and insurance sectors. Cinéaste, Vol. 36, No. 1, 2010, p.75. images and narratives that may or may not be Most of us could not bear such constant After more than two decades of collecting, 3 true.6 This can be quite literally seen through Hal Foster, The Cinema of Harun Farocki, bombardment. But surely Liu is not like they opened their first museum in Shanghai Artforum, 2004, p.157. both the soldiers training through virtual most of us. Starting as a street trader of Pudong in 2012. 4 Marcus Civin, Visibility Machines: Harun screens or the ‘therapy’ session of the veteran. Farocki and Trevor Paglen, Afterimage, 2013, handbags in the late 1970s, Liu was making This skepticism or lack of transparency can p.22. more than 10,000 yuan when the average By local standards, the second venue is also be applied to the media’s role in the 5 Ken Johnson, Unfiltered Images, Turning annual income in Shanghai was barely 300 in the middle of nowhere, as the closest documentation and representation of war Perceptions Upside Down, New York Times, yuan. It seems nothing can force him to subway station is almost a half-hour walk. 2011, p.24. to society. Through Farocki’s purposeful capitulate. The billionaire and art collector Only a handful of taxi drivers in town 6 deception in Serious Games III: Immersion, Johnson, Unfiltered Images, p.24. made a bold move to present the artwork could honestly tell you they have heard of the viewer is encouraged to also question what 7 Henriette Huldisch, Some Games Are More in the nation’s biggest private museum, his the street name: Longteng Avenue (The Serious Than Others, Exhibition Guide: Harun the media represent to us as real and consider museum, naturally. Then he built an entire Soaring Dragon Avenue). After a long walk Farocki. Serious Games, 2014. the element of spectatorship in war. exhibiting space packed with evidence to under the scorching sun, the Long Museum Critical Reviews - International Critical Reviews - International C# 50 C# 51

unveiled itself in front of me as one gigantic Soon after Liu purchased the work Most recently, Yang Danxia, a scholar of concrete white block. It’s stunning, yet from Sotheby’s New York in late 2013, Chinese paintings and calligraphy from the unapproachable. local scholars raised questions about Palace Museum in Beijing, stated that the its authenticity. Zhong Yinlan and Ling calligraphy is ‘clearly a fake and anyone with Two months after its grand opening, the Lizhong, both from the Shanghai Museum, little knowledge on Chinese calligraphy could foul odor of fresh paint still lingers in the argued the scroll was traced, based on tell’. Yang also mentioned that Liu once air. Inside the facility, the ground floor similarities between the auctioned work confessed over the phone that he has crossed looked like a much enlarged interior of an and some known problematic items in the the Rubicon as the Shanghai government had interstellar spaceship. The metallic colour collection of the Shanghai Museum. Shan generously offered to pay for the 23% import tone darkens the mood. Works by much- Guolin, head of the Shanghai Museum tax for the artwork. celebrated modern contemporary artists painting department, considered the scroll’s such as Xu Bing, Gu Wenda and Chen Yifei, brush strokes unnatural. Certainly, it was no charity work from the spread out on vast curved concrete walls. city government. Shanghai has developed All of these issues were carefully defended a five-year plan to become China’s cultural The lower ground level is dedicated to in the exhibition. The evidence started with capital by driving massive development in ancient Chinese works of art. There, a single newspapers and journal articles supporting both public and privately owned museums. In wing is singled out to exhibit the 900-year- the item’s provenance. They seem to an interview with the Financial Times, Wang old artwork. Crowds reportedly have packed indicate Xu Bangda, the maestro of Chinese Wei, Liu’s wife, admitted that they received the space to see it on display: a calligraphy calligraphy and painting of the 20th century, a deal on land cost from the local authorities work titled Farewell to Gongfu with just once authenticated the Farewell to Gongfu for their West Bund establishment, on the nine characters allegedly by the hand of the in a written letter. More evidence showed condition that they turn it into a cultural politician-poet Su Shi from the 11th century. numerous blown-up comparison pictures project. Now the skeletons are coming out of The prolific Chinese poet was the equivalent between authentic and fraudulent Su Shi the closet. to a European Renaissance master. brush strokes. Other support came from analysis of the seals and paper. Everything Ultimately, the special exhibition of Farewell The scroll is merely thirty centimeters in looks meticulously done on the surface. The to Gongfu made the Shanghai government a height. It’s mounted with a later calligraphy sheer amount of information had a shock laughing stock. The grand scheme of the city’s reproduction and two other commentaries and awe effect. I was simply lost in the sea of culture transformation received a big blow. It dated to the 19th century. I was surprised to texts. is unfortunate for Liu Yiqian as he has become see how small the actual work is compared the scapegoat in this much-publicised dispute. to the huge space it was given in the However, the Sotheby’s original catalog But we have to ask ourselves, without proper museum. In fact, the rest of the space is jam- entry was nowhere to be found in the regulations, as Shanghai’s culture expansion packed with journals, newspaper articles, exhibition. Earlier on, the auction house frenzy continues, who will be the next fall digitally enlarged texts and photographs, had published a fourteen-page document guy? all presented to prove this tiny piece of to authenticate the calligraphy work as by calligraphy is genuinely by Su Shi. Never Su Shi. The lack of Sotheby’s presence in before have I seen a museum so obsessed the exhibition is bewildering. Reports and with the authenticity of one single artwork. visual elements from the Shanghai Museum Forgery is common in the Chinese art world, are also missing. For whatever reasons, the but rarely leads to such fierce disputes. And curator only chose to show one side of the for the first time in China, an open debate argument. It’s such a colossal mistake. The took place between public and private public is forced to ponder why the counter- museums. arguments are left out. Critical Reviews - International Critical Reviews - International C# 52 C# 53

mirrors. Her mirrored image tells us that she is Overall, Ehlers’ seems to speak to the body and Jeannette Ehlers present but her corporeal body is invisible. This how it was both imaged and erased through Say It Loud! indirect embodiment of the ‘present but unseen’ power structures enacted by the transatlantic legacy of the colonial trade is dramatized by trade. The legacy of such structure has yielded her dancing figure. She also complicates the peoples in these post-colonial nations that are Nikolaj Kunsthal, Copenhagen narrative of how a black body would have at once inside and outside of their own bodies. 15 March – 31 July 2014 performed in such a space during the height of Ehlers proposes a quite poetically rendered by TAYLOR JAYNE LeMELLE its use in colonial times. Work and servitude are synthesis between the body and a collective replaced with enjoyment and reverie. self-image in Black Bullets, 2012, but also shows how this rupture might still be extremely The cinema-sized installation, Waves, 2009, fraught. The inside/outside tension is addressed is a close up, solarized depiction of waves by works like Bustin’ My Knots, 2011, in which crashing onto a shore. Upon adjusting to the an unseen narrator delivers a cringe-inducing disquieting scale, the viewer might realize that explanation of how, and why, she has assured the waves themselves are actually quite small that her unborn daughter will have ‘good hair’, (perhaps that last bit of ocean that dribbles and escalated to a confrontational reckoning in towards the interior of the beach during high Whip it Good, 2013-4. tide), but blown up they seem treacherous, monumental, and strange. The sound, which is Laced with Black American historical and thunderous and fills the entire space, pervades cultural references (for example, the title of the entire space and even leaks into the the show nods both to James Brown and the headphones through which exhibition-goers American Black Power movement), Ehlers Jeannette Ehlers listen to the other videos. Like Three Steps of demonstrates an engagement that reminds us Black Bullets, 2012, Still Image from HD Video, 4:33 Story, this work communicates what is not that the triangle trade and its reverberations, Image Courtesy of the Artist depicted: the cargo (human and otherwise) which are still being digested, are not solely an that was exchanged at the shorelines of several African-American and Black-British history. Denmark might not be a country that Presented on the ground floor of Nikolaj continents. figures prominently in the historicization Kunsthal, the church hall turned gallery of the colonial slave trade between Africa, space is completely dark save the flicker of Europe, and the West Indies. Additionally, eleven video projections of various sizes. in the context of contemporary academic Ehlers often depicts anonymous figures but engagement with postcolonial theory by the sometimes uses her own body in the works. ‘African Diaspora,’ the Black-Danish voice In this exhibition, as is consistent with her has not been as far reaching as compared to artistic practice, she highlights the political Harvard University’s WEB DuBois Institute charges embedded in the natural and built or University of Birmingham’s Centre for environments in Africa and the Caribbean. Cultural Studies. However, in her newest sound-flooded exhibition, ‘Say it Loud!’, In Three Steps of Story, 2009, Ehlers’ deftly Jeanette Ehlers explores implications edited video depicts the artist dancing related to the legacy of colonial global slave along to a Waltz, gliding about a colonial trade, amplifying its historical relevance for government house in St. Croix. Her body can Danish citizens. only be seen in absentia, through reflections as she dances past the house’s many Jeannette EhIers Installation View, Say it Loud! Image Courtesy of Nikolaj Kunsthal, Photo by Lea Nelson Critical Reviews - International Critical Reviews - International C# 54 C# 55

contemporary still life. Still life paintings Get the Bloom are a close reproduction of the flowers and fruits; the photography is a replica of the Shoot the Lobster Gallery, Luxembourg actual flower and vegetables. The perfection of the details in photography is an evolution 2 June – 26 July 2014 of the man made replica in painting. They are by Melanıe de JAMBLINNE faithful to the reality and all details are on the photographs.

The artist’s work echoes with each other’s. Get the Bloom groups the works of six nature that was and will always be there. Hansen work echoes Gonzato’s work in the artists: Paolo Gonzato, Maurizio Anzeri, Along with Hansen’s works, Dan Colen and common material they use (wood). Then Nate Lowman, Dan Colen, Elias Hansen Nate Lowman’s collaboration relates to the Gonzato’s photographs relate to Hopton’s and Georgie Hopton. It is the fourth show idea of evolution and moreover the idea of interest in nature and flowers. In term of at Shoot the Lobster, the newest gallery in infinity. Their work consists of two large evolution, Anzeri’s stitching on photographs Luxembourg, opened by Guillaume Smets photographs of a lighter shown next to each answers the idea of perpetual evolution and at the end of last year. José Martos, New other. The idea around this work is infinity: the idea of infinity of Colen and Lowman’s York based gallery owner and partner of the lighter on the photographs was initially collaboration. Smets, came up with ‘Shoot the Lobster’ to created as advertisement material. By promote his emerging artists. It’s a pop- photographing this lighter it gives it a ‘new In showing these artists together Guillaume up gallery that holds show in various cities existence’ and so perpetuates the existence Smets managed to highlight each artists keys around the world; only the Luxembourg of the lighter. Colen and Lowman’s hope ideas and focuses. Indeed walking to the based gallery is permanent. This show was is that someday the photographs could be show and viewing the works together raises born from a collaboration with the A Palazzo used as something else such as postcards some questions on nature, evolution and the gallery in Brescia, Italy. It is curated around and so the lighter would continue to exist effect of the human intervention that might a few themes: nature, evolution and the indefinitely. not be so obvious if the works were shown intervention of man and his knowledge on separately. natural elements. Maurizio Anzeri’s works deal directly with the concept of evolution. In fact, he explores Elias Hansen’s works are probably the the possibilities of the human evolution. central pieces of the show. In his work I In order to do so he uses vintage prints he can’t put my finger on it, he focuses his finds here and there and sews directly on attention on glass manufacturing and them. He sews geometrical shapes on faces, different techniques used for centuries. in this case the eye. The geometrical shapes In Italy, different families developed give the impression that the person becomes and transmitted their knowledge of glass a robot. The contrast between the vintage blowing from a generation another. He print and the robotic highlight the idea of learned to blow glass and is interested evolution. It widens the gap between ‘old’ in the fact that some of the techniques and ‘new’. will die along with the families. His work is a combination of glass and wood that Georgie Hopton photographs vegetables symbolise on one hand the manmade object and flower that she cultivates. They (the glass) that will survive the man and the resemble still life painting and in a way are Critical Reviews - International Critical Reviews - International C# 56 C# 57

An Exhibition in No Man’s Land C.P. Lin Collection of Ming and Qing Chinese Arts

Hong Kong Museum of Art, Hong Kong 3 May – 28 September 2014 by GABRIEL CHIN

On a scorching summer’s day in the month in under-glaze cobalt blue and iron red. The Pair of Square Bowls with of May, every art fanatic on the island has six-character reign mark underneath dates Phoenixes and Cranes Design Jiajing Mark and Period, 1522-1566 flocked to the Convention and Exhibition to the late Kangxi and early Yongzheng Teapot with Stylised Dragons Design and Falangcai Enamels Jingdezhen Ware, Porcelain Qianlong Mark and Period, 1736-1795 Centre (HKCEC), where the second year of (1722-1735) period. The character qing was with Overglaze Green and Yellow Decoration Jingdezhen Ware, Porcelain with Coloured Enamels Art Basel Hong Kong took place. Yet on this uniquely written so that the right bottom H. 9.5 cm, D. 19.8 cm H. 13 cm, D. 18.7 cm TTYCP, 203 Image Courtesy of C.P. Lin Collection, TTYCP, 203 occasion, a hidden vault filled with treasures radical yue became dan. The wall text Image Courtesy of C.P. Lin Collection from dynastic China is waiting to be explains that in those days, potters were discovered. To get there, board a seaborne largely illiterate and the task of writing vessel from Wan Chai or Central harbour, fell to the hands of a few people. The same cross the treacherous waters to Tsim stylised writing on porcelain bowls from on yellow ground is an example of Emperor layer of transparent glaze and firing at high Sha Tsui, fending off waves of onrushing across two periods indicates that the same Jiajing’s Daoist ritual bowls invented in this temperature. Finally, the glaze was enamelled commuters while traversing to the Hong craftsman had served two emperors. period. Because the square bowls could not with red, yellow, green and purple pigments Kong Museum of Art (HKMA), host of be thrown on a potter’s wheel, the shaping and fired again at low temperature. In other the C.P. Lin Collection of Ming and Qing Meet Raymond Tang, a 40-year-old, process was rather complicated as it either words, it is a porcelain decoration technique Chinese Arts, 3 May to 28 September 2014. slenderly built, baby-faced curator who on involved attaching four slabs of clay together that involves underglaze and overglaze this occasion, doubled as our tour guide. or moulding the clay from bottom to top. It colours. Technically speaking, to translate The exhibition is not organised Raymond has a good sense of humour. is not surprising that when Emperor Jiajing doucai as ‘fighting’ or ‘contrasting’ colours is chronologically. Instead, the themes are His aim for the exhibition is to educate art did not achieve immortality after all, the inappropriate. The correct translation should divided into six categories, namely the history in an informal way, because not production of square bowls gradually stopped. be ‘fitted colours’ or ‘joined colours’, as beauty of hues, the beauty of painting, the everyone is interested in art and history. pointed out in the exhibition catalogue. In my beauty of form, the beauty of materials and While painstakingly trying not to bore every On top of that, we also see Raymond’s effort opinion, a more proper translation would be the beauty of craftsmanship. The first object visitor to death, he has curated a show in trying to balance art history with practical enamels on blue outlines. you would encounter has nothing to do with engrossing tales to tell. For instance, information. This is evident in the way with Ming (1368-1644) or Qing (1644-1912) after an assassination attempt on Emperor several objects were curated, for example, Finally, the curator made sure to point out dynasties. In fact, it is a Yuan dynasty (1271- Jiajing (1521-1567) of late-Ming Dynasty, Chenghua doucai bowls. The innovation that the major aspect of the exhibition is 1368) white-glazed bodhisattva sculpture. the emperor began fantasising immortality of doucai was regarded as an important comparison. ‘While Emperor Yongzheng It is there simply because it is a captivating and spent lavishly on religious shrines and development in the Chenghua (1465-1487) (1723-1735) was upright and honourable, as piece of sculpture to begin with. The second porcelain wares with Daoist occult themes to period of mid-Ming Dynasty. The term doucai deliberately shown in the vertical manner object you should notice is a Qing dynasty be used in ritual worships, in hopes that he was, however, coined in the Qing Dynasty. his dragons were painted, Emperor Qianlong (1644-1912), Kangxi (1661-1722) period would become immortal. The pair of square The technique involved painting outlines on (1735-1796) was prodigal and indulged a bowl decorated with dragons amid clouds bowls with green phoenixes and cranes the porcelain body in blue, then applying a temptation to show his extravagance’, he Critical Reviews - International Museums & Private Collections C# 58 C# 59

explained while pointing at a Qianlong-period successful businessman turned collector. He teapot decorated with stylised dragons and established the illustrious C. P. Lin Collection, Boros Collection & Hoffman Collection, Berlin pink enamels. of which the imperial porcelains are the by MORAG WALSH BARNES most prestigious. In 1992, the Percival David Everybody loves Raymond. The most Foundation of Chinese Art, a distinguished humorous yet practical piece of information British collection of Chinese ceramics, invited he delivered was at the end of our session. Mr Lin to co-organise the exhibition Elegant One classmate asked, “Why doesn’t the Form and Harmonious Decoration: Four What used to be a dusty waterfront, expended in converting the structure, few museum exhibit local art?” Raymond cheekily Dynasties of Jingdezhen Porcelain. It was a as though the building required extra concessions have been made to the genre of answered, ‘This is Hong Kong Museum of Art, great honour for any Chinese art collector on fortification, a large solitary boulder stands the conventional art space. These are only not Museum of Hong Kong Art’. Arts of China the British colony. blocking one of the doorways to one of the traceable in the ascetic and sparsely applied had a great time. most prestigious private art collections in whitewash, the industrial strip lighting Located in the vicinity of HKMA is the Hong the world. Entering through the adjacent and the removal of a few internal walls, There are aspects I love and dislike about Kong Cultural Centre, which houses the city’s metal door, beautiful driftwood sculptures slightly alleviating the pervading sense of the exhibition. The great merit is loads Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Hong Kong immediately block our path. In forcing us to claustrophobia. In this raw, artificially lit of taxpayers’ money have been spent on Space Museum. Developed in the 1980s, step over them, they reinforce the sentiment, space the weight of history is everywhere: decoration and lighting. For instance, they the area currently serves as the central arts that a visit will be not only interesting but from the crude wall signs in Cyrillic script, fitted an octagonal cabinet onto the wall just and cultural hub of Hong Kong. Exhibiting almost certainly challenging. to the drains and broken tiles that pockmark to house several curio objects made of jade. the C.P. Lin Collection and the Xubaizhai the floor. Degraded black paint tells of the The wooden-tone cabinets are undeniably Collection of Chinese Paintings at HKMA is The art collection of advertising mogul period during which it earned the moniker charming. They enhance the exotic appeal of an acknowledgement to the achievements Christian Boros and his wife Karen is housed ‘the hardest club on earth’. the works of art. The display cases illuminate of local collectors as part of the city’s arts in a former Second World War bunker in the objects within from all corners, like artists and cultural heritage. With the completion Mitte, in the heart of Berlin. It was built on Whether evidenced by the glow-in-the- on the centre stage. Also, I find the narrative of West Kowloon Cultural District (WKCD) the instructions of Adolf Hitler in 1943 to dark paint once used in case of the frequent structure engaging. At the end of the day, and the much anticipated opening of the shelter passengers and staff from the nearby power cuts or the room dedicated to the I could appreciate the works of art because contemporary art museum, M+ in 2017, Friedrichstrasse railway station. Grand, lighting of candles to monitor oxygen supply I understood their historical significance. HKMA will soon be phased out as Hong imposing and adorned with architectural during its time as a nightclub, lack of light In other words, it is ‘why they were made’, Kong’s main art museum. At the time of details deriving from the Renaissance, it was is a constant preoccupation in the virtually not ‘how they were made’ that interests me writing this article, there are talks to build envisaged to become part of his new world windowless space. By contrast Boros, for and, presumably, most museum goers. What larger multi-purpose performance facilities capital, Germania. Unmissable from every whom the bunker represents a type of I do not like is the name of the exhibition at WKCD. In the future, the city’s primary angle, this is architecture that speaks of basement like a modern day chateau owner, which seems to gear towards ‘exemplifying art scene will gradually shift towards West power. has a weekend home in the sleek, glassy, various aspects of the collector’s exceptional Kowloon, far away from HKMA. In this case, modern penthouse at the top of the building. taste’. Nonetheless, because the exhibition what does the future hold for HKMA, the jolly With the demise in the forces that created Architecturally incongruent, perched at a consists of objects entirely borrowed from the good fellow who works in it, and the city’s art it, the bunker transformed from a place of vertiginous height, and all but impossible collector, it is the curator’s way of showing his heritage contained within? Forgotten. protection to one of internment as a Soviet to view from street level, it is accessed by gratitude. prisoner of war camp and then subsequently a system of lifts and industrial metal stairs changed its use again into a warehouse for which look impenetrable. But who is this Mr C.P. Lin anyway? cold war ‘luxury goods’, such as tropical Distinctive economic circumstances in Hong fruits. Post 1989, in the early days of The contemporary art collected by Boros Kong gave rise to the merchant class in the reunification, it became a club, hosting since 1990 is monumental and nothing roaring Sixties and Seventies. Mr Lin is a fantasy, techno, and fetish parties. short of dazzling. From the seductive Despite the many years and sheer capital metallic works of Danh Võ, to the large- Museums & Private Collections Museums & Private Collections C# 60 C# 61

welcoming guests into her apartment at the 1975 and 1977 by Carolee Schneemann. The top of the building to view the works there. unconventional and even the humble are embraced, evidenced by the small carefully A Hans Hollein sofa encountered in an curated cabinet of Netsuke, some of great early room sets the tone. It is beautiful yet value, others less so. Longevity of passion homely objet d’art used by the family over and immersion in art are displayed for all to the years: a stain reveals the unmistakable see as Erika herself appears in photograph of trace of young children. These are not works a performance work, given in tradition as a preserved in climactically-controlled, pristine birthday present to her late husband. environments but works to be loved, enjoyed and cherished. The collectors, all originally outsiders to the city, bounded only by personal taste, are Mutaflor, a 1996 video work by Pipilotti Rist committed and passionate in their support is viewed in a den like space. Installed by of artists, both in the city and much further the artist herself, a white shag pile carpet is afield. Just as the story of Berlin is a tale of scattered with cushions based on Hoffman two cities, divided by the east and west, so family photographs. Contrastingly the the two collections are equally disparate and Boros Collection presented us with a very polarised, but the city is eminently richer for Hoffmann Collection Installation View 1997/98 with Felix Gonzalez-Torres Untitled (Arena), 1993, 20 Watt Light Bulbs, 60 different version of a family space, that of the both of them having been chosen to reside Lights Bulbs and Sockets on Approx. 18 meter Light String, Dimensions Variable; Untitled (for Parkett), Teenage Room, 2009, an installation by Klara there. 1994, Poster, Silkscreen on Impregnated Appleton Paper, 317,5 x 690,9 cm max., 30 Sheets Lidén, a stark, humorous, darkly beautiful, Image Courtesy of Sammlung Hoffmann, Berlin cacophonous work.

scale photographs by Thomas Ruff and street and entered through a quiet courtyard Through photographs it is possible to see the monumental arboreal sculpture of Ai the light suffused contemplative rooms how close relationships and friendships with Weiwei, this is a selection of trophies to shock could not provide a greater contrast to the artists have informed their collecting practice. and awe. On occasion already provocative cavernous spaces of the Boros Collection. Nowhere is this more evident that in the and disquieting, the art, when framed Shuffling over the wooden floors in oversized monumental work by Frank Stella hung in with the weight of history intrinsic in the slippers provides an entirely different viewing the private apartment, which unlike any other walls, is powerful and intoxicating. Here, experience. There is a sense of intimacy work remains permanently on display. as everywhere in Berlin, it is impossible to and tranquility, and the elegant space has escape the past. a museum-like quality to it. Although the Of course none of this is to say that work original architectural structures have similarly displayed in the Hoffman Collection can at In the same district, just a short distance been embraced and left visible, the building times be any less hard-edged, it is simply away in metropolitan terms, lies the Hoffman has a decidedly more comfortable feel. curated and contextualised in an entirely Collection, the private collection of Erika contrasting, much more personal way. Hoffman-Koenige and her late husband This is a collection which tells a story of a Rolf Hoffman. It is housed in a former, once marriage, family life and a love of art history: Political histories are expressed in the large derelict sewing-machine factory, a sandy art and life intertwined, and inseparable. scale and raw work by Adriana Varejão and coloured brick building characterised by Erika Hoffman-Koenige as collector and sole the beautiful yet potent work of Ernesto Neto. an abundance of windows. Situated in a curator enjoys presenting her works according Elsewhere seminal moments in art history are bohemian neighbourhood, set back from the to her ‘personal idiosyncratic tastes’, even exemplified by works such as Interior Scroll, Museums & Private Collections Museums & Private Collections C# 62 C# 63

The story of ancient Chinese art begins with The collection of carved jade objects favoured Peeling off that Gold Foil Reveals a Real pottery figurines and architecture dating from prehistoric to Han periods and contained Gem in Pudong, Shanghai Han (206 BC-220 AD) to Tang (618-907 AD) some exquisite period examples from the dynasties. Even if you are not knowledgeable Ming and Qing dynasties. Highlights include in Chinese art, you will be dazzled by the a nephrite jade humanoid figure from the Aurora Museum dramatic showcase of funerary figurines and Hongshan culture (4000-3100 BC). A by DONNA YUEN architectural models. For instance, a painted crouching figure with folded arms is rendered earthenware figure of a nursing mother in the round. Large almond-shaped eyes, on camelback stands under a spotlight. A a snout as nose, long rabbit-like ears and a procession of travelers on camels is displayed four-horned head form perfectly symmetrical at knee-height, animated by images of sand features to this humanoid. Fine criss- dunes projected from overhead. crossed details on the forehead and a narrow headband decorate these otherwise smooth In another showcase, a Ming dynasty (1368- and rounded surfaces. 1644) pottery model of a residential complex is displayed in conjunction with a video In the softly lit gallery set against a robin’s- projection on the wall that zooms in and egg background, the pale green nephrite deconstructs each architectural component jade exudes a warm glow that beckoned me of the compound. Aurora Museum’s use of to examine each jade piece. Another star multimedia creatively animates funerary piece is a Han dynasty burial jade. This objects like no other museums I have seen suit comprises 2,903 pieces of rectangular before. The Musée Guimet in Paris is a close jade plaques, yellow-green in colour with comparison with a display of Tang pottery the exception of the areas demarcating the figures on horsebacks set in braces on walls, eyebrows and hair in brown jade. Red lining suggesting a snapshot of polo-players in and gold wire threads together the pieces action. However, the dim general lighting into an enclosed suit. Such elaborate and combined with black-coloured display cases extravagant burial suits have been found in A Parade of Blue and White Porcelain from 13th and 14th Century and strong spotlighting at Aurora elevates several Han tombs of kings and aristocrats, at the Aurora Museum in Pudong, Shanghai Photo by Donna Yuen on May 31, 2014 the objects to the status of opera singers on a one of which is Liu Sheng’s tomb in centre stage. Mancheng, Hebei province, now housed in the National Museum of China in Beijing. Private museums in China have been staircase to the six-storied Aurora Museum, If the first floor of the exhibit lures us in by mushrooming as the colloquial saying I anticipated tacky gallery space and dubious our visual sense, then the subsequent floors of As I follow the spiral staircase up the fourth goes, ‘like spring bamboo after the rain’. art objects beyond the guarded entrance. jade, blue-and-white ceramics and Buddhist floor, a parade of blue and white ceramics lies What should I expect from a skyscraper sculpture galleries certainly intrigue and in my direct sightline like a lit-up runway. that glitters in gold? Is this yet another A tall limestone chimera sculpture greeted challenge us intellectually. ‘How did they Large pieces of Yuan dynasty blue and white private museum that manifests the ego of me at the second floor entrance. The label make it?’ is the question that repeatedly came ceramics of different shapes and motifs stand a nouveau-riche? The Aurora Museum in accentuates that the beast was proudly to mind repeatedly as I ascended through the confidently on lighted pillars in encased glass. Pudong, Shanghai, is part of the glittering acquired from City of Buffalo’s Albright- upper floors. The minimalistic and serene I was awe-struck by the quantity, breadth gold sky-tower that serves as the head office Knox Museum through auction, in the effort setting also quiets the mind, giving space to and depth of the Yuan jars, plates and vessels of a furniture and communication solutions to repatriate Chinese antiques. This can be both ponder and wonder. showcased here. This collection of forty Yuan company by day, a giant billboard by night. interpreted as a good-will gesture from a blue and white ceramics is amongst the best As I ascended the opulent French-style Taiwanese businessman operating in China. Museums & Private Collections Museums & Private Collections C# 64 C# 65

in the world, surpassing those found in the Andō Tado designed the six-floor museum as Percival David Collection in London. The part of its social responsibility initiative to A Little More Culture, A Little Less Crime German-engineered glass case and the special share Chen’s collection with the public and Pérez Art Museum, Miami lighting allow you to walk around the object to advance academic research and study of and press very close to see all details (except Chinese antiquities. for the bottom!). by MARITZA MELANIA LACAYO The objects in the Aurora Museum are of I reckon my experience in this gallery to such superb condition across the board that standing on a Star Trek holo-deck, waiting I cannot help but ask if they were genuine to touch the ceramics as it materialises in objects. My biggest criticism is that there is front of me! As you wander through this floor, no provenance provided anywhere for any of you can see the evolution of blue and white these objects. We can only refer to mentions ceramics in form, technology and motif from of similar excavated objects in the audio Yuan, Ming to Qing dynasties (13th – 20th guide and published catalogue. Any trust you c.). A rare piece is a 40 cm-high oblate flask place in the authenticity of these objects will with painted dragon and phoenix underglaze have to come from your own expertise or on blue and four appliqué dragons crouching your trust in the reputation of the Museum on the shoulders. It incorporates the shape Director, Chang Lin-Sheng, formerly from of Central Asian metal flask, combined with the National Palace Museum in Taipei. Buddhist-inspired lotus scroll and Han Luckily, the mission of the museum is one Chinese motifs of double dragons chasing of study and research, so it is possible for pearl and male and female phoenixes. scholars to access the collection for hands-on Perez Art Museum, Miami examination. Coupled with the exceptionally- Image Courtesy of Perez Art Museum, Miami As for the question of ‘how do they make curated study room, each visitor can make up it?’ visitors can find their own answers in his own mind on the calibre of art objects seen What used to be a dusty waterfront all began with a series of high-rise luxury the research study room found on most here in Aurora. So beneath that golden façade construction site on one of Miami’s most condos in the late 90s and early 2000s. floors. Each room is devoted to the analysis of a nouveau-rich exterior lies a real gem expensive lots is now the home of the Pérez Although the prices were low and the of material, technology, tools, forms and waiting to be discovered and savoured. Art Museum Miami, or as the locals call it, buildings brand new, locals simply weren’t decorations of each medium. There is one on ‘PAMM.’ Renamed ‘Museum Park’ (with a interested. the study of jade (3rd floor), blue and white science museum underway), this area has ceramics (4th floor), stoneware and porcelain rapidly transformed itself into Miami’s new The opening of the Adrienne Arsht Center glazes and marks (5th floor) and Buddhist center of culture. With the Adrienne Arsht for the Performing Arts in 2006 came sculpture (6th floor). Each room has an Center for the Performing Arts just a few as a bit of a surprise. Located in central excellent layout of the analytical component minutes away, Downtown Miami has made a downtown and just a few minutes away and actual object samples for visitor to radical turn. from Miami’s waterfront Bicentennial compare. Park, people didn’t expect there to be many Downtown Miami was known for its crime visitors. Again, despite the fact that it cost The museum collection is owned by and low-income housing. The City of Miami millions of dollars to build, its location was Taiwanese tycoon Chen Yongtai of the was looking for ways to ‘clean up’ the questionable. Aurora Group, whose business had a humble downtown area, considering that a large The city of Miami was attempting to inject beginning as a time-stamp machine provider percentage of that land was waterfront, culture into parts of a city that were less in the 60s. In 2012, the Japanese architect and simply too expensive not to exploit. It than well-off, in the hopes of driving out Museums & Private Collections Profiles C# 66 C# 67

the residents and making way for new ones. countries. With the $40 million donation The Adrienne Arsht Center for Performing from Miami millionaire Jorge M. Pérez, the Ivan Seal – A Profile Arts was just the first step, but a crucial one. museum was able to finally relocate to a brand by GIULIA TURBIGLIO This development lead to more security in the new Herzog & de Meuron waterfront building area, and locals began to realize that if they in Miami’s now very trendy Downtown. invested in Downtown, they could get better prices, and the crime would have no choice There are many new residents in Miami who Ivan Seal’s studio in Berlin is an apartment ‘These starting points for the last few but to take itself somewhere else. never experienced the ‘old’ Downtown. Many inhabited by paintings at various stages of years have inevitably involved somehow visit the museum today and assume it has their lives. Blank canvases rest in a semi- memory or more specifically my memories. However, for Miami residents it is hard to always looked this way. PAMM’s very own dark, intimate space, while in the room I remember some one-thing-place-event remember a time when this area wasn’t what mission statement reminds local residents, just opposite, inundated by natural light, and then try and focus on one element from it is today. The Pérez Art Museum Miami, old and new, that one of their primary goals a painting on an easel, surrounded by a that recollection. This often is a single detail located just a stone’s throw away from the is to continue to improve the area: The new chaotic accumulation of dirty brushes and which then is used like a tool to carve out an American Airlines Arena, opened to the PAMM transforms Museum Park into a encrusted colours, struggles for its self- object into the pictorial plane.’ public in 2013, just a few years after the central destination on Miami’s cultural map, realization. It will then move next door, opening of the Center for the Performing Arts. promotes progressive arts education, builds joining other unfinished works. They will all The object/subject of the painting is thus Considering the positive impact this cultural community cohesiveness and contributes start a conversation of contamination: the the result of a series of abstractions: it center has had on the community and the substantially to downtown revitalization. sedimentation of this exchange may lead to takes form not from a tangible thing, but City of Miami, it seemed logical to continue to a solution, a final shaping, but also may not. from the memory of that thing, which is pursue the dream of having an internationally The museum has gained popularity among itself a re-elaboration. The artist himself renowned art museum. Miami residents very quickly. Although The Kreuzberg apartment Ivan Seal has defines memory as a ‘parasite’ fed by PAMM is not internationally recognised just chosen to give birth to and raise his accumulated and contrasting thoughts, PAMM has been around since the early 90s, yet, their collection sure seems to suggest that paintings in has a homely and intimate and itself originating an uncontrolled flow although it was then called the Miami Art it is trying to compete with the world’s famous feeling that in some sense questions of suggestions. The sculptural, ‘carved’ Museum. It was previously an exhibition modern art museums. To walk through its the possibility of a simple and complete appearance of Seal’s paintings hints at the space with no permanent collection, but various galleries is to encounter Ellsworth realization. There is no sign of that sense deceiving nature of memory which, even if it changed its focus in 1996 when they decided Kelly, Marcel Duchamp, Andy Warhol, Lygia of industrial production typical of spacious is seemingly embodied in a finished entity, to begin collecting international modern and Clark, Donald Judd, Joseph Albers, and open-plan artists’ studios; this is a place is actually based on open associations of contemporary art. many other modern masters. Although there inhabited by living things and memories, thoughts, on an unconscious perversion of are Latin American artists within PAMM’s and all the complexities arousing from the reality. This leap towards the irrational is to Miami’s primary focus as an artistic center collection, it is certainly not its main focus. dialogue between the two. To this regard, be found in the notion that the ‘original’ to had always been Latin American art. PAMM’s PAMM’s architecture has also made the physical, almost sculptural presence which the subject refers remains ultimately hopes of becoming a world renowned headlines. Herzog & de Meuron, the architect of the objects depicted becomes strikingly untraceable, lost in the overlapping of institution played a large part when it came duo responsible for Munich’s Allianz Arena contradictory when compared to the meanings. A knickknack or a dancing figure to the kind of art that they would collect. This and London’s Tate Modern, designed PAMM’s immanent sense of something undecided can be spotted in trosmeadmomnetcarteg meant that PAMM would not collect Latin current building. The glass façade allows that continuously reshapes itself under the sasi on tobe, 2014, a bunch of flowers in American art exclusively, but instead provide viewers to look out onto Biscayne Bay, from viewer’s gaze. This paradox finds its origin prototype to get out no 3, 2011, but both the Miami residents with an experience nearly any gallery within the museum. The in the conception of the works by the artist, are unresolved, ‘other’, not identifiable comparable to that of MoMA and Tate building’s white walls and wide rooms remind in that pivotal moment when the entrance notwithstanding their corporeality. Ivan Modern. us that we are in a museum setting but the into the picture plane, into the activity of Seal’s paintings become then the depiction windows remind us that we are, first and painting, takes place: of the failure of memory as a trustworthy The collection currently contains about 1300 foremost, in Miami. record of reality. works of varying media and from various Profiles Profiles C# 68 C# 69

chains of trustful reference and simplistic and creates sound pieces where the spoken interpretation. However, painting’s liberating word evolves randomly around a topic or a power – like in the RPGs’ (role-playing couple of terms. Inspired by the collaboration games) Seal used to play as a child – is between Merce Cunningham and John Cage strictly linked to its limitations as a medium, and by their study of chance, Seal exhibits to its rules: ‘I need the rules of figurative these sound works in an unpremeditated painting to create things which point conversation with his paintings: towards a meaning but are meaningless.’ This dichotomy between the freedom of ‘My sound works are so far made without the the open work characterized by a plurality paintings in mind and the paintings are not of possible meanings and the bounds of concerned with the sound works. But when artistic representation is tangible in Seal’s exhibited together, they both act parasitically paintings, particularly in the way the objects on each other. One subverts the other whilst depicted seem to explode the two-dimensional the other perverts the other and so on.’ surface of the canvas, the thick peaks of oil paint accumulating on top of the smooth The exhibition space – one of Seal’s last sound background. works was exhibited at RaebervonStenglin in 2013 - thus becomes a place of freedom, It is in works like gromop dancen, 2014, conceived as liberation from any attempt recently exhibited at Frieze New York, that the to retrace an original meaning. Personal self-referential aspect of Ivan Seal’s practice memories are confused and intertwined becomes more evident: the picture plane is within each other, letting the viewer choose repeated and consequently revealed in all whether to draw from his own personal Ivan Seal rosmeadmomnetcarteg sasi on tobe, 2014 its limits, while an uncanny object, familiar story or wander in between these multiple Oil on Canvas, 90 x 73 cm. but still unrecognizable, breaks this double references. ‘The function of the objects and Image Courtesy of the Artist surface, giving the impression of reshaping words is to create a space with which one can Photo by Adam Reich itself in front of one’s eyes. These objects use its features to generate meaning. Yet the carry, in fact, also a material memory: since space is always left as it was entered, without This failure mirrors another already from photographs but from that liquid and the artist never washes the brushes when meaning.’ widely acknowledged by contemporary ephemeral material that is personal memory, painting them they become the result of an art: the failure of painting. If the advent of a combination of past and present sensations extended reworking in which the starting photography played an important part in and images reaching towards an unknown point soon gets lost. Painting generates questioning the status of painting’s mimetic future. The deceiving and parasitical nature other painting in a never-ending stream of referentiality, it is also true that some artists of memory finds then perfect expression in consciousness that asserts its failure as a sign such as Luc Tuymans and Gerard Richter the flow of painting, in its repeated failure of freedom. used photographic images as source material in representation: ‘By using these failures as for their paintings in order to stress the material to work with, I find the paintings Ivan Seal’s interest in the concept of ‘open impossibility of trustworthy representation stop trying to represent and instead present.’ work’, as developed by Umberto Eco and in in the postmodern era. However, the position Roland Barthes’ theories about the death of of Ivan Seal as a painter seems to divert Failure seems here to overturn its traditional the author, is reflected strongly in his sound from those mentioned: the artist does not negative connotations and become a works. Here Seal uses cut-up techniques, draw inspiration from physical objects or synonym of escape and liberation from the random sentence generators or found texts, Profiles Profiles C# 70 C# 71

A Sit Down with Jemma Harrison by JOANNA HATTAB

On a warm Tuesday afternoon in June, I sat they work along side type. But I’m looking down with artist Jemma Harrison, who is to move away from working on a computer currently studying Graphic Arts and Design screen and start to work with illustration, so at The Leeds School of Art, Architecture I’d be creating these images by hand as well and Design. Jemma’s practice is presently as creating my own font. Its crazy how many exploring the realm of typography, which new skills I’ve needed to learn in order to she explains stresses the importance of the use these programmes. process behind a piece of work rather than the finished product. Typography originally JoH: Do you think technology and caught her attention as it provides fonts and working with an illustrator programme on lettering, such as Cambria, Ariel and the a computer is becoming more and more infamous Comic Sans a new life and enables popular in artists’ practices? words to generate images. Our discussion was focused around three of her most recent JeH: Yes, I definitely do. Technology is the works, of which originated from poetry, future, which I don’t necessarily think is a eavesdropping on conversations and her on good thing. going interest in architecture. JoH: Are you working on a particular Jemma Harrison Jemma Harrison Joanna Hattab: What kind of images have project at the moment? Re-imagined Rome, 2014 Our Conversations Are All So Boring Who Would Want to 59.4 x 42 cm Hear Them?, 2014 you created using these various fonts? Image Courtesy of the Artist 42 x 42 cm JeH: I’ve made works based on people’s Image Courtesy of the Artist Jemma Harrison: I began my exploration conversations that I overheard, whilst of typography with three poems and set out travelling around London. I got the idea to make three A3 posters. However, I knew by looking at one of Tomato’s publications building and then I screen-printed the image. bit clever as well. I might even take them into that I wanted to work outside the confines of called Skyscraper I Love You, which This work reminded me of very structural animation and have the streets, which are a sketchbook, so I chose to spell out words documents conversations and while I was grid like shapes, which gave me the idea of made up of type, moving around and flowing from these poems, which I found thought reading this book, it was as though the exploring maps. I recently created maps of in and out of one another. So it’s all a process, provoking, onto a wall of the building pages were having one hundred different Rome and New York, which are typographical, which, I guess, is the main idea behind next to my house in sticky tape and then conversations at once. When I was talking re-imaged maps, each with their unique key. conceptual art. Maybe it’s just the modern photographed them. I later uploaded the to my friend about this, she said to me ‘Our I’m thinking about expanding the series and way. photograph onto an illustrator programme conversations are all so boring, who would making maps of all different cities around the and screen-printed the image in various want to hear them?’ So I made a piece using world and I’m hoping to exhibit them in my JoH: So when you think about exhibiting colours. I also screen-printed it on to a piece this quotation and I even created by own upcoming exhibition on 30th August. So for your art, would you want to display the of wood because I think wood is a dense font for it. For the other pieces, I wrote example, the map of New York, every road material you used during the making of the material and I like my work to be made up down these conversations that I overheard is made up of type. For Manhattan, the type work in order to show the process behind it? of several layers. I’m really interested in around London onto Illustrator in various will be about Manhattan. I wanted them to playing with different materials and how fonts in order to make the shape of a be visual but if you read into them they are a JeH: I was thinking about this the other Profiles Profiles C# 72 C# 73

day. I don’t know if people would want to with deeper meanings. So clearly architecture see the materials I used in order to make the is a key theme that runs throughout my work. Saying YES and NO at the same time piece. Plus I want my work to be a mystery. Even back in the day when I was studying Interview with Christian Jankowski I want to encourage the viewers to work out GCSE art at sixteen I did an entire project the meaning of the work themselves. I don’t about buildings. I must be interested in by SORANA SERBAN want to feed them additional information. For structure and symmetry. Plus, people have me, my work is visual information that when always perceived my work as very structural. you peel back its layers reveals a clever state of mind. What I do think is clever about my JoH: Are you planning on sticking with this Christian Jankowski is not afraid of Christian Jankowski: The title is a huge maps is the key, where I include the font size, theme of architecture or is there another topic contradictions. Quite the opposite. Whether part of the project. It’s part of the artwork. colour, opacity and density. you’re hoping to explore? playing on tropes of the mass media or Sometimes I adapt titles or steal titles, dealing with the recent past, he explores but in relation to that I think about the JoH: Are you interested in or influenced by JeH: I’m currently looking into the idea conflicting feelings and ideas, wittily background of the Hamburg art school with any artists, who use this sort of computer of OCD because the work I’m doing at the overturning them. His childhood passion its certain ironic look and the influence of software? moment is very particular and quite obsessive. for archaeology has stayed with him, but in people like Franz Erhard Walter, who was For example with my maps, every small detail contrast to the seclusion of an archaeologist, very attentive to words, to play. [Sigmar] JeH: Tomato, who are a graphic design needed to be in a precise order. I think I’m Jankowski is deeply immersed into various Polke is another very good example, he was group, are my obsession at the moment. They going to stick with typography for these new social milieus, always interacting with also teaching there. So, it seems something do everything from graphic design to film. pieces, as well as go back to screen-printing people, some of whom take part in his related to a certain Hamburg attitude and Their work includes looking at architecture and photography. projects, becoming both subjects and a certain Hamburg feeling. And if you look and creating images of buildings through collaborators. at titles by [Martin] Kippenberger or Polke type, which to be honest, is where my initial JoH: Do you know what you’d like to be you understand why titles of shows or titles interest in typography came from. It’s really doing once you graduate? In Shame Box, 1992, one of his earliest of artworks play such an important part important to be knowledgeable about what works, people sat in a former shop window in reading the artwork. And I know some artists are influenced by and what they are JeH: I know I definitely want to continue – part of his then flat/studio in Hamburg of my works are happier with titles than working with. I always make sure I go to my work with graphic design. I’d quite like to – holding cards inscribed with things they others; but it’s always useful to spend time galleries on a regular basis and remain up have the experience of working in a graphic were ashamed of. A photo documenting that to think about the titles. Because even if to date with other practices. There is also a design firm, which produces work that has performance now hangs on a wall in his you think historically; Harald Szeeman group called Axis, who does similar work to been commissioned by other companies. Last studio, and seems to have become like an was great at finding titles for exhibitions, mine, but I only discovered them after I had summer I worked at ICO Design on Great icon for him. As he has momentarily moved although at the time there were quite similar made my maps and the French artist Armelle Portland Street and they had done all the back to Berlin and enjoys a sense of space shows, presenting the same artists, but Caron splits a map in half and disrupts it’s designs for Snog, the frozen yoghurt company. he was longing for in New York, Jankowski nobody came up with such a good title as precision and order. But I’d also love to continue producing my also re-engages with the cultural context When Atitudes Become Form. So there are own work and hopefully be represented by that informed his practice from the very different ways of getting your ideas across, JoH: Have you titled any of your work? a gallery. I want to keep pushing myself and beginning of his career: the playful approach making notice, and making a point in the growing as an artist. I’ve still got a lot to learn. to art and language of the Hamburg art title. JeH: I have a blog, which is www.jtahdesign. school. wordpress.com, so you can have a look SS: One of your most recent works, Heavy there! They are all titled but I didn’t really Sorana Serban: I noticed the poster of Weight History, 2013, deals with the issue think about the titles. I just named them your recent exhibition on a wall in your of art in public spaces. I think the Willy Skyscraper or Typography Skyscraper, but studio. The title – 25 Copies and an Brandt Monument is very interesting in maybe I will think about giving them titles anonymous Original – caught my attention. particular. Could you explain this project, How do you choose titles? this symbolic reconversion of history? Profiles Profiles C# 74 C# 75

CJ: I’m excited that of all these photographs experts who analysed the possibility of lifting you were drawn to Willy Brandt. I have the monuments, what it would mean, how to say that he was one of the inspirations would the public react, veterans...so this for this project. I was asked to do a survey whole mess of papers started. I also needed show at the Ujazdowski Castle, in Warsaw, approvals from the German Auswärtiges Amt but there was also a commission. I tried to [Federal Foreign Office] so that an art project find something that on one hand matches wouldn’t mess with German-Polish diplomatic my own history, gives the title to the whole relationships. Anyway, you see what kind of exhibition, but on the other hand represents resonance even before the performance, the a new artwork. It started as a trip to idea stimulated. Warsaw, dealing with the art in the city, its museums, monuments, architecture. I was SS: So how was it received in both countries, fascinated by the monuments of Warsaw maybe in relation to the mass media, as you because they refer to a very recent history, use the framework of a television show to also a very problematic history in the present the performance? relationship between Germany and Poland. Thinking about the dialogue between these CJ: I’m using the mass media format of the countries I found a performative act from sports show because there is no real mass the German Chancellor to kneel in front of media for monuments. So I used a very the Ghetto Uprising Heroes Monument. So familiar type of editing. For example, we also this performative gesture impressed me and needed slow motion because the monuments it immediately started me thinking about were only lifted for seconds, as in sports. forms of forgiveness, forms of dealing with In sports you have a moment that is very history. It also reminded me of my time important, that you put on repeat; that will be as a pupil, when in postwar Germany they shown a second time, the commentator goes spent many hours of history classes teaching over it and makes more comments. So it felt us this dark part, this Third Reich part of natural for me to document this performance German history in order not to repeat it. I in a similar way to sports events. But it wasn’t thought of looking at these monunuments produced by a real sports channel, it hasn’t from a new angle, and one thing is, if you been aired as a sports event on the Polish hold a monument up, if you take it from the sports news or German televison even though ground, you also create a new perspective on the commentator was a professional, and the it, which metaphorically is quite beautiful. sporstmen were also profis. But you asked So I imagined heavyweightlifters, strong about the reaction. So, in terms of media, the Polish men, lifting a monument of Willy print media jumped on it. The Spiegel put a Brandt, who was represented on his knees. large article about it online shortly after the This clicked in my mind and I thought about lifting of the second work, then an Austrian other monuments, which could be lifted. My television sent a team to come by, the Welt Christian Jankowski starting point was the Polish Association of Spiegel made interviews with the sportsmen The Artist in his Studio Heavyweightlifters, who were completely and I while we were filming in Poland. But I Image Courtesy of the Author thrilled by the idea. That gave me hope. Then also have to say I did not advertise this as a there were other people contacted: politicians, media event for people to come by and cover Profiles Profiles C# 76 C# 77

it. I wanted to keep it on a lower, respectful only depend on me. For example, the choice and controllable level. When you involve the of the sculptures in Heavy Weight History mass media some of the representation is out had to be talked over. There could have been of your hand and I was afraid that it might be some other sculptures as well, and there in some way unrespectful. I simply wanted to are different reasons why they couldn’t be control it in a way. I didn’t want the media to part of the project. So, now the ones that are mess with the situation, or the sporstmen, or there become part of the artwork. There are the audience. many details that are not completely upon me. But the core is performative. In this case SS: It seems you do a lot of research for [Heavy Weight History], if people had told your projects, interviewing people, involving me we should soften the ground around the professionals from other fields. It almost scultptures, that would have been doable, sounds like the work of an anthropologist. and would affect the look of the image, but How do you relate to that? it would be nothing that would harm the project. Or even the sports moderator, who CJ: Yes, I have an interest in history, plays a fundamental part in the videowork. anthropology. I could have been an archaeologist. It was my favourite profession SS: Did he have a script or were those his own as a child. I actually started to learn Latin, comments? Classical Greek, and realised my strength wasn’t learning languages, so at one point I CJ: They were his own comments. He had stopped and turned to other fields. For me been informed about the backgound of the it is anyway a natural interest. I read books sculptures, artists, historical context, but Christian Jankowski about history, because I think that looking he came fifteen minutes before we started Crying for the March of Humanity, 2012, Video, 26:02 min Image Courtesy of the Artist into the future also means looking into filming, just as if it were a real sports event. the past, and something related to it like He didn’t need to practise a day before. He digging into the ground and making sense of was very quick, and spontaneous. He’s a camera gets a certain situation during a soccer CJ: I think that I always look for moments the objects found. You uncover something, professional. For many of my projects I trust game, fans are annoyed, and even the referee that are conflicting. That you don’t know you learn, and something new might be professionals. Sometimes I do a project, and can’t see it again on camera. So he has to exactly how to take something, or for what created if you take it out of there. But I am think that a different person might have been choose whether it was a goal or not. So reality it stands. It’s almost like saying YES and also interested in the collaborative aspect, better. Who knows? It could take two years to appears to be like a mass media image. NO at the same time, when your ground is because in my performances there are never realise that he or she was the perfect person unclear. And I think that is the power of actors acting after a script. They are always in this position. But then you realise that you SS: And there will always be things left out. art. I think it’s good for an artwork to have individuals that take part in these projects out don’t want to control it so much. Because it multiple messages, to destabilize your own of their own motivations. can be beautiful that you pick just the right CJ: Exactly. position. Is it ironic, is it reactionary, is it person out of chance, it opens up the gate that just for the beauty of it? Who is it criticising? SS: So how does collaborative work influence can be surprisingly good for yourself. It’s the SS: In Crying for the March of Humanity, Is it criticising the system it talks about, is it the whole process? path you can take as an artist: whether you try 2012 you had telenovela actors performing criticising your expectations, your distance to control everything in your studio or not. My in an extreme way. When watching the video, from it or how you look down on mass CJ: I usually work on frames, on certain working attitude is more performative. And most people in the audience laugh although media, or because you might think there rules, almost like conceptual artwork that I after all reality is not perfect. If you see a live there is a lot of drama portrayed. Is it an is high and low art? I think these are all take as a guideline. But a lot of things do not show for a sports event, it can happen that no intentional effect? stimulating moments for me. With Crying for Profiles Profiles C# 78 C# 79

and use the auction house as an atelier, to CJ: For a long time my atelier was a shop create a performance. And then I got a very window in Hamburg. And I think that spontaneous thought that the auctioneer combination of presenting things in the is the main performer and that he should studio, in which I also lived, in which I auction his hammer. So...the initial idea was cooked, exhibited, produced...it was all one to sell the hammer. And since he started thing. And then I had another phase when my to take things off, like the hammer, such a studio was my suitcase. I was just travelling. fundamental item for the profession, what During my student times in Hamburg, I had would it be like to take off his clothes: jacket, to pay a certain amount for renting the space, shiny shoes, socks, and so on. I realised it’s I exhibited other artists that I admired, and a strip. So, let’s strip the auctioneer! And not like many other of my colleagues who that was the idea. And that’s a good example went for a year to be in Vienna, or to be going back to titles, Strip the Auctioneer another year in London, for studies, I always came after a few seconds and got stuck as a stayed in Hamburg. And then I started to formula. It was like a battle call. Then it was visit all the people that had visited me in great that Christie’s got on board with this Hamburg, so I went around sleeping in their project although the first reaction was no, do apartments. After that I relocated to Berlin, something else, and then suddenly an answer had an apartment, but I was still travelling a came that he might take his jacket off. This lot. Then, in the next phase I moved to New was the status of how it would have been had York, found a small studio space, which was Christian Jankowski I not travelled to Amsterdam. Because after also my living room. In the U.S. it was a very Strip the Auctioneer, 2009, Video, 25:24 min that reply, there were only a few days left international context, something I wasn’t Image Courtesy of the Artist before the auction, so I flew to Amsterdam, familiar with from Hamburg or Berlin. Now talked to them, and convinced them it was a Berlin is very international, but ten or fifteen good thing to do. I think that Arno Verkade years ago, it was not. In New York at some the March of Humanity I thought about the replace all parts of the existing telenovela with would have even gone further than he went, point I really missed space. It was great to melodrama genre. Because melodrama is so acts of crying. A dialogical way of crying. It is but his boss had drawn a line. It was good see, walk, meet a lot of people, but it was too present in cinema, in televison, and because a serial experience to watch it. anyway, it was a new line that it had been dense for me. Especially after travelling, being it tells stories about emotions, about people, before. Of course, in the final piece, to make it back in New York, I didn’t find concentration everybody also has opinions about it, and a SS: Another unfamiliar situation you placed an artwork, you start to manipulate a little bit because there was so much happening around way to read it. You think you can read it. You professionals in was Strip the Auctioneer, the reality of how something was, because you all the time. Sometimes you just need a bit think you know how to read it. Then I thought 2009. You staged this performance in perhaps are open to put information in and out of an of space and time to absorb everything. I how about making a meta-melodrama? the most commercial place of the artmarket. artwork. If you see it now, it isn’t mentioned came back because here is my culture, and I Not only the actors start to cry. This crying Performance started as anti-establishment, it was a charity auction, because that’s not came back because I was frequently travelling translates to the audience in the cinema. as anti-market. How did you manage this important for the piece. At the end of the day, to Berlin, so I realised I want to relocate to Doesn’t happen too often that people start to contradiction in Strip the Auctioneer? it’s still an auction, and we’re talking about a Berlin as it had become more inviting to work, cry in a gallery. Or to scream. I’ve never seen genre. live and travel from. people screaming in the gallery because an CJ: I am frequently asked to give art for artwork shocked them. It is a different genre, charity auctions. And I believe in the idea SS: You mentioned the studio space before. SS: I find it very interesting that for many but it is also fascinating because it relates of giving and taking. Giving is the start for a And here we are, in your studio, in Berlin. I years the studio was both your creative and to perfomance. It is an immediate reaction dialogue. So I thought why not try to create was wondering why did you choose Berlin. living space, but also a place to exhibit other I’m interested in. So, my proposal to the something right there, with the situation, artists’s works. And this seems connected to telenovela people was to constantly cry, and rather than offering an existing artwork, Profiles Features C# 80 C# 81

your practice...integrating life in art. I was have the chance to work in different prisons wondering if it still works for you like that, in Berlin. It’s not an easy task, and I’m still Baltimore’s Art Scene: as your living quarters are very close to the thinking on the concept. I just had one visit in Young, Transient and On The Rise studio space. a prison.

CJ: I mean, you see, the concept of this studio SS: How was it? by ANNIE JACKSON is of something in between. It’s a very liveable place. If you look at the projection wall over CJ: It was already an exceptional context. there, it has a double-function as a fireplace. There was something happening when I was I just believe in multifunctional spaces and there because they have a soccer team, and this is a reason why I like spaces that can be a they were playing with a team outside of the showroom, an atelier, a büro, a living space, a prison. And this was sponsored by a soda space to host a party all at the same time. company. And they had a filmmaker there, who told the players to pat the prisoners on SS: From mass media, to history, sponsorship the shoulder, and I thought that was a bit far and the art market – there are issues you’ve off. It probably was a nice thing, but even the been dealing with along your career, and field they chose was in a corner, because of which seem to reappear. What topics, debates filming reasons. It was already a very loaded are you interested in right now and maybe you experience. I met some very nice people, are considering to explore in new projects? including some prison employees in charge of cultural programmes. So, I’m still at the CJ: With some of the things I think I reached starting point. But I wasn’t really happy about a point where I did a lot of artworks about, how the camera was used there. such as the artworld, so now I’m looking into projects out of the artworld, and maybe also SS: Would that contradiction, the issue with catch up with earlier projects, such as the the company be a source for the project? Shame Box project, when people sat in a shop Nicole Dyer I Didn’t Think I Was Going Home Tonight (It’s Just You’re Really Pretty), 2012 window with cards expressing their shame. CJ: Could be. It’s a very powerful company. Acrylic, Oil, Pastel on Paper, 149.9 x 373.4 cm But that makes it even more interesting. Image Courtesy of the Artist SS: I actually noticed a photograph of that project here, on one of the studio walls. SS: One last question. What video did you screen in the 16mm Mystery? It takes place in the front seat of a car. The Didn’t Think I Was Going Home Tonight CJ: Yes, I almost use it as an icon, since it is viewer enters the painting through the (It’s Just You’re Really Pretty), 2012. It such an early work, from 1992. I mean, it is CJ: A...The secret of a happy marriage perspective of a girl in the passenger’s seat. evokes fear and excitement, while revealing part of a series. It’s a bit related to the little remains a secret (smiles). We can see her knees poking out of her the space between lack of control and total Decision Room – a recent work I have in short black dress with a pink flower pattern. control of one’s own lifestyle. Dyer puts all my studio, downstairs, and showed for the A cigarette lazily dangles from her right of this out there onto paper for people to Gallery Weekend. Where people stay in a very hand. The driver is looking at her, rubbing see. It is honest and personal, sweet and nice, fancy hotel, and the space is all cleared his hand on her bare thigh. His face is terrifying, which are characteristics found up. Then I asked them to furnish those rooms monstrous, with pink and green skin, razor in much of her work. Her paintings are in relation to their lives. It’s almost like their sharp teeth and glowing yellow eyes. This usually very large in scale and depict people portrait. And attach a price to it. Now I also is a work by painter Nicole Dyer entitled I and memories of her time in Baltimore: Features Features C# 82 C# 83

at parties, in the car, or eating pizza on the same for decades. Only recently has the Wednesday night, usually with bright and presence of an artistic community seemed sometimes sickly colours. to change the neighbourhoods’ economic standing and increase the surrounding When I look at Dyer’s paintings it reminds population. me of what it was like to live in this city. Baltimore may be small, but it is incredibly Typically the artists that live in Baltimore use complex. In a five minute drive you could the city as an incubator, a cocoon to grow, see a row of mansions with large freshly cut experiment and test out their ideas while they lawns leading up to the oversized brick houses go to school. Some people leave as soon as and then drive onto a road with abandoned they graduate; others stay for a few years. But boarded up row houses, with trash rolling there is not much of a market for art, if any at down the street and a blinking blue light all. There is some funding and an aim to grow on the corner signaling that the police are the artistic community through organizations watching this area. I have seen prostitutes such as Station North; the change is evident getting arrested, every car on a block getting but very slow. Even so, there are really its window smashed overnight, and a man interesting events that take place in Baltimore so down on his luck he lives in a wheel chair and help to grow the art scene. Every summer on the corner of Preston and Charles streets. Baltimore holds the nation’s largest public art With all of its weaknesses, Baltimore also festival, ARTSCAPE. The festival brings over has its fair share of strength. The city can thirty-five thousand people to an unbearably also be an incredibly positive and charming hot city for a few days in the summer. place. Baltimore is known for quirky things like big pink flamingos, beehive hairdos, and There are a lot of artists that choose to stay waitresses that call you ‘hon’. It is home to and work in Baltimore. However, it has a cult film director Jon Waters and supports a tendency to feel like a bubble, cut off from large community of artists. the rest of the art world. Many people move on to a new place to continue their careers The art scene in Baltimore is largely and art practices. This is the case with artist structured around the presence of one of Walker Seydell. After graduating from MICA, the top art universities in North America, Seydell stayed in Baltimore where he lived Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). and worked for two years before moving to The university is situated in-between some Brooklyn, not an uncommon story. Before very poor and violent neighbourhoods, but the move, Seydell had a solo show at the works hard to have a positive impact on the Copy Cat, one of the several large warehouses community. There is a lot of empty space in taken over by artists and converted into living Walker Seydell the city and the rent is fairly cheap, which is spaces, studios, galleries, and even concert my bed (graveyard), 2014. Champagne Bottles (Veuve Clicqout, Cristal, Gonet-Medeville), My Bed, Pizza very appealing to art students. The concept and party venues. Crusts, Takeout Containers, Natty Boh Cans, Prada Shoes, Comme des Garçons Button Up, Half-Burned Statue of Liberty Figurine, Chandelier, Lamp, Box of Condoms, Sexual Lubricant, Postcards, iMac Box, Nor- of artists moving into hard and rundown dstrom Box, MICA t-shirt, Wig, Paintbrushes, iHome Playing Soundbites of a Boy Snoring, Change, Plastic neighborhoods is not new. But in Baltimore, The show, entitled ICE, revolves around Plates, Dirty Silverware, Pajama Bottoms, Trash Bags, Levi’s Jeans, Dimensions Variable. the area in which this occurs had not yet seen bottles of champagne. Some works are Image Courtesy of the Artist any massive regeneration; instead it stayed installations with actual bottles while others Features Features C# 84 C# 85

are photographs of champagne bottles in bed artists feel un-restricted in their practice due with naked men. The photographs, all digital to the lack of a market presence. It allows New Kids On The Eastern Art Block print on aluminum, only show the models them to take risks and produce works outside by SORANA SERBAN from their shoulders to their knees using the of the pressure to produce for the increasing bottle to conveniently cover certain areas of demands of the art world. Until there is more the body. With titles like tony (with Cristal funding and more support for the artists 2005) and patrick (with Daddy’s Krug NV) living there, it will go on as it has for decades. it is clear who is being photographed without showing their faces. The installations include The Baltimore I knew only a few months ago a bowling alley set up with champagne bottle is already different. The faces are new and the as the pins, as well as a bottle of Veuve spaces have changed. There is now, more than Clicquot ‘Yellow Label’ placed on the floor in ever, a strong push from the city to increase order to prop up a large yellow canvas entitled the positive effect that the art community has yellow label (for Ellsworth), 2014. on the surrounding areas. Within the next ten years this run-down, cheap, and experimental The artist has expressed interest in neighbourhood will most likely undergo a champagne as a conspicuous choice of drink gentrification that will make it unrecognizable in both gay and rap culture. The drink acts as to those who have been there in the past fifty a way to signify wealth. Rappers incorporate years. champagne into their lyrics and pop bottles of it in their music videos. Jay-Z famously endorses Armand de Brignac, which Seydell has included in the work wet, 2014. This is one of the most expensive bottles of Alexandra Pirici & Manuel Pelmus champagne, seeing as each bottle is dipped in An Immaterial Retrospective of the Venice Biennale, 2013 Romanian Pavilion, Ongoing Action Enactment of Tramstop. A Monument to the Future, gold. Seydell has placed the bottle on the floor Installation by Joseph Beuys, German Pavilion, 37th edition, La Biennale di Venezia 1976 in a puddle of water and surrounded by a Image Courtesy of the Artists shattered ice bowl. A pedestal lays next to the bottle on its side as if it has fallen over. Art from Eastern Europe might have been A new generation of Romanian contemporary The show is not simply about the glamour ‘trendy’ or ‘exotic’ for the West about twenty artists, most of them in their thirties of champagne. There is an aspect of the years ago, after the fall of the U.S.S.R. but have moved on from the struggle with the artist’s self-indulgence and display of his geographical, or even historical tropes are Communist past in an attempt to analyse personal interests. The bed in the corner of both ideologically loaded, and very restrictive and, to a certain extent, even create their the gallery, with empty bottles of champagne, when it comes to explain an artist’s practice. own reality. They all live in Romania but a chandelier, messed-up sheets, and Adrian Ghenie, Ciprian Muresan, Marius exhibit internationally, and although much of trash covering the floor, entitled my bed Bercea, Victor Man, Serban Savu are some of their practice is rooted in the context of the (graveyard), 2014, emphasizes a look into the the artists critically engaging with Romania’s Romanian society, they address urgent issues artist’s personal life. recent past. Deeply embedded in that of international appeal. Labelling them as the context, their work relates to current socio- new art kids of the Romanian contemporary The art that is being made in Baltimore is political or art-related issues, exposing their art scene would definitely not do them experimental, young, and ever changing. The practice to an international audience. justice. Firstly, because most of them are Features Features C# 86 C# 87

no longer kids, despite a fresh subversiveness publishing and curatorial platform for Romania, gaining international critical acclaim. multidisciplinary art collective Apparatus 22 delineating them from the earlier generation of contemporary art dedicated to the East European Hebbel am Ufer, Berlin, Bass Museum of Art, was initiated by current members Erika Olea, artists after 1989. Secondly, because they have scene. Miami, Centre Pompidou, Paris, and GfZK, Maria Farcas, Dragos Olea and late artist Ioana been active for several years now, participating Leipzig are some of the institutions where her Nemes in 2011. Appropriating images and texts in major international exhibitions, so their work A search for new possibilites to reveal art’s activist works have recently been performed. This year from fashion magazines, staging performances is yet to be discovered by a broader audience, but potential is a starting point for choreographer Pirici is participating in the public programme or creating interactive installations, Apparatus could not be coined as new. Thirdly, because their and visual artist Alexandra Pirici. If You Don’t of Manifesta 10, Sankt Petersburg. 22 challenges the constraints of the fashion artistic practices are quite different in order to Want Us, We Want You, 2011, was one of her system and its socio-political reverberations. group them together on such terms. first attempts to subvert relations of power by Romanian performer, media critical Subversive, yet poetic, the collective employs involving an enactment of artworks as a strategy installationist, web archivist of Charlotte an anthropological barometer to critically deal The list below is therefore far from to challenge monumentality, whether reflected Moorman and curator of TAH29 are some with issues of labour, desire, and emotions, comprehensive, and represents just a quick in massive public sculptures or historical master of the labels Alex Mirutziu uses to describe sometimes plunging into explorations of overview of selected practices, aiming to entice narratives. She continued to explore and expand his practice. At the age of twenty-nine he set utopian programs, such as the TUTA – Futurist readers to plunge into further research and this approach in An Immaterial Retrospective of up a collective by associating himself with a artist and designer Thayant’s manifesto against analysis. This should soon be easier with the the Venice Biennale, 2013, when together with hyperobject – an identity he still involves in his fashion. Previous venues for projects include: launch of plural/mixed – an independent choreographer Manuel Pelmus she represented progressive approach to performance. In search MUMOK, Vienna, Museion, Bolzano, The for the reality of never, Mirutziu consistently Contemporary Art Gallery of the Brukenthal navigates between his philosophical readings National Museum, Sibiu, MAK, Vienna. and explorations of the body in the series of Pending Works (2009) and Scotopolitic objects. Professional handball player-turned-artist His work has been shown at ZDB, Lisbon, Ioana Nemes (1979-2011) embarked on an Power Plant, Toronto, The Glass Factory, Boda, introspective quest to document her daily Mucsarnok Kusthalle, Budapest, and, most life – the Monthly Evaluations series, 2005- recently, at the Centre for Contemporary Art 2010. Drawing on theories about time and Ujazdowski Castle, Warsaw. colour, Ioana evaluated her days by using a system of five parameters (physical, emotional, On the backdrop of running the intellectual, financial and the luck factor). Each experimental fashion brand Rozalb de Mura, day would accordingly be associated with a

Apparatus 22 7 Uncertain Scripts, 2014 , Installation with Video Projection Documentation MNAC Bucharest Image Courtesy of the Artists Alex Mirutziu Ioana Nemes Note #3 to Pending Work #6, 2012, Wax Carpathian Mountains, 2009, Painting Image Courtesy of the Artist and Sabot Gallery Image Courtesy of Jiri Svestka Gallery Features Features C# 88 C# 89

colour and a quotation, and then be archived. KILOBASE BUCHAREST and Ioana Nemes Hearts and Mind, Critical Art Ensemble, | Intense Proximity, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, Her conceptual practice included critical Circle of Friends continue to exhibit her Kassel 2012; La Triennale, Palais de Tokyo, 2012, European Travellers – Art from Cluj reflections on the art market, religion, and work, the most recent show being ‘Monthly Paris, 2012. today, Mucsarnok Kunsthalle, Budapest, hybridity of the Romanian rural traditions. Evaluations’ at Eastside Projects, Birmingham. 2012, ORIGINAL/COPY II, Peles Empire, Nemes participated in the Istanbul Biennial, Sourcing inspiration from the online cultural London, 2012. 2009, U-Turn Copenhagen, 2008, The Prague Collaborative duo Anca Benera & Arnold detritus and conspiracy theories, Mihut Biennial, 2007, and The Bucharest Bienniale Estefan have been active since 2011, and Boscu Kafchin meticulously constructs a From sculpture, to installation, drawing, 2, 2006. Art in General, New York, Secession, are co-founders of the Centre for Visual post-apocalyptic world of cyborgs, obsolete photography, video, computer animation Vienna, Smart Project Space, Amsterdam, and Introspection in Bucharest, an independent technology, and above all, what he calls the or digitally generated images, Radu Cioca Kunsthalle Fridericianum, Kassel, are some platform for research, artistic and theoretical ‘energy character’ – a formless character appeals to whatever medium would best of the venues where her works have been production. Their conceptual practice cuts generated digitally. As he works across communicate his ideas. Playing with scale displayed, while selected recent exhibitions through complex historical or current events different media, Kafchin merges details of and materiality, Cioca manipulates small include: Report on the Construction of a revealing randomness, abusive use of power Old Master paintings with sci-fi iconography details of everyday life to question reality Spaceship Module, New Museum, New York and the limited resources individuals can into works of utopian aspirations. Some of his through a series of connections. By placing (2014), Sometimes we shouldn’t pretend appeal to in subverting these processes. recent group exhibitions are: A few grams of the viewer in relation to unfamiliar objects, everything is OK, Salonul de Proiecte, Some of their recent exhibitions include: Red, Yellow, Blue, Center for Contemporary he aims to generate new meanings linked to Bucharest (2013), Ritual without Myth, Royal Der Brancusi-Effekt, Kunsthalle Wien, 2014, Art Ujazdowski Castle, Warsaw, 2014, Report his constant preoccupation with language. College of Art, London (2012), Desire is War, A few grams of Red, Yellow, Blue, Center on the Construction of a Spaceship Module Selected exhibitions include: A few grams The Contemporary Art Gallery of Brukenthal for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Castle, [Museum as Hub], New Museum, New York, of red, yellow, blue. New Romanian Art, Museum, Sibiu (2011), Communism Never Warsaw, 2014; 13th Istanbul Biennial, 2013; 2014, Prague Biennial 6, 2013, La Triennale Centre for Contemporary Art Ujazdowski Happened, Charim Gallery, Vienna (2011). dOCUMENTA (13) within the project Winning

Radu Coica Corrupted Symbols, 2013 Vintage Rug , Resin, Paint, Steel, Bronze 275 x 146 x 126 cm Mihut Boscu Kafchin Image Courtesy of the Artist Anca Benera & Arnold Estefan Father Energy I, 2013 I Work, Therefore I’m Not, 2012 - Ongoing Disco Ball, Synthetic Beard, Spraypaint, Mixed Media Installation (Wooden Boards, Variable Dimensions Wall Paint, Drawing, A3 Prints), Variable Dimensions Image Courtesy of the Artist and Sabot Gallery Image Courtesy of the Artists Deutsche Telekom Collection Features Features C# 90 C# 91

Rethinking Art Social Network

by AHRA CHO

How are artworks distributed and spread? Second, it provides some other functions How are artists discovered? According to such as blogging and online sale services. Victoria D. Alexander, author of Sociology For example, it encourages their users to of the Arts, there are several ways, such make their own portfolio or blog within as for-profit business firms, non-profit its website and to promote and sell their Razvan Botis Razvan Boar organizations, government, etc., and works on their own. Through these services, Cold Hands, 2008 That Generation, 2014 Lambda print, 90 x 55 cm Oil and Acrylic on Canvas, 120 x 100 cm among them are social networks. In a ASN aims to make international online Image Courtesy of the Artist and Sabot Gallery Image Courtesy of the Artist sociological term, social network, which is connections specifically between artists and consistent with the concept ‘social capital’, curators and art dealers. simply means ‘the pattern of ties among Castle, Warsaw, 2014, “œconomy, an already Mucsarnok Kunsthalle Budapest, Hungary; individuals’. Social networks have played a However, there is something suspicious tumultuous landscape where phantasms Trying to purchase what I once wanted to crucial role not only in art production but about how successfully ASN contributes cross”, Oberwelt e.V., Stuttgart, 2013, Hotspot forget, Krinzinger Projekte, Vienna, Austria. also its distribution. For instance, avant- to artists’ self-promotion and distribution Cluj - New Romanian Art, Arken Museum of garde artists formed their own networks of new artworks. There are many types Modern Art, Copenhagen, 2013, Impossibility Based on the clash between abstract and and shared ideas and, additionally, they of ASN but the degree of their success is vs. Self-Censorship, Center for Contemporary figurative, Razvan Boar’s paintings revolve were often socially supported within these controversial. For example, one of the most Creation Matadero, Madrid, 2013. around 1950s pin-up imagery and the networks. In Tony Bennett’s study on the popular ASN, deviantart, provides its service alienated desires it was made to cater social connection between musicians and via both website and application available on Having recently turned thirty, Razvan for. After he messes up the canvas by audiences, audiences sometimes play a the smart phone. However, if you visit the Botis has just finished the second series spilling colour and then smearing it, Boar role in introducing these musicians to website or download the application on your of his work, titled Normcore. While his superimposes mostly female figures with a a recording company as well as help to smart phone and use it, it might be difficult first series ironically explored the absurd drawn-like quality, emphasizing a general discover new artists. to say that most of the works uploaded are in everyday situations, by sometimes sense of emptiness. Contradicting gravity, the ‘artworks’. They seem rather computer merging the functions of disparate objects, figures appear forlorn, lost in anonymity. In Today, social network has evolved as a graphic works than artworks. Another as in Wash&Go, 2008, Normcore involves 2011 Boar received the Constantin Brancusi much wider form based on the Internet, popular example, Artists2artists provides apparently impromptu scribbles and fellowship at Cite Internationale des Arts, that is ‘social network service (SNS)’ such a similar service to Facebook; artists can colour mishaps to play on the obsession of Paris. as, amongst others, Facebook, Instagram make their own profile and group pages with trendiness. Now working on a third series, and Twitter. And now, we art-lovers have those sharing common interests. In addition, set at the intersection of lifestyle and visual Art Social Network (ASN). ASN here resident curators make comments on trends, Botis’s practice is probably the least means social platform for art, where a artworks uploaded by artists, which are later dependent on the Romanian context. Some number of artworks from painting to digital listed in ‘featured artwork’ page. However, of his recent exhibitions include: Hotspot photography, particularly modern and as the number of active artists and curators Cluj - New Romanian Art, Arken Museum, contemporary art, are shared as images. on the website is limited, Artists2artist Denmark; November Remember September, What distinguishes ASN from normal SNS seems still and out dated compared to other Künstlerhaus Schloß Balmoral, Germany; is that, first, it mainly targets many young SNS. European Travelers, Art from Cluj Today, artists and those working in the art industry. Features C# 92

Of course, it is impossible to deal with and promise. Artstack being one such example, analyze all existing ASN. However, based follows the same basic principles as other on my visits on some top ASN for several ASN but adds ‘following’ and ‘tagging’ weeks, it seems that they have a long way to functions which allow users the ability to go to achieve their goals. Why do they seem easily discover new artworks as well as not to work well? First, many ASN provide keep in touch with contemporary artists too similar services. In other words, there is of interest. The strongest point of Artstack no clear identity as ASN. Though Facebook, is that most uploaded images have great Twitter, Linkedin, Instagram and Tumblr, quality and that there are many pages of may all look similar, each has a different popular contemporary artists. In this sense, specialized field: To say briefly, Facebook Artstack is more user-friendly, and therefore begins wide international social networks, constructs more balanced online network Twitter is characterized as exponential between people and those in the art world. far-reaching power, Linkedin is used as online business networks, and Instagram It does not mean that Artstack succeeds and Tumblr are a bank of numerous as ASN, but means that Artstack at least images. ASN, however, seems something recognizes the fact that it is basically another ambiguous, something between Facebook form of SNS. The identity of SNS is broad and Tumblr. The number of ASN increases online participation of people, which many but they seem not to know what they are. It of current existing ASN miss. They focus might be able to say that ASN can be partly much on constructing networks between identified as a virtual space for e-commerce those in the art industry for e-commerce. of art. However, it is difficult to expect it However, there are obvious limits in to make outstanding results. There are artwork transactions, since there are too many important factors influencing values complicated and sensitive issues around of artworks, and some of them, such as them. In addition, though they either expect texture, cannot be confirmed through the commercial achievements somehow or online images. In addition, many art experts want themselves to be identified as another point out that social platforms should not space for artwork transactions, it needs be considered as sales platforms, and online wider public attention as its basis. In a mess sales cannot replace offline sales at galleries society, there is no commercial success in or auction houses at all. Third, offline spaces any industry fields without supportive public. are still preferred to online ones in any case. Still many people go to galleries, whether It is true that ASN has possibilities of they want to buy artworks or to interact with encouraging the art world as internet-based them, and still many gallerists and curators networks. However, it is true as well that the strongly prefer to meet artists face-to-face. current direction of many ASN leaves room for questions. Before any attempts to go In spite of several problems with the ahead, it is time for ASN to think of the very current existing ASN there are some basic condition not only for its existence and emerging ASN that are showing some but for long-term sustainability as well.