July 9, 2010

Save AREA 10

” With the help of these young artists Peckham is pulling itself up by the bootstraps please do not knock it on the head and force it back into the A downtrodden and pitiful place. Area 10 is a vital part of the transformation of Peckham from disadvantaged ghetto to the creative engine of a re-imagined London. The offering of a facility that allows a wide range of artistic expression within a socially embedded space is a great catalist for trasformation and Peckham is becoming well known as a place of art and artists.”

Anthony Gormley, 2010

The Save Area10 Campaign is to try to stop Southwark Council’s plans to close the much loved arts organisation, Area10, Eagle Wharf, Peckham. Area10 has specialised in bring ambitious and worthwhile events and projects based in Fine Arts, Perforative Arts, Circus, and Theatre for the last eight years, and is the bed rock of South East London’s artistic community. Please see www.savearea10.org for details and testimonials. Noteworthy supporters include Anthony Gormley, Gavin Turk, South London Gallery, Cedar Lewisohn (Curator of Rude Britannia at Tate Britain) and Matthew Stone, as news continues travel, more and more people in all areas of the world are coming forward to show the support and solidarity for the importance of Area10 within our Culture.

**Save Area10 Picket Party**Saturday 10th July**10pm – 3am**

 A party where all visitors, instead of paying, will be bringing signs, banners, slogans and placards supporting and celebrating the Save Area10 Campaign and the importance of Independent Arts in London. Dancing all night whilst protesting. 

Acts to play in kind are: Girl Unit b2b Mr Charisma (Night Slugs)/ Off Modern Djs/ My Panda Shall Fly / Legendary Children / Dollop Djs / Blaise Bellville / Throwing Snow & Amenta / Chairman Kato / Young Montana? / LuckyPDF Djs / Pat And Trevor Djs / Jeraine / Rough Trade Djs

Save Area10 Party Facebook Event


Supporters

Bob and Roberta Smith, who have donated their ʻMake Art, Not Warʼ placard to help inspire others to make supportive banners.

South London Gallery

Matthew Stone (Artist/Shaman)

Cedar Lewisohn (Curator of Rude Britannia at Tate Britain)

Melanie Jackson (Head of Sculpture at Slade School of Art)

Matt Franks (Head of Sculpture at Camberwell College of Art)

House of Fairy Tales

Kate Morross (designer)

Hannah Barry Gallery

www.savearea10.org

Save Area10 Facebook Group

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June 9, 2010

Phoebe and Elizabeth Cope, Open Studios

Next time you happen to be in Kennington you should find time to have a glance at the paintings in the small bay window of number 6 Windmill Row, a sleepy village-like row of shops just off Kennington Road. Here is the home and studio of Elizabeth Cope, the Irish-born artist.

This month it’s her daughter Phoebe Cope who has taken residency, working on new paintings – mostly large-scale oil works – with an intense palette of bright colours. Her work is classically and art historically minded, scenes taken from Italian houses and London monuments, also figurative works and some sculptures. You can track an obvious influence from Matisse’s work and those who followed him, combined with a folk-like semblance. 

She evolves what starts as realistic landscapes in several ways, sometimes by creating highly detailed, colourful and patterned versions – a craft-like side to her work which brings out beautiful and imaginative elements. More of a surrealist edge comes into play in some of the works – objects, faces, house interiors and parts of other landscapes are fused into the overall space creating a mythical narrative between the parts. In the above paintings they are taken from Classical history and Shakespearian stories (‘Journeys’ as Phoebe refers them).

Recently she has had sitters for portraits, locals who pop by, part of what seems to be a bit of a South London community of like-minded people including a local politician and a journalist from a London paper. A piece she is working on, an enormous canvas rolled up in the corner of the room, is in the process of becoming a life-sized group portrait of her friends which will hopefully will be on show for her open evening coming up next week on the 22 June. 

6 WINDMILL ROW, KENNINGTON, LONDON SE11 5DW

 tube: Kennington, Vauxhall bus: 3,59,159, (opposite Pizza Express)

Open Daily

www.phoebecope.com

www.elizabethcope.com

+44 (0)20 7735 2085

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May 5, 2010

Up and Coming Art Openings May 2010

May got off to a bang this Bank Holiday with Hive Projects opening a huge new artists’ studios and project space in Whitechapel and nearby Lava Collective’s exhibition at the Rag Factory.

But the fun has just started, coming up over the next few weeks there are some real showstoppers.

Art Festivals:

Concrete and Glass, 13th-27th May 2010

The return of this most excellent of East End art festivals. This year artists include: Alexander Baynes, Alice Anderson, Ben Long, Brass Art Collective, Charlotte Warner Thomas, Claire Morgan, Clarisse D’Arcimole, Lilah Fowler, Matt Clark, Oliver Beer, Paul Westcombe, Robert Montgomery, Suki, Chan, Tamsin Snow, Thomas Lindvig, Tim Head, Tim Phillips, Tyson Howard

A panel of art experts will select a “winner” who will be offered a solo show at the following year’s festival. This year’s panellists include John Kieffer, Creative Director Sound & Music, Paul Hobson, Director of the Contemporary Art Society, and Sabine Unamun, of the Arts Council, as well as other representatives from the world of arts and music – names to be confirmed.

The art exhibitions will be presented in collaboration with 20 Hoxton Square Projects and the Sound Art & Music performances will take place at Hoxton Bar & Kitchen.

For an idea see here for review and images of the last show. It was fantastic. Look out for a review on this coming shortly.

Free entry Hoxton Square

disPLACEment Festival – 8th-15th May

Across various venues in Southwark in a week of events by Arts 4 Human Rights charity – including visual artworks and installations, theatre, live performances, music, films, talks with experts, and schools and community workshops – through which they aim to highlight human rights issues.

Free entry Southwark area

Art Openings – Opening nights – early May :

Grabbing the headlines is Stuart Pearson Wright’s new exhibition at Riflemaker. Little to do with him being the brilliantly humorous artist he is, the press have got wind that a certain someone will be appearing in a short film directed by Wright. Oh yes! None other than Keira Knightly! Perhaps Riflemaker needs to think about investing in a red carpet…

‘I Remember You’ – OPENING – 5 May  (Paintings) – Saturday 26 June 2010 Riflemaker – 79 Beak Street, W1

Maze: a film installation by Stuart Pearson Wright, (the one with Kiera) Private view Wednesday 26th May, 6 – 9pm, 1 Berwick Street, London W1F 0DR, Exhibition continues until Wednesday 9th June Mon – Fri 11am – 6pm, Sat 12pm – 6pm

The Young Unknowns: those rebels from yesteryear are putting on a new show. The 6th Salon de Collage. It’s all a little hush hush, but for those up for a little adventure see more at www.theyoungunknowns.co.uk.
Opening night 6 May

Subway Gallery – ‘Rock is my life’:

Totally by coincidence more original punk culture at this exhibition where Marc Zermati, founder of the first independent punk rock label in ’73 will open his files and boxes and display a range of rare posters, original drawings and lithographs.
Opening night 6 May
Till 29 May 2010

Charles Mason: Is showing his quirky sculptures (cum office furniture de-constructed) wall drawings and photographs at Nettie Horn
Opening night 6 May. Till 20 June 2010

Young Art 2010- Opening 11th May – A competition for find the best in Young Art, taken by schools and children in hospitals around the country is now going to be on exhibition at The Royal College of Art only till the 13th of May so get down there sharpish!

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March 31, 2010

Guest’, White Cube Hoxton Square

Photo – gallery layout: Ben Westoby
Courtesy White Cube, London and Galerie Gebr. Lehmann , Berlin | Dresden

Eberhard Havekost
Gast 2, B10
2010
Oil on canvas
78 3/4 x 51 3/16 in. (200 x 130 cm)
© the artist
Photo: Werner Lieberknecht
Courtesy White Cube, London and Galerie Gebr. Lehmann , Berlin | Dresden


Eberhard Havekost
Gast 4, B10
2010
Oil on canvas (9 canvases)
Polyptych, each: 78 3/4 x 51 3/16 in. (200 x 130 cm)
© the artist
Photo: Werner Lieberknecht
Courtesy White Cube, London and Galerie Gebr. Lehmann , Berlin | Dresden

Having got dates wrong Art Sleuth ended up at the White Cube last Thursday. Knowing there would be free beers without fail it was the obvious decision for a thirsty art lover. 

The Hoxton branch is showing Eberhard Havekost’s new work, a painter that is known for his Doig-like approach to painting. He starts with a photo and deconstructs the image so that it takes on a more compressed, stylistic result. Unlike Peter Doig his paintings tend to be stunted, usually fixed close-ups  – such as on an edge of a building or a skewed image of a wing of an aeroplane. Because of this they have little of the sense of drama that Doig’s paintings have. Instead they concentrate on form and line, using shadow or light to bring out static composition more than movement or atmosphere.

Havakost’s exhibition consists mainly of a series of paintings of a fir tree. ‘Gast’ or Guest considers how you would look at a tree at night, the ‘distortedness’ that comes from night photography – the flash of the camera showing up as red outlines in some of the works – and the idea of haunting and memory. The use of toned down pastel shades, the conversion of object to line and composition are part of his style; these paintings are placid, detail filtered out, like the image has become ‘over-saturated’. 

Similarly other paintings that are exhibited intermittently between the series of the nine ‘Gast’ works are simple, negative spaces. Rainbow colours – almost like ink blotted out in water. Also a wonky view of a corridor, compressed and redefined in oranges and reds. 

Havekost’s work is not the easiest to like – perhaps. With so much of contemporary art being forward-looking in its content, or ‘shouty’, or about the spectacle, his paintings seem a little introspective and a touch banal. They are about form and composition and toned down atmosphere. Yet once you accept this, they begin to work their meditative charm.

(And perhaps because the White Cube has not made its name by exhibitions like this, we entered on the back foot….)

‘Guest’, White Cube Hoxton Square, London
26 March – 1 May 2010

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March 22, 2010

‘The Library of Babel/In and out of place’, projectspace176, The Zabludowicz Collection

 One tenth of a huge private collection focusing on contemporary and emerging art is being exhibited in the 176 project space, an old Methodist church in Chalk Farm. It is the first time even this much of the collection has been on show, over two hundred works out of two thousand collected by Anita Zabludowicz, a founding supporter of The Zoo Art Fair. If you haven’t got to it yet it is a must see, so get down there sharpish.

The quirky, decorative interior, and powerful stone pillar entrance lends a theatrical glamour, a perfect setting for the ‘salon style hang’ chosen by the curator Anna-Catharina Gebbers . A refreshing departure from the concrete white cube which, you could say, is becoming a bit of a ‘Noughties’ phenomenon.

There are some classic pieces and many works by impressive artists that have not yet become the superstars they hopefully will. Plus the odd name dropper – e.g. that photograph of Tracy Emin arranging money to go where, perhaps, it shouldn’t. The great mixture in content, style and curatorial freedom encourages the viewer to find their own random connections and associations between works. The shear scale of pieces allows you to trace trends in the UK and international art scene over last decade. Death, transience and religion seemed  to reoccur in many of the pieces, the depiction of the human skull for instance has become a popular icon, from paintings such as Skull by Tomery Dodge in the back hall, Nathan Mabry’s weird bronze skulls with animal masks, and a white motorbike helmet cut into a skull shape by Mike Nelson, to mention just a few of its uses in thei exhibition. (Perhaps with the late Alexander McQueen’s iconic scarf and old Damien Hirst with his diamond skull – it is have become a growing symbol of the last decade.)

One of the most impressive rooms is the double height space behind the main hall; showing a suspension of DIY tools from ceiling to floor, Five Tools in a Straight Line, Grayham Hudson, and a totally retro 80′s neon/black and white patterned structure, Dollar City, (which would not look of place in the Three Men and a Little Baby’s penthouse even though it was made in 2008) by Gosha Ostretsov. And the more earthy work by Nicole Wermers, Untitled Bench – incorporating purple slate, golden quartzite and mixed glacier with sand and acrylic.

Look out for Colin Chilag and David Quan’s immense pencil drawn comic strip (interspersed with pockets of detailed miniature paintings) debating the existence of God through hypothetical Where’s Wally conundrums.

On until the 9th of May. Free. Visitor’s tours on Sunday at 3pm, with talks by the artist’s – see website for dates.

http://www.projectspace176.com/

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January 28, 2010

One Night Show: Apartment 21

Feeling a little adventurous this evening? A hotel in Kensington is the venue for a one night show from the Rented By The Hour project group. Four artists – Olivia Hicks, Beatrice Haines, Anna Curtis and Laura Clarke – have produced work in a ‘psycho-social’ response to the surroundings.

Apartment no. 21 of the Clearlake Hotel, 18/20 Prince of Wales Terrace, Kensington, London W8 5PQ.

If you’re around Redchurch Street anytime soon have a look in Kaleid Editions, an artist led bookshop which encorages artists to produce a one off printed book as part of their practice. It also exhibits  on site and has Owen Bullett‘s incredible sculptures there at the moment, plus the re-imagined landscape paintings of Louise Bristow.

And while I’m writing just to let you know that there was a wicked set of openings last week down in Redchurch St. But with Art Sleuth’s camera broken there was little that could be done to cover it…try Artwars Project Space right next door to Kaleid Editions for the  group show Hot Boredom (not covered on their website) which still should be going. Thanks to Martin Sexton and co we have a mixed media show with a sense of humour – ingenious what a broom that magically stands upright by itself and a candle can create. An excellent find. Also includes spoof 1970′s film documenting the end of the world in 2020 with aliens landing on Mayan ruins.

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January 20, 2010

Automatic Shoes, Danny Rolph solo exhibition.

N.Chamberlain, Danny Rolph, Mixed media on triplewall, 105 x 100 cm, 2009

Ramsay MacDonald, Danny Rolph, Mixed media on triplewall, 150 x 210 cm, 2009

PMQ 12, Danny Rolph, 2009, Pencil on paper. 28 x 38 cm

Images courtesy the artist, Danny Rolph, and Poppy Sebire Gallery.

Danny Rolph creates striking multi layered collage paintings using a top layer of triplewall – an industrial plastic roofing material made of clear perspex strips – stuck over a base canvas. He paints over and under and on both sides of each layer, often using cuttings from newspapers or consumer items and varying types of paint. Four of his large peices are exhibited at Poppy Sebire‘s latest exhibition and some smaller canvas paintings and drawings.

His main works are less about a meaning and more about the act of ‘doing’. He said in an interview (see link) he performs a ‘non deliberate act of painting’ using materials for the sake of themselves, an aesthetic experiment rather than to convey a purposeful message. Although it is an abstract way of ‘doing’ the finished product is almost a contradiction to this in its’ sharp composition and graphic design style outcome. There are consistencies with his work and other contemporary painters such as Fiona Rae and Jamie Gili not least in form and the use of luminous bright colours.

An interesting side effect is that a photo of the work looks very different to the real thing, the reduction of detail giving a polished feel. The rawness of the actual works reference that time warn Modern Art underpinning, the use of the banal object, going back to artists like Kurt Schwitters. Here a building material is being used, in part, to create what is essentially a fine art painting. The lines of the triplewall prevent total clarity of the layers and patterns underneath. Although the viewer is being exposed to each layer, they are also being held back from seeing ‘the whole picture’. Printed material from an everyday existence, some or perhaps all personal, are stuck between the layers, partially visible. Flyers from old exhibitions, an old photo of himself, pages from The Power Rangers colouring-in books, newspaper cuttings of transport, bits of vinyl records are combined to create a scrap book effect, an embalmed time capsule. Without a clear message or purpose he has created what is a jumbled woven fabric of art and information, the random paper items and paint forms giving an individual make up, a sort of DNA, for each painting.

Exhibition on till the 20th of February
www.poppysebire.com

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