Thursday, August 30, 2007

Leaded: The Materiality and Metamorphosis of Graphite

Just discovered this show which doesn't open until October but has work by the artists Stephen Sollins, Sara Lovitt, , Tara Donovan the art guys,[these guys are fantastic - so much fun] Marco Maggi and Creighton Michael

21 Oct - 22 Dec 2007
Bedford Gallery - USA [not uk]

Paul McDevitt at Stephen Friedman Gallery

I must confess I don't know anything about this artist's work, but I generally love the majority of what Stephen Friedman shows, not to mention my consideration that 'colony' by Tara Donovan is the best piece of work I have seen all year. [if you scroll through Donovan's work on the Stephen Friedman web site you will get to good images of 'colony'].

Paul McDevitt exhibited at the Cell Project Space. click on link and on title of post to see images of his work.
1 - 29 Sept
Stephen Friedman Gallery
25-28 Old Burlington Street
London

Rachel Cattle and Steve Richards

'Same Old Scene'
Rachel Cattle who recently exhibited at the Centre for Recent Drawing is exhibiting with Steve Richards. For the show they are showing animation and a comic. I expect everything to be very hand made with a hint of underlying horror.
Rachel Cattle's show at the Centre for Recent Drawing was excellent and so I am looking forward to seeing the 'stills' the drawings moving.

7 Sept - 8 Oct
Transition Gallery
Unit 25a Regent Studios
8 Andrews Road
London E8 4QN

Gabriel Lester at IBID projects

The reason why I am flagging up this artists work is because of his exploration of architecture. Through cuts that create viewing windows, vistas through buildings. He also makes films that seem to entirely use appropriated footage but fascinating collage of images which play with conventions of films and documentaries. The exhibition at IBID looks as if it will be focusing on his film works.

Gabriel Lester 'And Now for Something Completely Different'
7 Sept - 31 Sept
21 Vyner Street
London

Friday, August 24, 2007

Underground

Underground is mutual exploration of the process of making by three artists; Roger Ackling, Eric Butcher and Simon Granell. Though these three artists come from a painterly tradition they all produce work which is the 'trace of an act' the visual formation of the method of making, which is one way of understanding drawing.
There is a also a publication with writing by Tania Kovats the artist who also produced the fantastic resource 'The Drawing Book'.

Thursday, August 23, 2007

Sara MacKillop

The work of Sara MacKillop was a sensitive jewel in East International. One of my favourite exhibitions partly because of how artists exhibiting in this show go on to become so influential, and because of the quality of the work shown.

Sara MacKillop's work was displayed on the top floor of the main building in a space delicately lit by natural light. Her work often using stationary or found papers such as record covers reminds me of geometric abstract paintings. Works where the edges of pages almost become areas of flat colour to be read in on the plain rather than receding into the background. The subtly of the change in density of pigment, and the bleaching and fading of the aged papers. The edges and the folds become the lines. I kept thinking about Kasimir Malevich's 'Black Square on a White Ground'. Calm work and want to see more.

Start Your Collection

3 August - 16 September
Contemporary Art Projects
20 Rivington Street, Shoreditch, London EC2A 3DU

This exhibition of small works has the aim of getting people to start or add to their collection with affordable works. The majority of the works are small and a large proportion of drawings. The thing I like about these kinds of exhibitions as they are a like a mini survey of emerging artist and a large percentage of them exploring drawing. What I don't generally like about these exhibitions is the way that the work is displayed. Several works were placed in see through plastic wallets which protected them from mucky fingered viewers but totally interfered with the reading of the work. I could go on a rant here but I will stop and start talking about what I found and liked. If i had a big house and lots of money I would start my collection with the following;

Lucinda Oestreicher [Drawing of a donkey - sad and lumpy]

Keith Roberts [rough landscapes - nighttime - cut out of cardboard - inky melancholy]

Claire Beale [cut out radiator interior - empty furniture absences in everyday space]

D. J. Roberts [Non spaces in photographs, like Vija Celmins but the bits in between - photorealism that throws you back to the surface and the transitions in tone - hard pencil - previously exhibited at Lounge - favourite one was 'urban darkness' 2006 street crime seemed to be hiding in this one but filled all the space - creeping]


Robin Dixon

[colour field - watercolour bleeding + grids and lines]

Anka Dabrowska

Laura Green
[liked the pen and ink big space slightly sci-fi drawings]

If you do have lots of money and a big house you should go and buy work by these artists.

drawnapart west

The second half of this two part East West exploration into drawing. The second part being in Day Faber who's expertise lies in drawings from the 15th to 19th Centuries.
Artist included in this show [alive ones] are;
Kate Davis
Lucy Day
Leo Fitzmaurice
Kate Hawkins
Ben Long
Ed Pien
Terry Smith
Chloe Steele

Drawn Apart West 9-20 October 2007
Day and Faber,
173 New Bond Street, London W1Y 9PB
Monday – Sunday 12- 6 pm

Julie Cockburn at Forster

I recently came across Julie Cockburn's work at Forster Gallery. Though the work wasn't displayed in a space that gave it room to breathe and the other artist work in this group show was of a completely different aesthetic which meant I was unable to appreciate the other exhibitors in 'Ten at One'.

Cockburn responds to pre-existing images including maps and whole books by various manual means, such as cutting, collage and sewing. Many include beautiful elegant scribbles - but stitched. I am interested in the relationship between the stitched lines on top of the existing ground. One work 'A Bird in a Bush' looked initially as if Cockburn had just rapidly scribbled on the ornithological book, but the lines were carefully hand stitched. The response wasn't 'off the cuff', but carefully considered and laboured. The stitching is more tactile than a pencil line across a page, this to handle nature is also found in the choice of working on a book, not just pages but the whole book, but open at chosen pages. Why this page? With Cockburn's work like many other artists the response to the work seems to be 'dumb' in terms of a complete blindness to the content of the text. In a way that a child draws in a book, they know the image is there and they know what the image is of but are adding to it in a way that seems to bear no relation to the image or content. The graffiti nature of Cockburn's practice is a loving one, not one of disrespect, but it maybe territorial.



Julie Cockburn is in the group show 'Ten at One' until 31st August 2007
1 Chapel Place, Rivington Street, London EC2A 4DQ


Copy link below to see image of 'A Bird in a Bush'
http://www.forstergallery.com/Julie-Cockburn/a-bird-in-a-bush

MA Drawing Show Wimbledon

MA Wimbledon Students open their final show on Friday 7th September 2007
6-9pm [other MA courses are also exhibiting]
Wimbledon College of Art
Merton Hall Road
London
SW19 3QA

quick words on MA drawers work

Jack Hutchinson - cosmic background radiation

Tia Schmidt - scatter/arrange

Marwa Arsanios - figures and what they do...

Tom Robinson - Scene of the Crime?

Victoria King - Digital v Analogue

Fiona Meakin - Furry Touch