more snaps from the Snap 2012 exhibition (Art at Aldeburgh Festival) at Snape Maltings...in one of the disused malt buildings, an interesting 'conflation' of traditional painting and sound installation by the suffolk-based artist Maggi Hambling...
you are the sea, maggi hambling 2012this building is 'presented' in a state of elegant abandonment, not unlike a dystopian film set, littered at the boundary with architectural detritus but the floor is scrubbed clean. the eerie sounds of a water sluice (which Maggi Hambling encountered daily while sketching the north sea at nearby Thorpeness beach) meld into the sounds of a wailing voice or a poetical reading of sorts (uncredited) from the circular vented structure (a redundant relic from the building's former use) - the ghosts of the sea are summarily summoned...
i sat on the vent to listen through (as instructed). the accompanying 'suspended' canvas painting (Wall of Water VIII, from a series on the North sea) became less compelling as the draw of dark, semi-derelict architectural spaces encourages the eyes to wander & explore - although, bravo to this bold departure from the context of a white cube gallery.many of the redundant outbuildings here (especially those without windows or roofs) are artfully preserved in a state of semi-dereliction with tidy groupings of architectural & industrial detritus - rusting containers, stacks of wood, bricks and tiles, drainage pipes, scrap metal, engine parts, even the carcasses of old cars - and such arrangements became even more appealing to the senses because on this day it was raining hard (in that dystopian, the-world-is-falling-apart-and-i-think-i-like-it way). no one else was about and this environment needed no other artistic intervention other than eyes to see it (or souls to feel it)...
...
and let us not forget the invasive nature of the flora which some might call 'weeds', that serve to remind us of the unassuming poetry in encroaching wildness. nature is reclaiming this building...it's an idea purposefully recrafted as a secret 'Walled Garden' by the artist May Cornet later on in the Snap tour. stacked piles of bricks have been sown with a medley of wild flowers and grasses, with the white hexagonal structures perhaps mystically channelling these elements of nature. alas, the white gate to this manufactured haven for wildlife was firmly locked, so one was left peering through the prison-like bars from a controlled distance, as if we can never truly be free with nature, wherever we seek it. in truth, this merging of the man-made and nature in the environment can be witnessed anywhere: in urban derelict spaces, the hinterland sprawl, waste sites, railway sidings, rural backyards...
the walled garden, May Cornet 2012...
A painter's progress
Fog and fug, grit brown, deep striations, a blush of pink rises through a glaze of smoke... a burnt orange melts into a caustic violet ash...
bubbling umbers, of oil and residue, the cool breeze of cerulean blue... then, a mechanical yellow, breathing blisters from a greenish bronze...
Mere descriptions, slowly unfold a hidden narrative, representing nothing, in reality...Just colour, applied; some of it lived and some of it died...
apocalypse, now and again
Every now and again I really look forward to seeing monumental new works by major artists. Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster's newest creation in the Turbine Hall at the Tate Modern in London is a scene of disaster... it seems mismatched, ill-conceived, too referential, derivative, a bargain basement of installation art... She has said in an interview that it's a memorial to previous Turbine exhibitors, set in the future (2058) when it rains everyday, the sculptures have mutated and the space has become the only sancturary for art and people, yet it's not a dark work (yep, the bright lighting doesn't support her dystopian view of London), and viewers will bring their own relationship to the work but the (too) many references to post-apocalyptic novels and movies skew the perspective...Unlike Louise Bourgeois' original Maman spider, her copied, or should one say referenced work seems to rely on scale to convey a message, but it doesn't seem to have any substance (the sculptures are apparently made of polystyrene)... she has seized upon the apparent zeitgeist of doom and catastrophe and tried to create a bleak cultural oasis of the future, but has merely mutated others work, then collated some obvious dystopian fiction which make any message seem as crude as a shopping list, and the books are all shiny new copies; some chewed-up or even water damaged books might have worked better... no doubt they'll have to be replaced regularly - FREE BOOKS at the Tate everyone... and the yellow bunk beds made me think of a quick trip west to Ikea... these objects apparently allude to Henry Moore's war shelter drawings.
TH 2058 at Tate Modern, London 2008 © TateAll in all, this work of works is all the more disappointing because I so wanted to to like it - I connected to the overall premise. Of course, I am relying on what I've read and seen in the press, and perhaps I will eventually warm to it, but I sense a rain check coming on... However, with the post-apocalyptic glow of an Eliasson sun highlighting a few Doris Salcedo cracks, with some Hirst-esque diamond superbugs crawling around a Whiteread style sugar cube mountain, maybe it would work as a chilling memento mori...A much more startling scene of cultural devastation was that of a stash of modern art smouldering in the aftermath of a London city warehouse fire in 2004; art imitates life even after reports of its death...Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster at the Tate Modern View a video clip of the Turbine Hall exhibit at Times OnlineView installation photos at BBC.co.uk