the YBAs have: 'grown up, headed for the fields and found fresh inspiration in the countryside of suffolk'...i've just been reading all about it over at the guardian/observer newspaper... it conjures up images of them drinking pints of adnams with the locals & taking long country walks in their hunter wellies and barbours... the guardian refers to the YBAs as if it is a definitive artist movement and now they're moving in on suffolk...they are putting on a group show called 'snap', a new contemporary art exhibition as part of the aldeburgh festival. the festival runs 10-26 june 2011, and will be set up in various locations around snape maltings (home of the aldeburgh music festival), using 'foyers, derelict buildings and outdoors, offering the chance to see art outside a conventional gallery' (a nice change from the white cube). it will feature the work of twelve artists: darren almond, don brown, cerith wyn evans, mark fuller, russell haswell, gary hume, johnnie shand kydd, abigail lane, simon liddiment, sarah lucas, julian simmons, juergen teller.
[Sarah Lucas, Julian Simmons & Abigail Lane. ©Andy Hall/Observer]only some of these artists could be considered true YBAs (are they perhaps honorary YBAs?), but they have all made links one way or another with east anglia and have come together to make 'snap' happen. the 'snap' exhibition will include photography, site-specific sculpture, video and sound installations. what, no painting, then - but gary hume is involved..? to remove any element of elitism there will be an 'open day' instead of a traditional 'private view' (does that mean everyone is invited?), serving suffolk aspall cider instead of champagne (they usually have champagne..?). as one of the artists abigail lane explains: "I want the farmers to come in and complain, but actually get a bit drunk with someone who's come up from London. That's how it should be."i think the jolly farmers of suffolk might be busy that day but i'm all for supping some local 'cyder' while contemplating contemporary art... will any farmers walk in with mud on their boots and complain about the art? they are more likely to gruff & shrug it off as 'a load of ol' squit' - but i jest - there is a serious problem with crops and not enough rain right now... and i really wish that the art world/media would not play off the metropolitan with the rural, it seems like a case of us & them, as if we are somehow culturally deprived or lacking and unable to see the nuances of the country without the benefit of their urban vision... (ok, rant over...)however, i'll still be intrigued to see how these artists will work with and interpret the suffolk landscape... and snap is a very snappy, apt little title for this exhibition - a small snapshot, a breaking away, loud, sharp and to the point, snapped together, synchronous - but i also wondered if it might be a reference to an erroneous mispelling (or mispronounciation) of the village of snape.to coincide with the promotion of snap, there is not one but two mentions of the artist sarah lucas (and a few of her artist pals in the process) in the papers this weekend... in the saturday guardian interview she says of her beginnings in art that: "I met somebody there who'd been to art college. I didn't know about art college before that. That's when I thought, 'Oh, that's something I could do."i was quite disappointed by that statement, that it was just something to do, she had expressed no creative urge before that moment, there were no childhood stories of pulling the heads of cindy dolls and making crazy, hybrid toys or just making weird-shaped stuff out of potato smash or dirt - no, nothing of that sort was mentioned - but that's not to say she hasn't done those sorts of things - because this is what her art seems to do now - playing absurd and sometimes subversive games, as she goes on to say: "when I was little, just making things, because I always did, to keep myself company. I think that sort of continues – the making things to keep yourself company." so there could be a darker, confessional side to the 'art' of sarah lucas just as there is with tracey emin - and perhaps this is why they became the best of friends in the YBA playing ground...
[Sarah Lucas in her studio in Suffolk. ©Eamonn McCabe/Guardian]i wish lucas had 'fessed up a little bit more about her struggle in 'making art' and say it was also a case of being in the right place at the right time, talking to & hanging out with the right crowd of people - but it is good to see that she can now create ironic and refined work, such as the bronze sculpture 'perceval' with the two supersize marrows, situated in the grounds of snape (i cast a cucumber in alluminium in 1986, which seems slightly ironic in retrospect...). here's a quck snap i took of perceval in snape a while back. i saw something similar (but much smaller) in a local charity shop for £20 - i wonder if sarah lucas bought it?
[Perceval by Sarah Lucas - photographed looking east]according to the guardian, the artists who are included in the snap exhibition are 'a tight-knit bunch and they started talking about pulling together a group show [...] and it was mooted that they could crash the Aldeburgh festival'... it sounds just like the good old days...sarah lucas now lives & works in suffolk and her friend, the painter gary hume, apparently also has a studio here in rural suffolk (i wonder if he needs a studio assistant - someone who can paint smooth and 'dead flat'?) - and just down the leafy lane (so to speak) lives the london gallery owner sadie coles, who represents sarah lucas... the 'snap' exhibition sounds mildly exciting and rather marvellous, as if suffolk will be an über-cool locus of contemporary art, if only for a few weeks in the summer.winter might paint a different picture - sugar beet lorries hog the road, the stench of slurry wafts from the brown fields, and as the slow tractors rumble on a whole lotta mud is laid down in their wake... but there are the expansive skies and the light, and the trees look mysterious shrouded in a morning mist - and then there is the coast... it's impossible to miss this particular beach find, but rare to find it not crawling with people, such is its tactile charm...
[Scallop by Maggi Hambling - photographed looking out to the sea]there are, of course, already a lot of artists living & working in suffolk ; i moved from london to rural suffolk in 1993...i grew up, i headed for the fields and found fresh inspiration in the countryside of suffolk.i am still trying to get my philosophical head around that career move - so i look forward to seeing what the YBAs(?) will make of the place......The Saturday Interview: Sarah Lucas | The GuardianSarah Lucas: A Country Life | Art and design | The Observer.The exhibition 'Snap' runs from 10-26 June 2011, at Snape in association with the Aldeburgh Music FestivalThere will also be Snap: a discussion with Michael Craig-Martin on Thursday 23 June 2011An edition of twelve large-format prints by the artists is also available at http://www.paulstolper.com
six abstract painters : an exhibition
this is a small exhibition that i am currently showing some new paintings in, and as the title conveys, it features the work of six abstract painters, all with connections to east anglia. the artists are geraldine carratu, anthea eames, mari french, jazz green (that's me!), joan hickson and john midgley. it opens today (saturday 28 may 2011) at the halesworth gallery, in the heart of rural suffolk...i took these photographs of my paintings in the gallery on the day of the hanging. all went very smoothly, much helped by the assistance of jan & alan (and some tea & biscuits!). as any artist will tell you, transporting art & installing art exhibitions can be a tiring and sometimes stressful affair...the halesworth gallery is wonderful space in which to show one's work, as it has an honesty, simplicity & serenity that i find very appealing. it is not the white cube of a gallery space desired of most contemporary artists, but having recently exhibited in a 16th century church, the cellar of a medieval merchant's house and two listed barns, halesworth gallery's own period charm & modest character feels to be a 'right' context for my particular work (born as it is from the surrounding countryside), and i am very pleased to have been selected to exhibit here in 2011...
this is the view of my art as you enter the third room of the gallery. my paintings are hung along the church-side wall (the gallery is directly opposite st mary's church - i discovered some interesting lichens in the graveyard). note the ceiling with its old oak beams and the impressive inglenook fireplace - when i learnt that one could hang artwork in the fireplaces my red edgescape painting 'rost' simply shouted to be included in this show. the floor (covered by some matting, under which i presume to be the original oak floorboards) has a gracefully uneven character about it too...
here are three of my abstract farmscape paintings from 2010, and this is their first public exhibition. i wondered if they might look a little too dark, cold or austere in this room as they are quite muted & monochromatic, but actually the light in the space seems to bring out the subtlety of colours and surface textures...
this is looking back along the long expanse of white wall (it's about 7 metres, with a casement window in the centre - this photograph is a bit washed-out), with the three farmscape paintings at the far end, another large edgescape painting, this one is called fenn, and then three canvases making their small entrance from the right...
the large abstract painting fenn once again and six small works seen to the right, which leads around to the second fireplace in this room... i wanted quite a lot of whitespace around the painting fenn, but the green hue is subtly reflected in both farmscape II to the left and the three small abstract canvases situated on the right...
these are three new canvases from my ongoing travelling 'iCons' series, wildwood I, II and III. i kind of broke my self-imposed rules of the iCons by giving all three abstract canvases the same title, but they had to be seen together in a sequence...
to the right of the narrow doorway that leads back to the staircase are three more 'iCons', siena, congo (there is a mention of congo here) and redwood. i chose to exhibit these three canvases together because of the obvious textural similarities to the architectural features of the room (dark oak beams and red brickwork)...
this photograph perhaps shows better how these three small canvases complemented or just 'clicked' in this particular location; i think that they hold their own quite well.i am always reminded when i exhibit my work how very naturalistic, earthy and rustic my palette is for an abstract artist. it is a renewed sense of clarity about my work that i can't always seem to realise within the confines of my very small studio.there was perhaps another plan in my proposed layout for this exhibition, well a formative idea at least (that i was able to achieve in the end), that all my paintings if viewed from left to right would naturally transition from rusty red to deep brown or violet grey on to green and then into brown and rusty red again.so, with all the paintings installed (as i had them originally mapped out on graph paper) i left the art gallery with a sense of all things in their rightful & purposeful place - and, at just that moment it began to rain. ever so slightly at first, like an erratic, hesitant wind-blown spray, an is-it-raining-or-not sort of rain, even though heavy rain showers had indeed been forecast, and it had been a blustery and overcast morning. soon enough the rain came down good and proper, but it was not enough of a downpour to call it a torrential rainstorm. the first fall of rain that afternoon brought about a fresh, dewy lustre to even the most parched of things - and the light green of the blossoming hedgerows were instantly repainted in a deeper, more luscious, vibrant green hue, set against the pale violet-grey sky.this change in the atmospheric conditions, from so many days of sun to the cooler, changeable air seemed, metaphorically speaking, as if other matters were slowly shifting in alignment too. at least, this is what i momentarily thought as i headed back - mindful of the similarity to driving which focuses your attention on the road ahead but with a watchful glance back every now and again. the small window on the world that i was looking through was, at every precise sweep of the windscreen wipers, also clearing out the unnecessary clutter in my mind. i have some art out in the real world and can concentrate on some printmaking again.given the simple title of this exhibition, i hope that my paintings will provide a small glimpse into my 'abstracted' world. i will have to visit the exhibition again as there wasn't the opportunity to fully appreciate the other artists' work at the private view, but it was most interesting to meet the other artists and talk with friends and old acquaintances - and it transpires that i have previously been in group exhibitions with both anthea eames and john midgley - and perhaps it sort of makes natural sense, really - it is in the landscape of east anglia.the exhibition 'six abstract painters' is on until wednesday 15 june 2011, and i hope it will, to coin a well-worn phrase, be something of an eye-opener to anyone who might consider 'abstract painting' is only about colour, pattern or moving paint around on a canvas until it looks 'right'. all the painters in this exhibition respond to the 'landscape', the implicit emotional engagement or dialogue that exists between the artist, the places where they live or work and the substance or language of paint . i think i might write more about this particular aspect in another post, after i have revisited the exhibition......Six Abstract Painters, Halesworth Gallery, Steeple End, opp. St Mary's Church, Halesworth, Suffolk, IP19 8LL, 28 May to 15 June 2011, open daily, Monday-Saturday 11am to 5pm, Sundays 2pm - 5pm...*please note, due to the unique character and age of the building those with mobility issues will find the steep, narrow stairs to the upstairs gallery difficult. please call the gallery on 01986 873064 should you require any assistance or more information prior to your visit...
more art made by mother nature
an altogether more natural artistic intervention in the landscape - the somewhat startling sight first witnessed on a sunday drive to the supermarket - a short stretch of rambling hedgerow wrapped in a fine, gossamer grey web. i passed the spot on two further occasions, and on the third drive-by pulled over to take a closer look... (photographs taken with a mobile phone)
i think it may have been a hawthorn or perhaps a spindle or elder bush but there was really nothing of it left, just a skeleton... cautiously peering into the faintly spooky, sticky mesh of fibres i could see hundreds of off-white, wriggly things...i later googled caterpillars and webs and ascertained this was a colony of ermine moth larvae or caterpillars (later to become ermine moths) and they can completely envelop a tree or a shrub to keep predators from attacking their growing colony (which here must amount to many thousands of soon-to-be caterpillars!). i discovered a similar infestation has occurred in a public park in yorkshire... maybe it's the prolonged spell of dry weather...
quite fascinating and yet mildly frightening in a way too, alluding to a small act of god's damnation, a biblical allusion to the great plagues of egypt, or nature just proving its powers again - we are all doomed!.. but i think i'll let you decide...
an obvious art-historical reference sprung to mind - the wrapped trees of christo & jean-claude...wrapping up the landscape, here looking especially marvellous in the early morning (or is it evening?) light...
[Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Wrapped Trees, Fondation Beyeler and Berower Park, Riehen, Switzerland, 1997-98 (Photo: Wolfgang Volz) © 1998 Christo]the trees still look ghostly but seem alive (this is winter), with the appearance of fluffy clouds that have just landed or are about to take off, the trees not tightly bound or swaddled into submission as other artists have done...
[Christo and Jeanne-Claude, Wrapped Trees, Fondation Beyeler and Berower Park, Riehen, Switzerland, 1997-98 (Photo: Wolfgang Volz) © 1998 Christo]curiously, it was about this time last year that i chanced upon or found some found or readymade art in the landscape (albeit of a humanly-constructed kind) - what is it about the month of may, i wonder?...