Christmas

Christmas 2014

... is the time for special things to happen!

Pipa’s waiting for Santa while the turkey is in preparation!

To many choices to eat in front of the fireplace!

Azeitona’ well deserved rest on Christmas Day!

Pipilotti Rist: Worry Will Vanish

Pipilotti Rist
Worry Will Vanish
Hauser & Wirth

"Christmas is the time for special things to happen!"

In «‘Worry Will Vanish’, Rist has transformed the gallery into a fully immersive, sensory environment. Projected against two walls, ‘Worry Will Vanish Horizon’ (2014) is a journey inside the human body, based on a three-dimensional animation. Rist delights in patterns created by manipulating creases of skin, caressing, pushing and pulling to depict the varied textures of human flesh. These corporeal images periodically overlap with close-up fragments from nature as Rist blurs the boundaries between the self and organic structures. She explores the relationship between internal and external, how individuals are linked to the tissues and blood vessels of other organisms, and in so doing, she suggests relationships with the universe at large.» [... MORE ...]

«Pipilotti Rist was born in Grabs in the Swiss Rhine Valley in 1962. Since emerging on the international art scene in the mid-1980s and 1990s with famous single channel videos such as ‘I’m Not The Girl Who Misses Much’ (1986) and ‘Pickelporno’ (1992), Rist has had numerous solo and group exhibitions and is one of the most celebrated video artists working today. In 2009 Rist was awarded the Joan Miró Prize for her wide-ranging creative activity and her outstanding contribution to the current artistic scene by Fundació Joan Miró, Barcelona, Spain. For her first feature film, ‘Pepperminta’ (2009), in 2009 Rist was awarded the President of the Jury’s Extraordinary Award at Spain’s 6th Seville European Film Festival and in 2010 she received the ‘Cutting the Edge Award’ by Miami International European Film Festival. In 2012, Rist was awarded the Harper’s Bazaar Art China prize for ‘Best Artist’ and in June 2013, she was awarded the Zurich Festival Prize 2013.

Recent solo exhibitions include ‘Gentle Wave in Your Eye Fluid’, Times Museum in Guangzhou, China (2013); ‘Pipilotti Rist. A la belle étoile’, Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington, Seattle WA (2012); ‘Pipilotti Rist – Spear to heaven!’, LEEUM Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, Korea; ‘Blutbetriebene Kameras und quellende Räume’, Kunstmuseum St. Gallen, Switzerland (2012); ‘Eyeball Massage’, Hayward Gallery, London, England (2011) which travelled to Kunsthalle Mannheim, Mannheim, Germany (2012); ‘Parasimpatico’, Fondazione Nicola Trussardi, Cinema Manzoni, Milan, Italy (2011); ‘Pipilotti Rist. Partit amistós – sentiments electrónics’, Fundació Joan Miró & Centre Cultura Caixa Girona Fontana d’Or, Barcelona / Girona, Spain (2010); ‘Elixir – The video organism of Pipilotti Rist’, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, Netherlands (2009); ‘Pour Your Body Out (7354 Cubic Metres)’, MoMA, New York NY (2008) and ‘A la belle étoile’, Centre Pompidou, Paris, France (2007).» [... MORE ...]

A London

A London in December.

Martin Parr: Black Country Stories

Martin Parr
Black Country Stories
The New Art Gallery Walsall

«The New Art Gallery Walsall is a modern and contemporary art gallery sited in the centre of the West Midlands town of Walsall, England. It was built with £21 million of public funding, including £15.75 million from the UK National Lottery and additional money from the European Regional Development Fund and City Challenge. Its first Director was Peter Jenkinson. In May 2005, former BALTIC director Stephen Snoddy was appointed as Director.»

«Over the last 4 years, Magnum photographer, Martin Parr, has created a photographic portrait and archive of life in the Black Country through photography, film and oral histories.

Martin has made many visits to Walsall, Wolverhampton, Sandwell and Dudley, meeting a wide range of local people. He has visited shops and markets, places of worship, football grounds, factories, pubs and clubs, dances and parties, cafés and restaurants, dog training classes, summer fêtes and street parties celebrating the Royal Wedding and Diamond Jubilee.» [... MORE ...]

At least in China you can still smoke inside public spaces... not like in the demagogue Western free world!

«Martin Parr was born in Epsom, Surrey, UK, in 1952. Martin Parr studied photography at Manchester Polytechnic, from 1970 to 1973. Since that time, Martin Parr has worked on numerous photographic projects. He has developed an international reputation for his innovative imagery, his oblique approach to social documentary, and his input to photographic culture within the UK and abroad. In 1994 he became a full member of Magnum Photographic Corporation. Martin developed an interest in filmmaking, and has started to use his photography within different conventions, such as fashion and advertising. In 2002 the Barbican Art Gallery and the National Media Museum initiated a large retrospective of Martin Parr’s work. Martin Parr was Professor of Photography at The University of Wales Newport campus from 2004 to 2012, and Guest Artistic Director for Rencontres D’Arles in 2004. In 2006 Martin Parr was awarded the Erich Salomon Prize and the resulting Assorted Cocktail show opens at Photokina. In 2008 Martin Parr was guest curator at New York Photo Festival, curating the New Typologies exhibition. Parrworld opened at Haus de Kunst, Mucich, in 2008. The show exhibited Parr’s own collection of objects, postcards, his personal photography collection of both British and International artists, photo books and finally his own photographs. At PhotoEspana, 2008, wins the Baume et Mercier award in recognition of his professional career and contributions to contemporary photography. More recently Martin has just completed a 4-year project documenting the Black Country, an area of the English West Midlands, in conjunction with Multistory. Phaidon have published the third volume of the highly influential History of the Photobook in Spring 2014 and Martin is also working on a book about the History of Chinese Photobooks to be published by Aperture in Spring 2015. Martin Parr has published over 80 books of his own work and edited another 30.» [... MORE ...]

I am here seated and thinking about an interesting angle on Tate’s 2014 Turner Prize

I think it is amazing what time-lapse can cause to a particular cause. People complaint about the 80s, for instances, but it may not be the proclaimed principle. The main thing about it is that it worked on the subcultural level, with extreme levels of creativity to inform about a cause deserving our attention, a movement that advocated a deep commitment to support a socio-political whatsoever - being it a lesbian or gay cause, negritude or colonialism, or, even, Samantha Fox's completely dressed performance in 'Touch Me', which is still more social-cultural provocative than Miley Cyrus almost naked performances.

We need public interventions like those, when the questioning was also relevant, not the cynical entertainment that we are offered on a constant base, by the present days, of abstract ideas documenting our ordinary everyday life routines; go and redefine off so terrible moments. The abysmal thing to say, to transform a dull language, either it be about (gratuitous) images from nipples, dicks, vaginas, anus or a person's pubic hair… whatever! Do not want to trivialise, but this idea is packed of trivial topics. Definitely, if the 80s were whatever they were, the 00s and the 10s are worse!

Hiroshi Sugimoto: Still Life

Hiroshi Sugimoto
Still Life
Pace London

Hiroshi Sugimoto, Olympic Rain Forest (gelatin silver print), 2012 [Detail]

A copy of a copy of another copy from a possible copy. We're way beyond simulations and simulacrum; from the original and reality - whatever that could be. We're living through perceptions, memories of what could have been, and not what can be, just like in a cinema projection, in a computer screen. Seeing, wanting to increasingly see what that's not to see anymore. Not even a shadow of a figure.

Hiroshi Sugimoto, Olympic Rain Forest (gelatin silver print), 2012 [Detail]

Reality doesn't make any sense when one's all alone in a place packed of model bodies, financial professionals, carnal environments. It is like those photos of dioramas by Hiroshi Sugimoto. Empty backgrounds for a lifeless life. Destitute of life and all other living beings it is not worth living. Even when love subdue time and space. I do miss those physical sensations, those intense feelings gained from bodily interactions. It is a big Still Life of void and emptiness. One of these days I will get in to one of those non-smoking places and smoke. Will stay as long as I want and no one, no one will say a damn thing about it.

Hiroshi Sugimoto, California Condor (gelatin silver print), 1994 [Detail]

«Hiroshi Sugimoto (b. 1948, Tokyo, Japan) has defined what it means to be a multi-disciplined contemporary artist, blurring the lines between photography, painting, installation, and most recently, architecture. His iconic photographs have bridged Eastern and Western ideologies, tracing the origins of time and societal progress along the way. Preserving and picturing memory and time is a central theme of Sugimoto’s photography, including the ongoing series Dioramas (1976– ), Theaters (1978– ), and Seascapes (1980– ). His work is held in numerous public collections including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo; The National Gallery, London; The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo; Smithsonian Institute of Art, Washington, D.C., and Tate, London, among others.» [... MORE ...]

Egon Schiele: The Radical Nude

Egon Schiele
The Radical Nude
The Courtauld Institute of Art

«Woman in boots with raised skirt, 1918
Black crayon
This drawing shows Schiele at the heights of his powers as a draughtsman, in what would prove to be the last year of his life. Deftly rendered in black crayon, the difficulty of capturing the woman's complex pose is made to look effortless. Indeed, our attention is consumed by her seductive gaze and the glimpse of her exposed vagina. The drawing epitomises Schiele's ability in his last years to combine provocation, erotism, technical virtuosity and aesthetic beauty in a single image.»

Turner Prize 2014

Turner Prize 2014
Tate Britain

«Tris Vonna-Michell has been nominated for his solo exhibition Postscript (Berlin) at Jan Mot, Brussels.

Through fast-paced spoken word live performances and audio recordings Vonna-Michell (born Southend, 1982) tells circuitous and multilayered stories. Accompanied by a ‘visual script’ of slide projections, photocopies and other ephemera, his works are characterised by fragments of information, detours and dead ends.»

Some or all of the events in these absurd tales may never have occurred, yet all are narrated with a breathless persuasiveness so as to seem tentatively real. Sam Thorne, Frieze [... MORE ...]

«Ciara Phillips has been nominated for her solo exhibition at The Showroom, London.

Phillips works with all kinds of prints: from screenprints and textiles to photos and wall paintings. She often works collaboratively, transforming the gallery into a workshop and involving other artists, designers and local community groups. Phillips has taken inspiration from Corita Kent (1918–1986), a pioneering artist, educator and activist who reinterpreted the advertising slogans and imagery of 1960s consumer culture.

For the exhibition that won her the nomination she turned London’s The Showroom gallery into a print workshop, inviting designers, artists and local women’s groups to come and make prints with her. Born in Canada in 1976, she now lives in Glasgow.»

Phillips is a brilliant print maker who imbues the medium with a freshness that is remarkable, in posters, prints and textiles. Moira Jeffrey, The Scotsman [... MORE ...]

«James Richards has been nominated for his contribution to The Encyclopaedic Palace at the 55th Venice Biennale.

Richards weaves together his emotive films from a diverse range of found and original footage to explore the pleasure of the act of looking. Found VHS video and new imagery undergo varying levels of manipulation and repetition and, with an accompanying soundtrack, heighten the emotional and psychological range of the original.

Born in 1983 in Cardiff, Richards was nominated for Rosebud, which includes close-ups of art books in a Tokyo library – the genitalia scratched out to comply with censorship laws.»

Richards generates meaning through abundance, by way of allusion, ellipsis and unity of tone, the lack of legibility counterbalanced by a strong sense of mood. The White Review [... MORE ...]

«Duncan Campbell (born Dublin, 1972) has been nominated for his contribution to Scotland’s pavilion at the Venice Biennale. Responding to Chris Marker and Alan Resnais’ 1953 film Statues Also Die, Campbell’s It for Others included new work by choreographer Michael Clark.

Campbell makes films about controversial figures such the Irish political activist Bernadette Devlin or the quixotic car manufacturer John DeLorean. By mixing archive footage and new material, he questions and challenges the documentary form.»

He’s a really compelling filmmaker. I’ve noticed that when his films are shown in galleries people will sit through 45 minutes and no one will leave. Jennifer Higgie, Frieze editor[... MORE ...]

Loose thoughts on the Turner Prize 2014 artworks: fragments, emptiness; ...; gratuitous, personal; documentation, fiction, colonialism, art market, capitalism, neo-liberalism, conditions of uncertainty, meaningness prices

Gerhard Richter

Gerhard Richter
Marian Goodman Gallery