Pierre Huyghe at Hauser & Wirth in Saville Row London.

 

 

Even though I have been very busy I managed to see another exhibition in central London, by French artist Pierre Huyghe at the Hauser & Writh Gallery in Saville Row London called 'In Border Deep'. At first I thought the gallery was shut because it looked completely blacked out from the outside; I pushed their main door anyway to find out they were actually open but blacked out for the exhibition for which they are keeping three aquariums in the main gallery. Some had fish inside with lights that switched on and off. I was a bit concerned for the welfare of the fish because in one particular acquarium the light kept flicking but also because the acquarium looked dirty, but maybe it's ok I am no specialist in aquariums. The aquariums are positioned on the left hand side of the Gallery next to each other while next to them on the right was a film showing and at the back another film was showing but in the sections of the aquarium there was also what looked like a red painting going across the room and in front of it a stone sitting on top of sand. I mean it was quite dark in the gallery so I couldn't see it that clearly because the whole Gallery was blacked out; I felt like I was inside an underworld. The way the works were set out in the gallery was coherent as there was space between them and it worked well with the films been positioned on the right and at the back of the gallery. 

 

Pic taken of the aquariums when lights inside the Gallery were on.

Apparently the three aquariums contain biotopes from Monet's ponds in Giverny but I didn't see any water lilies floating on the surface of Huygh's ponds and one is supposed to see them. Strange. Inside the aquariums are supposedly sunken man-made objects that have been modified over time by the erosion of the water, I guess, natural elements. But I didn't see any. The lighting sequence  is programmed to a fast-paced rendering of the variations in weather conditions as recorded at Giverny between 1914-1918, when Monet painted the 'Nympheas' which are in the Musee de l'Orangerie. The light sequences for each aquarium follow the shortest day of the year in 1914, the autumn of 1917, and the entire four year period. I wouldn't have known any of this if the Gallery assistant (who was very nice) hadn't told me. I did notice the lights timings were different as one was flickering but I have to say the flickering was bothering me and I was wondering how would it affect the fish? So I focused more on the aquarium with a slower pace of light. Looking at aquariums is reported to lower your heart-beat.

 

 

In front of three aquariums  I saw a reclining figure, a concrete cast, a headless sculpture which looked covered in moss (above). I was told again by the gallery assistant that inside of it there was a heating device that encouraged the growth of vegetation, and apparently I was supposed to notice that the sculpture  was 'emanating a body temperature' like a human body. I failed to notice any of this and if I hadn't asked the gallery assistant or read the Gallery leaflet I don't think in the dark room I would have noticed anything at all. At least it was coherent with the 'theme' of the exhibition. It represents an anti monument as it is not fixed and is continuously evolving.

 

Film De-extinction 2014

Going on to the two films, the first I watched was  the one at the back of the Gallery which was apparently the starting point in the exhibition ( I went to the fish tanks first because they were closer to the main entrance) where Huyghe uses microscopic and macroscopic motion-controlled cameras to record insects encased in amber. Actually they are done so close up that sometimes it looks blurred to the point that could look like moving paintings. I did find it really relaxing to watch, they are slow moving, combined with the soundrack similar to a mechanical shuttle which I didn't hear very well, indeed at points I thought it was soundless. I think actual music would have added to the piece. Anyway, the film is done in consecutive close up frames where Huyghe explores the idea of 'an instant frozen in time'.

 

Film The Human Mask 2014

The other film titled: 'Human Mask' is a dystopian setting where an animal acts out the human condition; the animal is trapped; apparently this is inspired by a real monkey in Japan that has to wear the mask of a young woman and has been trained to be a waitress; I mean really weird.. it has a dark undertone. At the back of the aquariums I saw a stone on the floor which for Huyghe marks 'the origin of man and the development of rudimentary engineering'. Really?  Above is a work called 'the Clearing' apparently made from sanded down layers of paint from the wall's surface exploring the wall as a body, as something alive, what is left of human remains.... again I didn't notice this due to the room being dark.

 

 

I saw what looked like a painting on a wall (above on the left hand-side) and only found out about it because I read the Gallery leaflet. Anyway it combines with the rest of the work with the overall theme of the exhibition. Because the whole gallery was blacked out and by the way the works were positioned in the Gallery I felt like I was in an enclosed space, a cocoon in which one could walk around the gallery in a circular way surrounded by living organisms. This shows that the artist is interested in growth and change as the aquariums and the sculpture are living organisms that constantly grow and change so that the gallery becomes a container where new events and encounters take place, but in conditions and context that are imposed by the artist. Each aquarium for example is a mini theatre with the fish being the performers. Huyghe said in interviews that ' you throw a piece of banana in a compost and there will be a metabolisation. It's not that the banana disappears, but it will do something else? It will achieve a different intensity of being a banana. That's what I am interested in, this banana-ness and this variation of intensity and how things leak into each other'. So he is not interested in the end but more in the transition, he constructs a play.The live elements, like for example the fish inside the aquariums, can create something umpredictable and in doing so change the rhythm of the work so the work itself is continuously changing which will affect the time and space and will help to draw in the viewer, It sent me into a meditative state in some ways; anyway it was a consistent, interesting exhibition with elements of surprise and darkness.

 

Adriano Costa at Sadie Coles Gallery, London.

I haven't been blogging since June. I just had the worst summer. I decided that if I want to get back in my University course I have really got to start again blogging.  I have been thinking... how can I do the last year at University if I can't even concentrate on basic things? So I thought if at least I can start back on my blog maybe later I can start working back on my thesis again; so here I am. The first exhibition I got to see is the one by Brazilian artist Adriano Costa (BA Universidade de Sao Paolo) at Sadie Coles Gallery, titled: Touch me I am Geometrically Sensitive. It was the first time I went in the Sadie Coles Gallery in Kingly Street which is at the back of Carnaby street, in a street full of restaurants and bars, very centrally located. From inside the gallery one can see busy Regent Street; it is easy to get to. Inside the exhibition space most of Costa's work is shown together in one large room; the works are closely displayed so that you really can't focus long on one particular work.

His work was made over a period of two months while he was staying in London which was to lead to the exhibition, and using all sorts of objects that he could find around from rugs to bricks, but I feel that some of the objects he chose were not just found but purchased especially in one particular piece called Bartira/Suggestion for Furniture - here the ladders looked brand new and also in Untitled, which undermines a bit of the spontaneous concept implied by the Gallery in their leaflet  and by most art critics: 'mostly gathered in situ - harness of everyday daily objects', yes he does use some daily objects but it is not spontaneous work, it is thought through and is not entirely whatever was to hand for inspiration. I would say Adriano Costa is also a 'conceptual/referential artist': he reminded me of Brazilian modernist Helio Oiticica in his use of plants and wood and in the tea towel tapestry, and there is also reference in his work to Carl Andre'.

 

Overall the room looks busy and messy because all the works are so closely put together so I didn't feel I could focus much on one piece. He combines a different range of forms, materials (mainly industrial), and colours but the colours are not really dominant in his work, form and materials and geometrical shape have priority in his work.

Some works are bigger in scale than others, some are suspended while others are more earth bound.In some of his work, by using common materials and being playful with their combination like putting foam inside Perspex, suspending socks for example, he is showing how a supposedly uninteresting material can be made into art, but this is not a new idea it has been done before. Even if the work is playful I really didn't feel it was 'art of the incidental' like the Gallery states, it is not at all, it is well thought out one can see this by the way the work is positioned in the space. There are paintings made into geometrical patterns; some work better then others but I didn't feel they added anything to the rest or added anything new to what has been done before by other artists. I felt they were the weak link in the exhibition;

I mean they were really average, like the squares on a board, and the artwork called Norwegian Cheese (pic. above), they didn't add much to the other pieces; also the newspaper cut out and frames with some of the things happening during his stay in London in the news added nothing more to the exhibition.  What's the point of this? Is he trying to say that a lot of contemporary art is useless? Which seems to me the opposite of what he says in his other work. He said that he used the newspaper cut-outs to understand the country he is living in, which I find odd. I don't think you can really understand a country by only living in it for two months and cutting things out from a newspaper and then by framing them he is saying anything can be art and he is making fun of the art world, despite showing his work in a major art gallery. But the rough newspaper cut outs and the dark smartly polished frame didn't really go together and he has made a point in previous exhibitions of not using frames or pedestals as part of his work as he said in interviews, so what he is doing now is not consistent with what he has done before.

He  did use some recycled materials, polythene bags recycled from different London Boroughs so basically using them in a different way. What I do question is the fact that the way he uses the materials is not really ground breaking and has been done before by other British artists. Why is a major British gallery asking a Brasilian artist to do work about London instead of showing hs work about Brasil which is better?!

There are a lot of artists in London in British Universities working on similar concepts in very innovative and interesting ways but they don't seem to be taken by some major British Galleries, there are hardly any major galleries going around universities in London to see what is available; they seem to prefer taking artists from the USA and Germany mainly or from other countries. So I really do feel bad about a lot of English students that are paying £9000 per year with poor studio space who don't have access to studio space outside of University because they can't afford the high fees in London and on top of that galleries don't even look at their work or promote them, and there are hardly any scholarsips or sponsorships for art students but they are getting charged the same as students of other faculties who don't have to spend money on art materials.

And they have to compete also with a lot of other artists from Europe who don't pay the £9000 per year fees but only up to £1800 and they have to compete with Scottish students who pay only £1800 per year. I think English art students are currently really badly treated in their own country which opens the door to another argument: that of the politics in the art world on how they choose artists.  I am amazed by the dedication of a lot of British art students at my University who work hard to achieve the best in really difficult financial circumstances.