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Sunday, 2 December 2012
so I saw Judy Chicago! .(scribbled at 11:10 )
I
stumbled across this image earlier this morning, taken at Egg Café when I was
last in Liverpool which reminds me to tell you if you didn't venture up
towards that part of the not-so-bleak north for the Liverpool Biennial, then you missed out folks. (Or
down south, if you’re in anywhere north of Leeds)
I’ve been up to Liverpool since that photograph was taken,
to have a look around the unmissable John Moores Painting Prize. Running until
January next year, it brings curatorial together decisions from Alan Yentob OBE,
Creative Director of the BBC; Turner Prize Nominees Fiona Banner, George Shaw
and Angela de la Cruz, as well as Whitechapel Gallery’s Director, Iwona
Blazwick. Creating a blockbuster show of painting, the chosen entries vary from Elizabeth Gill (who's had her work featured in the Government
Art Collection) to lesser known and younger artists like Tom Pitt. I’m pretty
sure it’s been their (the JMU Painting Prize’s) tag line forever that David Hockney was a previous winner, but I guess they
can justify repeating that endlessly, considering the plethora of talent that
gets exhibited every year. Seriously, I
think it’s inevitable that many of those who get through may become household
names one day.
There were some really beautiful works there, as well as a
good selection of achingly cool contemporary ones that challenged your perception of
what painting could be and how it isn’t necessarily restricted to its familiar
canvas context. Like Bernat Daviu’s Overall
Paintings, which are kind of exactly what they say on the tin: painted overalls.
I’m a bit shit at selling his work here, but these were pretty cool. I was also
rather surprised when I saw Amikam Toren’s ‘Armchair
Painting- Untitled’ (The Unthinkable) . Now that was bizarre. Having only first came across Toren earlier this
Summer when he was part of The London
Open at Whitechapel Gallery, I would never have guessed that Toren’s work
would look anything like a mediocre cheap landscape with the words THE
UNTHINKABLE scalpel’d out of the canvas. Dramatic, and somewhat rebellious, it
seems that Toren is here for a reaction more than anything. The cut out
painting was also protected by a standard Perspex box, which added to the drama
of having to admire a slashed canvas quite nicely actually.
(Image courtesy of the Liverpool Museums website) Here’s one
of my potential favourites, ‘M is Many’ by
Ian Law:
Also, I popped over Eastcastle Street for the Manfred Mohr private
view at Carroll / Fletcher, I really like his work so I’ll be making a return
visit within the next few weeks before Christmas fever hits Oxford Circus...
And went along to the Piper Gallery for the first time, situated just on
Newman Street. It’s a brilliant space (a glass floor is always impressive…),
and we were lucky enough to get a behind the scenes peek too! I was introduced
to its director, Megan Piper, who told me about the gallery’s agenda of only
representing artists whose career had spanned 40 years or more. That’s a fairly
unique gallery altogether then, and I suppose you could assume that’s quite a
safe decision too. Anyway, the series of abstract paintings from the seventies
that are currently hanging there are worth heading over to Fitzrovia for
altogether…
and one of the highlights of the past month has been seeing Judy Chicago. In the flesh. Up close. She was leading a talk and discussion at Whitechapel Gallery a few weeks ago, and I luckily managed to get a ticket before the event sold out. It had become fully booked fairly rapidly, so the gallery had to run additional screenings in another room. By something of a miracle, I'd nabbed a much coveted front row seat so I ended up virtually sitting opposite Chicago as she sat on stage at the Zilkha Auditorium, speaking to us all about her practice and Feminism throughout art history.
Talking through her entire practice, from her large scale
paintings all the way through to her current practice via embroidery which she
says ‘kind of backed into’, Chicago is someone you won’t forget in a hurry. Née
Judith Sylvia Cohen, it seems that ever her first ever works caused a little
controversy when she studied at UCLA; she distinctly remembers her art being
received as too radical amongst
lecturers. Adopting the use of spray paint shortly after finishing art school (she
trained amongst car sprayers), Chicago created enormous paintings that emulated
the masochistic LA arts scene, works that focused on technique and colour and
how these could essentially, merge together. Rather than oil paint, that just
sits and cements itself upon the canvas.
More than anything, I really liked the overwhelming feel of passion she executed by just talking about The Dinner Party. Her attachment to the work, even now, is just phenomenal. Chicago could recount every place that the iconic work had travelled to, and told us all about how she had felt somewhat naïve when realising that gifting one of your works to a museum or institution doesn't necessarily mean it will ever be displayed, and often the reality of this is your object being put into a museum basement for twenty years. ..
Also rather mind blowing, was Bronze at the Royal Academy. I went a few weeks ago for a Friday late opening and was pleasantly surprised from the moment I entered the first
gallery space. The Dancing Satyr from the 4th Century BCE is just... incredible.
Admittedly,
whenever I visit museums and galleries I have a slight habit of not giving
quite enough time to bronze sculpture. I understand the process is completely
fascinating, but I guess whenever I look at stone and marble it's a little more visceral. What I really liked about Bronze though, was the way that its focus was primarily on the
material itself. Okay- that sounds a little obvious, but the exhibition didn’t
lend itself to focusing on famous bronze sculptors at all, instead its prime
purpose seemed to be teaching us about the alloy’s versatility and how
techniques and approaches to its use have gradually altered since 3000BCE, when
copper was alloyed with lead to create a more fluid consistency. Rather than order the works by date, the RA opted for a thematic approach, which was actually far more interesting!
... and after months of indecisiveness, I caved in and got these black leather converse from Kurt Geiger:
Labels: ART DESIGN AND ARCHITECTURE, Bronze, Bronze Exhibition, Carroll Fletcher Gallery, Egg Café, John Moores Painting Prize, Manfred Mohr, Royal Academy
