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Wednesday, 1 August 2012

Artist Details


WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?

THE ARTISTS
Ralph Anderson     
  www.ralphresearchfolio.wordpress.com

Tim Barnes   
 www.timbarnesstudio.com

Sasha Bowles   


Josue Borges   

Karen David   
www.karendavid.org.uk
 

Alice Eikelpoth   

Phil Elbourne   

Matt Gee   









Tuesday, 31 July 2012

The Exhibition


WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?

THE EXHIBITION
THE GARAGE


THE ENTRANCE

The opening night was a great success with
over 100 guests attending.

 A big thank-you to everyone who came to support us.

Many thanks to Jasmin Mackenzie for manning the bar and to Charlotte Trower for her tireless help and enthusiasm.



CICADAS IN THE SILENCE OVERLOOKING ANN-MARIE’S BOOKPLATES




THE FAR END





WE ARE ALMOST PERFECT





FROZEN LIME PEARL AND SHELL



JASMIN MACKENZIE CHECKS OUT SASHA BOWLES AND TIM BARNES’ WORK




JOSUE BORGES VIEWS PHIL ELBOURNE’S DIGITAL FILM







MATT GEE’S FROZEN LIME STANDS IN THE FOREGROUND OF SASHA’S TOPOGRAPHY OF DOLOUR




KAREN DAVID’S ‘PINK,GREEN,CHALK AND ARAGONITE ENGAGES WITH ITS SURROUNDINGS





LOOKING FROM THE SIDE ROOM INTO THE MAIN ‘GALLERY’





THE GEE FAMILY GETTING TO GRIPS WITH ‘FRUIT OF THE SEA’





RALPH ANDERSON’S BLACK RAINBOW



ALICE EIKELPOTH AND PHIL ELBOURNE




SASHA BOWLES ‘A TOPOGRAPHY OF DOLOUR’ ALONGSIDE ‘ANCHORING THE TEMPEST’






TIM BARNES EXPLAINS THE IMPORTANCE OF SILENCE IN SOUND SCULPTURE TO CHARLOTTE TROWER




ALICE AND MILO MEASURE UP FOR NEW TEETH






JOSUE BORGES’ WE ARE ALMOST PERFECT (DETAIL)


ART LOVERS ENJOYING A DRINK OR TWO OUTSIDE












The Discussion


WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?





THE DISCUSSION


The discussion event on Friday 27 July was a great success and well attended despite clashing with the Olympics ceremony. The sun shone and tea and beer was served alongside Alice Eikelpoth’s delicious carrot cake and biscuits iced with the words ‘WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE? Thank-you Alice!



Philip Elbourne took charge of the proceedings and an intense debate ensued; at which point a fearless large black rat popped its head out of the drain right in the centre of us all and lightened the mood.


SOME OF THE REFERENCES FOR THE DEBATE WERE:

Artie Vierkant’s The Image Object Post-internet


Louis Doulas’ Within Post-Internet, Part One


Gene McHugh’s Post-internet blog


Mark Hutchinson’s Painting in the Age of Digital Reproduction




Phil’s Questions/discussion points:

In contrast to mechanical reproduction, painting produces unique objects, marked by the labour of the artist. In contrast to digital reproduction, it produces a substantial, material surface. Paint has unique qualities…


The bias towards the surface of the screen, nudges artists towards exploring different types of bodily shock effects.  The relationship of the body to the computer screen after all is different than that of the body to the physical painting in space

These cybernetic relationships create a desire for clicking, scrolling, and following—dynamic motion premised on sifting through an accumulation of data rather than gazing for very long at a single pattern of light


Artists after the Internet take on a role more closely aligned to that of the interpreter, transcriber, narrator, curator, architect.

Some of the subjects that came up for discussion were:

Phil Elbourne’s solo show on Ruben’s phone.

Nothing is in a fixed state: i.e. everything is anything else. Does ‘immaterialised’ necessarily mean ‘equalised’?

Attention as currency: has it always been, how do we deal with this? Is power held by those who present things as worthy of attention?

The internet is more ‘real’

A performative viewing process?

‘Hanging out’

Artist defined by the choices they make – i.e. indistinguishable from consumer.

Noise: the white cube versus the blank page.
Specific questions:




Jeff: Someone recently said of your paintings that ‘One of the reasons your paintings appear to keep updating themselves is that in the face of our increasingly ‘virtual’ world of the digital, your very real and tangible painted surfaces of bubbles (read pixels), pipes (read optical fibre cables) and montage scenes (read computer windows opened together on a single screen) are keeping Painting ahead of the game.’ Are these elements of your paintings conscious mimicries of digital phenomena, and if so how do you tackle the ‘perversity’ of depicting the immaterial in a very material way?




Anna: Your work examines the notion of the party. ‘Amassing energy, collecting, grouping in order to improve, impress, alter, intimidate or overwhelm. Events devised by, with and for groups of people deal with the invitation as concept. The following rhetorical formula is tied up in the work: to achieve a celebration - to celebrate an achievement.’ Is it fair to say that both your medium and your subject matter are people? So how does your work interact with the internet, a medium that fosters isolation?




Tom: Coming from a gallery point-of-view, have the ideas of ‘ubiquitous authorship’ and ‘ubiquitous ownership’ affected the way galleries operate? Traditionally, a curator or gallerist, as a single voice, in their choice of what to show, defines what’s ‘good’, which is usually a cultural object clearly authored by an individual or small group. Now, images and ideas cannot be ‘owned’ exclusively.

Thank-you to everyone who came and joined in the debate. There were no solid conclusions made by the end of the discussion. The group all seemed to believe there was some role to be played by the internet in viewing art. Some people thought it was a better place to view it, being able to get even 'closer' than you ever would in 'reality', while others said they would not want to exchange the experience of seeing, feeling, hearing and smelling art in the flesh for the pixelated representation on the screen.



Wednesday, 25 July 2012

How to find us


WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?

HOW TO FIND US
THE GARAGE
60 STANWAY STREET
SARALANE LOWER LEVEL
HOXTON
N1 6RE
JUST BEHIND ‘THE HOWL AT THE MOON’ PUB
NEAREST STATION – HOXTON OR OLD STREET
SEE LINK ON WEB-SITE


WE LOOK FORWARD TO SEEING YOU THERE

Tuesday, 24 July 2012

Interview with Karen David


WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?



INTERVIEW WITH ARTIST KAREN DAVID


On a sweltering afternoon dashing about Karen took a few minutes out

Do you think there is a duality in your work between the painting as surface and the painting as object?
To me, they exist in a constant co-dependent disagreement, like an old married couple. The surface telling stories of painterly mystery, while the object reminding the surface of its limitations.
There is a great thoughtfulness in your work; where every element is considered from the exact shape of the geometric stretchers, the perfectly folded corners of the canvas, beautifully applied paint to the placement of the crystals and other objects. If one of these elements is out of place, do you feel the work is unbalanced and therefore failed in some way?                                   There is a lot of process, and like you say, a lot of consideration. I have tried to be more liberal about these decisions, but the end result never feels ‘right’ to me. Other people may not notice these seemingly small details, but I would know they are lacking and my feeling towards the painting would change.
Crystals play a large part in your work. Are they used in a cynical way or are you questioning wider beliefs?
I leave that observation up to the viewer.
Does the physical presence of your art transfer to being seen on a computer screen?
Unless your work is made up of pixels (like text-based or digital photography), being viewed on a computer screen would never really be ‘true’ to any material other than pixels.
How important do you think it is for people to engage with art in the ‘flesh’? Isn’t the internet a fantastic opportunity to access art without ever having to leave home?
To a certain degree you can get the idea of a work by viewing it on the internet, and sometimes that is enough, but at other times there’s nothing like getting close enough to a painting to inspect the surface and edges.
What are your feelings about showing in a raw gallery space such as The Garage? Does the environment in which you exhibit your work change how your work is perceived?
It’s not the space, but what you do with it that counts.
Finally, what does your screen smell like?
Amazingly, I have a ‘special’ pc which smells of whatever my screensaver is. Right now, I can smell meadows.





Sunday, 22 July 2012

Interview with Ann-Marie James


 
WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?



INTERVIEW WITH ARTIST ANN-MARIE JAMES

Ann-Marie found time to reply to a few questions on a rare sunny day in fitzrovia


Can you tell me the starting point for your work?
I am interested in taking imagery that already has an established cultural reading that I can wrestle with, adapt, exploit, examine and transform. Purloined pictorial elements from art history are veiled, conjoined, contorted, revealed, emphasized, interpreted, translated, explored, repeated, omitted and manipulated, imbuing them with a new spirit to my own ends. The hybrids that I have constructed have so far taken the form of small paintings on found book plates, pencil drawings, large scale paintings and photographic documentation of interventions made (with permission) at the Museum of Classical Archaeology at Cambridge University.



There is an intimacy to your work whereby the viewer is invited to get up close. It feels almost secretive, is this close relationship between the work and the viewer important to you?
I’d like the paintings to function both from afar and up close. There is a level of detail that invites close inspection. Whether this proximity affords a sense of “secrecy” or a “close relationship” is a question of the individual’s response to the work – something that can be encouraged but not controlled.


Do you meticulously plan your pictures from the outset or do the marks you make influence how the pictures progress?

Yes, both.


Your work has layers upon layers of references. How important is it to you that people can access all these sources buried within your work?

I’d like them to continue, over time, to reveal themselves slowly.


Within your practice you use a lot of found old books, does it feel like a sacrilege to deface them and paint on top, or is that partly the point?
Yes it does, and yes it is.


To what extent do you use the computer within your work?

“Sending emails, receiving emails, left-clicking, right-clicking – I could go on…”

Would you ever consider having an exhibition solely online?
Sure.


What does your screen smell like?
Like a sky ‘’the colour of a television screen, tuned to a dead channel.’’





Friday, 20 July 2012

Interview with Tim Barnes


WHAT DOES YOUR SCREEN SMELL LIKE?


INTERVIEW WITH ARTIST TIM BARNES

Tim managed to find time to answer a few questions between various sound distractions



You would I believe describe yourself as a kinetic sculptor. Can you describe your practice to me?
I am a kinetic sculptor, or kinetic sound sculptor to be exact. I have spent the last year searching for a material that is both dynamic so as to be continually surprising and engaging but also critically robust and creatively fruitful. (A plane flies overhead) That material is sound.
A painter usually cannot paint without moving something and the role of movement in my kinetic work is just as necessary, only automated to continually produce a sound. My work is made to invite an attentive listener and is often very quiet and considerate of silence. (Door closes) I feel an artist who uses sound must not forget the silence and should not interrupt it unless they have something better to articulate.


Your work has a powerful emotional effect on the viewer; something is shared between the sculptor, sculpture and spectator. Is the emotional response intentional or a happy bi- product?
Some people might talk about the humour in a work or bring some kind of emotional significance to the situation but this is really just baggage. (Rattling in the wall cavities) I believe in some ways that artworks can be like terminals or depositories where thoughts and ideas can be left or collected, perhaps revisited.
But I think listening is an immensely personal act. Critical listening places the perceiver at the centre of the universe.


I believe that you sometimes pine to be a painter. Do painters have an easier time within the larger art world?
I suspect painters have an easier time in general, but it doesn’t bother me being someone who sculpts. I am however a little envious of the format of painting, (Telephone Rings) but the dynamic surface eventually closes down towards something finished. If it was impossible to finish a painting then I’d paint. It’s partly the idea that a painting can be finished that I find unsatisfactory about painting.


As a sculptor the environment in which your art is seen must be very important. How do you feel about your work being exhibited in a disused garage space? Do you think context is important?
I think as long as the art works aren’t parked in the garage space, we’ll be alright. I consider more than most the auditory environment, what sounds have the potential to interfere with or modify my work in some way. Usually this is not a problem.

Your sculptures are kinetic and by definition contain moving parts and also emit sounds. One might imagine that the computer screen would be a compatible medium. Is this so?
The medium of the computer screen is such that it does not allow my work to be engaged in the way I want it to be. My work is centered around the listening body and there is no opportunity for a bodily, reciprocal exchange through the screen.


Do you think there will come a day when there is no longer a place for ‘real’ art in the ‘flesh’?
(A pen rolls off the desk and falls on the floor) I don’t think so. Ideas involving the occasion, the body or the installation, these all require a live audience to appreciate it fully.


Finally; What does your screen smell like?
It smells like it’s over heating.