poppy

Southampton 6/2/08

Amanda Parker - Run, hide in the woods...
When I was there the title was a lot longer, something like "Run, hide in the woods and never come back, said the woodsman to Snow White" which in itself is something different than whats being advertised on a space's site. Impressive to the senses. The smell of sugar. The sight could have been more impressive, to take up the whole room. a little to confined. Also I didn't like the tangle of wires when you look up at the ceiling. Is the audience just not supposed to look up...
Overall though it was something different, I like the deliberate involvement of another sense (unlike smelling the gallery cafe in the Hayward). Reading the press release/statement thing stuck to the wall strted putting me off the work though. It says how the audience really interact with the work, their body heat melts the sugar (perhaps if you're made of molten lead), and it would make you all sticky, with a massive sign next to it saying DO NOT TOUCH. Slightly hypocritical saying how important the audience are to the work, then telling them off and being threatening.
In the screening room there was a making of type film, with Amanda Parker talking and setting up the piece. Also put me off the work that she seems damn annoying. Reminded me of little mindless daddys girls at aib "er, so then like i did this, a ha! wow and like" etc. Also the main part of the work is surely the string, but in the video she says how someone suggested she use it and she was like "so i did!" Just seems a bit lucky rather than any thought or talent. And of course there was the obligatory 'environmental' bit: "yeah, like, the work will break down and gradually just like dissapear" or some bollocks.
There never seems to be anything good at the Bargate, which is a shame as its such a cool space.



Southampton City Art Gallery
When you get up the stairs you are met by giant colourful metal type...things. Looking closer you see theres lots of recycled stuff (of course, how can there be any work at the moment that isn't.) And a tv playing, with children in school uniforms on it. Kids and artists and councils have made these things for some reason, and put them in the gallery, for some reason.

A Rational Aesthetic: The Systems Group and Associated Artists
Boring mainly. Very graphicky. Like Bauhaus but with more colour. Moasics, seemingly pixellated images. Uninspiring trite crap.


Millais Gallery
The Jerwood Photography Awards 2007. Interesting how they were all from the London College of Communication. Something to think about...

Moira Lovell - The After School Club
Series (like all of them) of grown women wearing slutty school uniforms, stood outside school gates. I didn't really understand. Two of the women look like men, so I thought perhaps they were all just men in drag, a few look a bit unwell, so I thought prostitution/drugs angle. Turns out they are just women from club nights. Though it's good the information text was after the work, normally it is before, so you read before looking. This is definitely a better way of doing it. Art information prevents thought, especially if not written by the artist themselves.

Dana Popa - Not Natasha
These pieces had explanations underneath each photo, as well as the text to the side. Because human trafficking and prostitution are such sensitive subjects it is hard to criticize work centred around it. But these photographs brought nothing new. Many of them were young girls looking sadly at the camera, or holding babies. Sort of deliberately tugging on the heart-strings. I also was not aware that Natasha was slang for prostitute in a lot of Eastern countries, which if I had known, would possibly have changed my experience.

Sophie Gerrard - E-wasteland
Probably the most boring and blatant of the lot. LOOK WHAT WE IN THE WEST ARE DOING TO THE ENVIRONMENT. LOOK AT WE ARE DOING TO THE POOR UNDEVELOPED COUNTRIES. CONSUMERISM IS THE ROOT OF ALL EVIL IN THE WORLD. etc. Pictures of poor Indian children taking apart computers and playing in acid, all because we in the west need the newest technology we can get our greedy little hands on. No, actually theres an illegal trade in recycling, that a few nasty people in the east and west participate in. Everything develops and moves forward. People will make money from abuse no matter what. It's like blaming the Iraq war on the invention of video games.
She won a special award as well. What a surprise.

Kevin Newark - Protoplasm
From the info sheet:
Kevin Newark's series of photographs of plastic bags cast adrift in the canals of East London transform the material momentarily into something precious and jewel-like.
No they don't. How do you know they're in the canals in East London? How do you know they're in water at all? How do you know they're plastic bags?? Laid out differently to the rest of the exhibition, in a grid, which sort of implies a narrative. Look a bit like under-sea creatures. Knowing they're plastic bags, puts me in mind of the film American Beauty where the boy films a bag getting pulled about by the wind, and all the various piss-takes and rip-offs. Perhaps I am just being cynical, but small beauties like that only work to the individual experiencing then. A feeling of wonder cannot be documented.

Edmund Kevill-Davies - Puppet Love
The series that worked the best. Although I didn't really know what it was about, I didn't leap to a million stupid conclusions. The most coherent work. About the ventriloquist industry, or rather how it is dying. Photos of the performers with their dummies and families in their own home. There is something touching, sinister and comical all at once with these photos. YAY! Something vaguely interesting at Millias. Now that is a nice change!


The train back without warning stopped at Brockenhurst for 40 minutes, so we did a miniture pub crawl, theres a few nice places. Must remember the Snakecatcher has hobgoblin. Villages can be good.

posted by poppy @ 12:46 pm