Viewing articles from 2018/04

Parc de la Villette, 211 Avenue Jean Jaurès, 75019 Paris, France

Interview: Will Ryman on his commission for Parc de la Villette

Will Ryman, La Villette, Heads

New York-based sculptor Will Ryman recently unveiled his first large-scale European presentation of work in La Villette, an expansive urban public park located in the northeast of Paris. Three sculptures, ‘Pac-Lab’, ‘Heads’ and ‘Sisyphus’ (all 2018), have been commissioned as part of the interdisciplinary Festival 100%. Made first in clay and then fabricated in painted resin and bronze respectively, the sculptures have a theatrical bent, something the artist is keen to connect to personal experiences of making processes, histories and audience dialogue. Anneka French speaks to the artist.

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Met Breuer, 945 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10021, USA

Like Life: Sculpture, Color, and the Body (1300–Now)

Like Life: Sculpture, Color, and the Body (1300–Now) at the Met Breuer, 2018

Like Life, current on view at the Met Breuer, is a sweeping paean to historical contemporaneity, but where crowded chaos or a pandering sense of prurience could easily reign, co-curators Sheena Wagstaff and Luke Syson manage to imbue the eerie magic of mimesis with an academic bent that won’t intimidate fair-weather tourists. Review by Torey Akers

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Huxley-Parlour, 3-5 Swallow St, Mayfair, London W1B 4DE

Jocelyn Lee: The Appearance of Things

The Bath

It would be hard for anyone, man or woman, to walk into the Jocelyn Lee’s exhibition at Huxley-Parlour and not feel surrounded by the regenerative power of nature and its symbiotic connection to the female body. Of course, these themes have walked hand-in-hand since the earliest forms of visual art, but Lee manages to shed a new light on this age-old allegory in her photography by capturing the physical world in all its transience and fragility. Review by Kristina Foster

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Large Glass, 392 Caledonian Road, London N1 1DN

Alice Channer: A Coin in Nine Hands - Part 5

Crustacean Satellites, 2018. Vacuum Metallised Spider Crab (Maja Brachydactyla) and Brown Crab (Cancer Pagurus) Shells on Stainless Steel Jigs; PVC Coated Steel Cables; Fixings, 295.5 (h/variable) x 105 (w) x 110 (d) cm

'A Coin in Nine Hands - Part 5: Alice Channer (Carapaces)’ is a fascinating celebration of the elaborate figure of a shell. Inspired by Marguerite Yourcenar’s novel ‘A Coin in Nine Hands’ (1993), which recounts the journey of a ten lira coin through the hands of nine different people – a prostitute, an artist and Mussolini’s assassin – this exhibition is part of the gallery’s ambitious project of displaying the work of nine international artists in nine different solo shows over the coming months. Review by Fiorella Lanni

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Spanien 19C, Kalkværksvej 5A, 8000 Aarhus, Denmark

Mette Boel: Sunkissed

Mette Boel, Sunkissed, 2018, exhibition view, udstillingsstedet Spanien 19c, Aarhus.

Trainers pair up with swimming pool noodles to create weird, often amusing pairings, as the noodles appear to be wearing shoes and claim the space for themselves. Posters look like tourist ads and then again not. Then there is the sand on the floor, which reminds us of relaxing days at the beach. Yet, here, the sand does not move; it has become like a carpet. Not a carpet to lie down upon, but something to investigate, to brush up against. Review by Rikke Hansen

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National Portrait Gallery, St. Martin's Pl, London WC2H 0HE

Tacita Dean: PORTRAIT

Mario Merz, 2002 by Tacita Dean. 16mm colour film, optical sound, 8 minutes, 30 seconds. Film still.

The glance, with its speed and lack of resolution, is probably the defining characteristic of contemporary vision. We see people with the same lack of depth, quickly skimming across their seemingly shallow surfaces. The experience of viewing Tacita Dean’s ‘PORTRAIT’ at the National Portrait Gallery, on the other hand, is more like the process of reading than the ways in which we usually contemplate visual art; the whole show seems to provide a slow, even still, contemplative corrective to the incessant pace of modern life. Review by Matthew Turner

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Alan Cristea Gallery, 43 Pall Mall, St. James's, London SW1Y 5JG

Christiane Baumgartner: Liquid Light

Christiane baumgartner liquid light installation view

Light, so yielding it lies beyond our sense of touch, leaves its trace by an absence: expanses of white are produced by what has been cut away from the imprinting block. Review by Kevin Brazil

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Jerwood Visual Arts, Jerwood Space, 171 Union Street, Bankside, London SE1 0LN

Jerwood/FVU Awards 2018: Unintended Consequences

15 days by Imran Perretta as part of Jerwood / FVU Awards 2018: Unintended Consequences exhibition at Jerwood Space until 3 June

This year’s Jerwood/FVU Awards sees Maeve Brennan and Imran Perretta engage with the theme of ‘Unintended Consequences’ by considering, in very different ways, the complex nexus of vision, knowledge and representation. Review by Anya Smirnova

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FOLD Gallery, 158 New Cavendish St, London W1W 6YW

Thomas Bang: States of discontinuity: New and recent work

Thomas Bang, Sign (Flying Yellow Flags for Elena and Nicholae) 2018, Plywood, textiles, leather, gesso, acrylic paint, 165 x 204 x 94 cm

Dominant in Thomas Bang’s exhibition of recent work at FOLD, where eight sculptures as upright as paintings are pinned to the walls, is a concern with how sculpture relates to its supports. In fixing all the works to the gallery walls he questions the distinction between those two most traditional of media: painting and sculpture. Review by Samuel Glanville

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kurimanzutto, Gobernador Rafael Rebollar 94, San Miguel Chapultepec I Secc, 11850 Ciudad de México, CDMX, Mexico

Sarah Lucas: DAME ZERO

Sarah Lucas, installation view of DAME ZERO, kurimanzutto, Mexico City, 2018. Images courtesy of the artist and kurimanzutto, Mexico City.

Whilst firmly rooted in the irreverent humour of Britain, Sarah Lucas: DAME ZERO, currently on view at kurimanzutto, Mexico City, is able to securely locate itself within (as if emerging from) the context of Mexico. Review by Elliott Burns

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Exeter Phoenix, Gandy St, Exeter EX4 3LS

Young In Hong: The Moon’s Trick

Detail of Burning with Triadic Harmony

In South Korean artist Young In Hong’s solo exhibition at the Exeter Phoenix, The Moon’s Trick, themes of censorship, authorship, and reinterpretation with a focus on Korea’s own cultural and historical struggle with similar issues are explored. Named after a Soo-Young Kim poem, Hong’s exhibition refers to the vortex created by a spinning top which poet Kim once watched and felt let him exist in a different sphere from our world and gave him a new level of perception. Review by James McColl

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Serpentine Sackler Gallery, West Carriage Drive, London W2 2AR

Sondra Perry: Typhoon coming on

Sondra Perry, Installation view, Typhoon coming on, Serpentine Sackler Gallery, London, 6 March - 20 May 2018

‘Typhoon coming on’ is the first solo presentation of Sondra Perry’s work in Europe. For those unfamiliar with the artist, one may find themselves swimming against the purple ocean waves projected across the gallery walls in search of Sondra – in search of healing that feeling of uncertainty in an art gallery, amplified by the disorientating, dizzying, environment we’ve found ourselves trying to navigate. Review by Cairo Clarke

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