Black Sun Horizon, The Royal Standard Liverpool

Boredom that thing that encompasses us from time to time, envelopes you with that sensation that you really should be doing something, shouldn't you? Well you would if everything wasn't devoid of interest. It may sound like a contradiction but from boredom there often comes creation; a prime example would be Bowie's Sound and Vision. It's this paradox where boredom meets unbored that is the theme of The Royal Standards 'Black Sun Horizon' exhibition.

A collection of four video pieces which deal with this concept. Take Samuel Williams piece Natural Habitat where a camera is dragged around in a homemade dolly through a small scale landscape. Watching the video you get the sense that this is something done to fill in time, the journey of the camera has no other aim then its own existence. So there's a combination of boredom and means here, an equation of time plus materials equals something, the kind of downtime where people make sculptures from Kit Kats.

This equation is also present in Dick Jewell's and to a degree Corey Arcangel's pieces which employ editing software to manipulate the elements from the sea of digital transmissions. Looking at these pieces I begin to consider whether having access to all this methods of creation will lead to a vacuum of choice, being able to produce something may not lead to something being produced. That maybe this is my subjective laziness, laziness that close relation to boredom.

Something occurs to me as I watch various edited cats bash out a Schonenberg piece, I begin to think about the many stupidly clever internet videos out there (including this one) and how they exist simply to be, to distract and pass time for both the creator and viewer. At poses a question if so many people are creating stuff which serves simply to elevate boredom and has no life outside of that remit what happens after that? Is more to be created to continually fill the space then are we stuck will a lot of distracting yet empty culture?

It's a possibility, boredom is a motivator yet it mustn't be the sole motivator for it happens as quickly as it can be quenched.

Rogues Galleries, Chester

If I'm honest most of my time spent in Chester has been swayed towards digging in Charity Shops. Rarely do I make a purely cultural visit to the city, well not since the Toy Museum closed. This week sees artists taking up residence in various empty shops across the city under the banner Rogues Galleries. Its aim seems to be to explore the nature of the commodification of well just about everything and the value of things. I hear the word performance drifting down from on the row above me I have first reached my first stop.

Upon entering I'm cheerful greeted and have the goings on explained. I quickly head upstairs to directly meet a man dressed in an ill-fitting suit, who has the practiced joviality of any salesman. This is Harry Giles who is offering a free debt counselling service for visitors today. I accept his offer and he takes me into his office, where the walls are covered in scrawl and graphs and numbers, like the Cave Painting edition of PowerPoint. Mr Giles begins to throw out some jargon and gets me to think what I owe people and what people owe me. I realise that this is something that I don't really think about. Mr Giles gets me to visualise my debt as a 'monster' and I select a distant shuffling zombie, which is precisely how a like to think about my debt off in the distance awaiting a kill shot which will solve my financial problems. Which makes me feel strangely better. If this performances aim is to make the participant to think about what is meant by debt it done that to a degree, on reflection I wonder if a view of how other people dealt with their debt may of have a greater impact.

Still I feel pretty better about handling my debt.

I have a brief look at the videos on display there well-made but none really sing to me. If I'm honest I've come with a performance bias.

Talking of which I fall into Two Destination Language's piece Storyville, it seems like I've walked into their living room. For their piece they have brought all their belongs and have offered them for sale. These items have been in storage so have been existing in a value status. If an object is not interacted with does its value change, does the inaccessibility of the object increase said objects value. These are the questions that come from my conversation with the artists, they engagingly tell me of the histories behind certain objects and I'm happy to discuss these values. We agree about the value of homemade objects. As I sit there surrounded by the collected objects created by peoples passage through life I begin to make connections with the Mark Leckey exhibition at The Bluecoat. Both speak of the alchemy that occurs when value, whether it be cultural, personal or monetary, becomes attached to an object.

I also have to admit there is a slight voyeuristic thrill in going through someone stuff.

Before leaving I have a quick game of Fruit and Veg chess, as the rules change I become aware of how quickly my attitude to having and losing things change along with them. Though an actual working knowledge of chess might have helped.

It's on to The Scrivener's based in the old Odeon cinema. Here I find a small space where Octopi ribbons of paper hang in the air, while a lady types away in the shops window. These are two pieces which deal with the value of words of the cost of communication, what are words worth. The typist in the window is Rowan Lear or The Scrivener she has set herself the task of transcribing an old book of Chester's history. She injects her own thought about the city and what is happening directly in front of her, collapsing two histories into each other. I feel that this piece is about the value of writing of the production of words, of how we transcribe meaning through the written word. Through that it also touches on the different forms of memory and how valuable that is and whether history can be commoditised.

Sharing this space is Heard Words a machine which spits out words, well tries to make sense of the word inputted into it. Speaking into a microphone your words are decoded or recoded by an invisible machine who spits out what it thinks you said. What comes out of the machine is quite often radically different to what went in; it's like a machine which converts everyday speech into beat poetry. I can't help but thing of Burroughs and Gysin as this mashed up beat poem forms in coils around my feet. The whole thing feels like a celebration of gibberish, a point towards the fallacy of words and therefore if communication can become this confused then where is its true value? It's also one of those pieces where the technology used to produce it provides fascination rather than distraction.

I stand outside reading Rowan's words and looking at Simon Faried's collected newspapers before moving on.

I am heading towards the Grosvenor Centre, all plastic shiny facades to find The Haberdashery. It's a little quiet I gravitate towards Anoushka Athique's Repair Stations. A small confession when I read about this piece I thought it will be a great opportunity to get my button sewn back onto my jacket. It's a simple piece where Athique will repair something you own in exchange for a story. It's odd coming up with a story and like many of the other people before me I come up with a 'story' that is about my personal history in relation to Chester. If you're wondering my first date at the now defunct Odeon. As I attempt to tale my story there's something at the back of my mind which makes me think about the history of storytelling and how this apparently unassuming piece is somehow connected to a grand history, of a different time when a tale was currency. Or is that just a myth?

I had arrived too late to catch Secret Door Theatre, and Kate Gater-Davies sound piece doesn't really engage me it feels like it can be developed more or needs to be presented in a different way.

Before I leave altogether I return to take part in Two Language Destinations auction, where the artist's engage and amuse. We also get to see subjective value of objects in action especially when an expensive piece of fabric fails to meet expectations and is sadly removed from the auction. I also get a really nice chocolate as well.

So what did I think of Rouges Galleries as a whole, well I found some interesting and involving works and I felt that the works fitted within the overall theme. Whether it was my bias towards the performance pieces I found the installation pieces to be less engaging or seemingly not as developed as the performance pieces. On the bus ride home I wonder what ambitions Chester Performs have for future versions of Rogues Galleries a North Western version of the Fierce or In-between Time Festivals? If so then this is something our cultural hubs of Liverpool and Manchester should be aware of.

 

 

 

 

Mark Leckey - The Universal Addressibility of Dumb Thing, The Bluecoat Liverpool

Tomb of the Feline

A huge form dominates the space. Its benign smile blesses the people who pass. It is the great magician Felix he stands, protector, guardian the other spaces. People take tribute by taking and sharing his image.

Fertility

The mandrake and the green man speak of fertility. As the grossness of the growing spring swells mammalian glands and engorges erections. The force of the bull creates the reproduction of technology.

Animals

The animal as a cypher for human spirituality, for things unknowable. The knowing of are animal closeness, the ape hoots of Lucy. Spiritual exploitation becomes scientific exploration, animals become cartoons, and cartoons become animals. Both abide by the same laws. Also second appearance of Felix, are all black and white cat Felix? Felix cats love Felix.

Man Machine

The desire to reproduce, to replicate the human. To ascend beyond human form, objects given holy relevance. A Rocking Machine no longer that after use in Delarge death kill. Though stark warning of troubled aspect of man machine interface provided by cyberhead.

Man Machine 2

The progression of machine sexualisation. The configuration of the organic into the machine, organic rhythms made metallic. Pylons subject for still life. Schizoid’s electric waves influence Automatic Drawings. Man like machines, machines like man.

The Wheel

Mankind’s greatest achievement given prominence of wall space. Engine sparkles lethal attraction like they are want to do. Child describes the world as machine parts. Ballard reflected in the automobile influence on culture. The true description of the relationship of culture and technology.

Reflection

The reflected image, reflects high gloss image unexisting outside of its reflection. Light emits, captured before. Reflected image shows digital self.

 

 

Tracing the Century, Tate Liverpool

I seem to be making a habit of making two trips to exhibitions, no bad thing really as it always gives the chance to revaluate the exhibitions. Often a second trip is necessary if a particular work you’re interested in isn’t up and running. As Anthony McCall’s piece in Tracing the Century wasn’t this makes Tate’s Tracing the Century one of those exhibitions, though that maybe I left my last visit till the last minute.

Trying to stretch my memory back to pre-Christmas I recall myself to be pleased by the exhibit. I get the sense of the exhibition as a reminder of the role of drawing, a refresher of the importance drawing. Drawing being one of those mediums whose ubiquity belies its power and commutative qualities. Consider that drawing is maybe, one the first  creative acts we undertake its one of the gateway drugs into the wider world of arts. On my first visit I slip into ideas of gestural marks, of a sense of a familiar movement across paper.

Things change on my second visit McCall’s piece is working. If I’m honest this piece is the main drive behind wanting to see this exhibition. It being one of those pieces of art that where so evocative when discussed during those long gone student days. Sentiment aside how do I react? Well stepping inside the room which houses the piece my eyes begin to adjust and I begin to adjust. Walking around the space my reaction to the curved lined being shot onto the wall by the projector on the other side of the room. I can see this object that isn’t an object, a thing which a whole and yet a combination of separate parts.  This is pure concept everything dependent on my perception and my, relative position, I move to being observer to part of the cone of light. It’s also very poetic, a beguiling, and illusory piece.

Stepping outside of the installation I began to revaluate the rest of the exhibition. The drawings become representations of darkness and light, they become variations of mass. I make an observation that I didn’t make on my first visit, that drawing are all interpretations of perception. Conversions of three dimensional space filtered through the perceptions and concerns of the artists. The shadows casted by the sculptures become solid and extend their physicality. I imagine that this is somehow reflective of the origins of the sculptures themselves, the line forming in the mind is marked across paper where they become solid and are able to cast shadows. It seems somehow cyclical.

Any criticisms? Well maybe the exhibition feels familiar and I would of liked to seen Tactia Dean’s sea drawings or Turner nominee’s Paul Noble’s drawings. There are still some surprises Andy Wharol’s drawing of mechanical delicacy is an example. On the whole the exhibition seems to part of a current curatorial trend to look at the fundamentals of art, exhibition such as Drawing Sculpture at Leeds Art Galley or Paper Cuts at Manchester. An exhibition like this provides us (we creative types I guess) with a reminder of how are interest in art began and why we continue to be involved.

 

Liverpool Biennial 2012, Tate/Open Eye

Outside the Tate there's a strange pavilion, if you go around dusk you'll see the sides of this pavilion shining with the bright faces of the great and good of the creative industries. This is Doug Aitken's The Source a project to locate the source of creativity, though it's an admiral attempt but after a few minutes I have no new insights into creativity.

Anyway inside to where the rest of the art is. I recall when I first visited the Tate during the opening weeks of the Biennial where my thoughts where that the exhibition was much smaller then pervious Biennials. Was this due the a overlap with the blockbusting Turner Monet Twombly exhibition, maybe. Maybe it's a reflection that this exhibition, Thresholds to give its proper name, will be here long after framework of the Biennial has been removed. Maybe that just my perception. Whatever it's a good exhibition with some great pieces including Kader Attia's meditation on the corrupting influence of oil in his video Oil and sugar. My highlight of the exhibition is A Travel without Visual Experience by Pak Sheung Cheun, where you are invited to explore a dark room by means of a camera flash. I enjoyed the simple action of using the camera flash in order to navigate myself around the room, while that action made regard the fallacy of using a camera in order to capture a moment.

In the cameras flash everything becomes clear, knowable, yet the result of that becomes clear as on the cameras view screen you see a corner of a frame or simply nothing. On leaving the space I asked what happened to the images taken with the Tate provided cameras only to be disappointed to discover that they were all erased. It occurred to me that this collect of photos would expand on the issues of the piece and touch on questions about the changing nature of the photograph in a world of Facebook and Tumblr.

Of course less than a stone's throw away from the Tate is the Open Eye. Wherein there are pieces which also explore the nature of looking, watching, how and why we watch. Konei Yoshigui's The Park is comprised of photographs of couples in tryst's being watched by small groups of voyeurs. Youshigui enhances a sense of voyeurism by permitting the images to be viewed only by torchlight. So you enter the darken space the photographs inhabit armed with your torch to be greeted by other visitors with torches. There's an odd sensations of guilt, complicity as we all stalk in the darkness looking at images of people looking at people, fucking. The piece subtlety raises the question of why are we driven to look at images especially sexual images.

There was a point while watching the second piece, Love Hotel where I was waiting, expecting to see the grainy images of naked bodies to being moving. That these questions came to the fore as I was unsure why I was expecting these images to move, because they are presented on video monitors? Some need for titillation perhaps? I'm still unsure but I had to consider what the Gallery Assistant much make of someone like me taking a little too much time in considering the work. Again caught in the infinite regression that is our need to see and be seen.

Paul Rooney – Here Comes Franz, VG&M Liverpool

There's a moment in Paul Rooney's film 'The Futurist' where the main character recounts a story about being transported to a new land on a slave ship. Though it's apparent that this character has never experienced these events, he is clearly haunted by them.

This sense of been haunted permeates Paul Rooney's exhibition at the VG&M. A haunting brought on perhaps by the conflict between the layers of meaning that we subject the world we inhabit to. Whether we attribute these meanings to a historical, cultural or personal context there would seem an inherent issue to applying these tags to one place. It would appear to become some act of magick and ritual of sort in order to solidify a sense of meaning in the world around and through that a sense of meaning within ourselves.

In the piece Small Talk, a piece of liminal space, in this case an petrol garage on the edge of a field. The act of filming and the act of watching imbues that footage with meaning. Of course this meaning is subjective provided in part by the narrative subtitles which reference films (in this case a scene in the The Umbrellas of Cherbourg set at a garage) I guess this another case of apophenia the need to find meaning in unconnected things. This isn't a bad thing it can provide the world with a sense of magic and wonder, for example the shot of a waning moon over the garage edges the mundane with the sense of the supranational.

There is the sense of the supranational within this exhibition, in this case when I mean supranational I'm thinking of the world of David Lynch or of Kurbick's The Shining. How else could a tree tell of its own destruction? Rooney's work is about the worlds between worlds (the German's call it zwischenwelten) of people and objects that are at once trapped and liberated by their situations allowed to be defined by and define the limits of their worlds.

 

The Monro, Liverpool Biennial 2012

Up some creaky stairs, pass some haunted looking portraits, there seems to be something supranational going on upstairs at The Monro. Where two un-homely hotel rooms created by Markus Kahre, they wait like a vacuum to be filled by the presence of the viewer. I think by this point you probably know the punch line to this piece, the un-mirroring mirrors. During my first visit I did stand in front of the mirror moving my arms around in some strange attempt to activate the mirror. Like with most optical illusions it relies on your brain being set to a narrow band of information, in this case that if it looks like mirror then I will be reflected within it. I wonder if this piece called No Title is about the whole super-modernity concept where in the replication of environments such as chain hotels, airports etc. Makes it hard for the individual to gain a hold within that world and therefore becomes invisible.

Sharing the space above The Monro are Dane Mitchell's Spectral Recordings. When I first heard about this piece I was intrigued by the poetic and enchanting idea of capturing words into glass. Facing the speech bubbles I felt I little disappointed. Well perhaps not disappointed but while looking at these exhalations I really want to hold them to feel the vibrations of the caught voices. Ultimately I want to smash them open, to hear the voices inside, I imagine the twinkle of shattering glass followed by the gasping squeal of the voice released to the ether. I think somewhere within my desire to undertake this act of destruction is the desire to complete a cycle to allow the imprisoned voices to possess another human.

Before I leave there is Janine Antoni's Umbilical which I initially mistook for some strange instrument of mediumship, an instrument to communicate to another world. In a very strange way this might be partly true Umbilical is a cast of the artists mouth which is connected to a cast of the artists mothers hand. The piece seems to be channelling the inexpressible feelings created by the parental bonds. Two bodies joined by the delicate and un-nameable bond of love.

The works at The Monro carry their own poetry they speak of the spirits which inhabit us all and of the spirit we leave behind. The ghosts we form with our memories of the places we inhabit, the people we contact, of what we are and who we will be,