Contour States at The Cornerhouse

Claire Brentnall

Samantha Donnelly’s first major UK solo show at The Cornerhouse, Contour States explores the objectifying nature of the modern media, in particular its representation of women. Wandering around this exhibition, the works on display almost appear as mutations of one another: evolutionary creatures that have spawned by splicing plastic, metal, faux fur and glossy magazines. I wouldn’t say that the alien objects conjure images of the human form, but suggest more of a displaced humanity, with the false nails, eyelashes and tights scattered amongst the debris: the remnants of a person (a woman?) once present.

With various components of fluorescent wires, photographs, magazine cut-outs and plaster casts precariously balanced upon one another, or hanging together with bulldog clips and vices, the works were simultaneously hard-edged and exquisitely fragile. They are inviting, tempting viewers to prod and poke the squidgy stuffed stockings and pet the spider-shaped fur, but once reeled in, the sharp cut angles and jagged corrugated plastics ward off potential threats to their equilibrium so much so that The Cornerhouse didn’t really need their ‘Please do not touch’ sign.

My personal favourite sculpture consisted of a large piece of polystyrene, beaten and bashed through until the inner substance of the board was scattered over the floor of the gallery, a trail of blood seeping from the victim in the form of a bright orange piece of fabric. This, for me, is where the beauty of these works lie: in the overt display of their creation. Delicate and measured or violent and uninhibited, journeys around and into these works reveal their birth, life and death.

Clowns, Pigs and Stuffing: A visit to The Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney

Claire Brentnall

Still feeling a little Picasso’d out after visiting Barcelona’s Museu Picasso last April (I think I perhaps have an annual Picasso intake threshold), I decided not to visit the Masterpieces from the Musée National Picasso, Paris, exhibition, and instead devoted my time and attentions to the free, much less crowded exhibits that were showing at the Art Gallery NSW. And I’m very glad I did.

For me, as I am sure is the case for many an art lover, an enjoyable visit to a gallery will always include some fluctuation of emotion, and I am pleased to say that the Art Gallery NSW did not disappoint. Indeed, as I strayed away from the herd of Picasso fans to the basement floor of the gallery, the New Contemporary Galleries, featuring the John Kaldor Family Collection satisfied this remit: a contemporary cacophony of witty, gritty and sometimes freaky artworks. Aleks Danko’s Art Stuffing caught my eye: a paper filled Hessian bag with Art Stuffing written in prison block lettering on the front. This Warner Brothers-esque piece reminded me of the dry wit of David Shrigley, and I allowed myself a quiet giggle at the strange prop that I imagined sitting on the shelf in Danko’s studio, ready to fill his next creation, as if it were a cheap DFS sofa.

I also thoroughly enjoyed Jeff Koons's intentionally cringe-worthy Art Ad Portfolio. With the airbrushed skin and plastic hair of a Hollywood actor, Koons is pictured in gaudy hi-res answering a show-and-tell in an American classroom, gazing wistfully into the distance while being waited on by female swimwear models, and showing his fluffier side by cuddling a piglet next to its disgruntled mother.

Maybe I had had my fill of the ‘comedy’ art object that showed two fingers to the decorative arts with Danko, but Michael Landy’s No Frills series, left me rather cold. The huge Tesco value style Sculpture, Drawing and Painting had nothing in particular to offer, I felt, other than the obvious display of a rather boring concept. But perhaps that was the point, in which case I suppose it was successfully delivered: I was bored.

This monotony was however violently disrupted when I wandered into Ugo Rondinone’s piece If there were anywhere but desert. Wednesday. Not being a fan of clowns, discovering a life-sized clown figure lying on the floor was enough to make me jump, and then feel silly. This, coupled with a looped recorded conversation entitled ‘What do you want?’ projecting into the room, Rondinone’s work was altogether unsettling and sent shivers down my spine. I challenged myself to remain in the space for at least a minute. I failed.

However, after spotting the familiar, rasterised faces of Gilbert and George I felt reassured to explore the rest of the fantastic works that make up the John Kaldor Family collection. After experiencing an array of emotions that was as multi-coloured as Sol LeWitt’s Wall Drawing, I decided that this was a collection that was eclectic as much as it was well-stuffed.

Northern Art Prize Winner Announced: Leo Fitzmaurice

Claire Brentnall

I set myself the admittedly reductive and clichéd challenge of describing each of the artists’ exhibited pieces in this year’s Northern Art Prize in one word. This is of course a pigeon-holing activity that artists, including myself, may find irritating and that viewers will undoubtedly debate, but none-the-less, the challenge had been set in my mind so I gave it a go. My results were as follows.

My initial reaction to the work of James Hugonin was to describe it as ‘clinical’. The scrupulously delicate and vividly colourful paintings were very impressive when considering the care and attention that would have been needed for their creation: these are paintings that have been made by combining a surgeon’s precision with the love of a parent for their child. However when it came down to personal taste, Hugonin’s abstract work was not my favourite.

With Liadin Cooke’s work, I was instantly reminded of Rebecca Warren’s 2006 Turner Prize entry Come, Helga: the beaten and moulded sculptures that just make you want to stick your hands in and squeeze! I therefore chose to describe Cooke’s work as being highly ‘visceral’, with objects reminiscing of their physical, fluid creation and hinting towards natural or bodily forms.

Richard Rigg’s art I enjoyed for its ‘playful’ nature: the lost functionality of the seats in Some Rest on Six Occasions and likewise with the negative imprint of Wall Hanging. These were objects that tempted and teased the viewer to recognise an everyday and familiar occupation that has somehow been disrupted. I also found Wall Hanging strangely beautiful, and thought of Duchamp’s Bottle Rack when considering whether this was Rigg’s intention.

It was the work of Leo Fitzmaurice that I struggled to label with a single adjective. I felt that Horizon was a novel concept, taking 19^th and 20^th century landscape paintings and placing them side by side to create a single, joined landscape. Similarly, the urban environment images were quite interesting yet had, I felt, a rather depressing quality when pictured opposite the idealistic, romantic landscape paintings. Perhaps this awkward meeting of opposites was Fitzmaurice’s intention; in which case, maybe a suitable adjective for his work would be ‘juxtaposing’.

Is it possible that my difficulty in ‘pigeon holing’ the work of Fitzmaurice tells the tale of an artist that is innovative and fresh? Perhaps it was this that won him first place at this year’s Northern Art Prize, and it is a title that I feel is well deserved. I would however, like to suggest Rigg as a close second for the crown, as it was through his work that I was able to consider a different kind of aesthetic ‘beauty’ to that found within a landscape painting.