Audiences

How does the curation and the space effect the Art? A Blog By JAMES MAXFIELD


Tuesday, 5 May 2009

Goldfish



I went to an exhibition at MAP called goldfish which was a exhibition where all the things in the gallery where controlled by a tank of goldfish. The controlled drawing machines, drums, music, and images all by them swimming across beams of light. From the point of view of the audiece this exhibition worked realy well as what you saw was random and would never be seen again. It was really interesting to see the thing that was creating the work and the things happening. It made the viewer question who makes the music and art we see and hear.

 

Thursday, 30 April 2009

Atrium Gallery at St James Hospital

We have been give a large wall space at St James Hospital called the Atrium Gallery. Fine art 2nd year has been split into 4 groups to Curate, market, fund raise and to look after the logistics. I am one of the curators we have the task of decideing what goes in a where it goes. The Audience for this space is very intresting as it is primarily a none Art audience consisting of Patients and the visitors and hospital staff. For this reason and due to it being a hospital we are limited and have a criteria for the content of the work shown here. We are not alouded for example images of death or glamore. However none of the work has been made with the hospital as its intended audience so i think the exhibition may not work to well in its location. I think there will be an intrest in what is there and many people will enjoy it and come down to see it but i dont think they will relate to it as it has just been plonked in there.

 



Tuesday, 28 April 2009

195 Miles at PSL































I attended the closing off 195 miles at PSL this exhibition was a of collaborations of Leeds based artists working with artists from the whitechaple gallery london. I think the space makes a really nice space to show work in because of the hight ceilings, large windows and the industrial feel to the space. I liked Rory Mac Beth's work as it engaged the audience by intriguing them as things keep happening such as smoke coming out or a printer printing out sheets of paper which then where blowing about the gallery. One of the other artists had made cup cakes for visitors to take and eat while watching a video based on cakes as well i thought this was a interesting way to get people interested in your work and to feel engaged with it. 

Cases
















I placed some of my small sculptures into a Perspex  case. I think the small one worked well and it adds to the work and makes it lot more 
interesting because it gives it that museum quality and the idea that it is real.  I showed this in a crit today and people thought it worked well because it makes it seem like the object has actually been taken and placed there fro
m another place and make is seem more real. I like how the view has to look in to view it madeit a more intriguing  and a more private view.


















With the larger object this one based on a cigaret packet i don't think the 
case adds it takes away as u cant get in close and see the detail of the miniature. 


So i think there are pros and cons to using a perpex case but i like how it effects the small model so will see where this will take me and make models that will work in the case. 

BALTIC

I visited the Baltic before easter for the opening of two shows there A duck for Mr Darwin and Sarah Sze solo show Tilting Planet.

A duck for Mr darwin was a realy well curated exhibition putting together Works that look at evolution and natural selection it fetured works by Charles Avery, Marcus Coates s
everal other Artists. I liked how althow all the works where diffrent media and diffrent look compley they all worked real well together becausae of the underlineing theam of the work. The works where not fighting each other for attention from the view they all seemed to be one. This menat the view felt more at ease to wander around the exhibits i think and to go back and forth from one work to the next because they didnt all seem separated.




















One Armed Snake by Charles Avery 2009

More on Charles Avery

























Sarah Sze Tilted Planet


I have been realy intrested in Sarah Sze for a long time but have never been able to visit a show only seen it in books. The work is 100x better face to face. When you can walk around the work and get in real close and see the detalis it makes it better as u feel more like a viewer into her created worlds. I like how her work is mainly on the floor of the gallery this is a real intresting space as it is rarely looked at or used. This means everyone is looking down to view the work and it is not in there normal view when they see art. In this exhibition the only things that spoilt it for me was there was to many people and invidulaters looking over your sholder to stop you touching the work.

For More Pictures CLICK HERE



Thursday, 12 March 2009

Black Flags on London Bridge



This was an performance piece i saw in the news paper while in london. 8 photography students from Camberwell college or Art stood on London bridge with flags every morning at 8 till 9 for 5 days. They where trying to communicate with the commuters to the finical district.  I through this was tied in nicely with the things Gary was talking about today. They interacted with the audience simply because people asked them what they where doing. As well as this one to one engagement there was an interesting discussions happening afterwards between commutors about what it was about and rumors spread READ THIS! 

Visit there website for more info: www.fiohb.com

Non-Gallery spaces

In the Audiences lesson today we where discussing site and situation for our art work outside of the "white cube" gallery space. A first i wasn't to interested because in my work i always have so sort of gallery space in mind and don't consider any alternatives. But this has got me thinking what effect this would have on my work as well as ways in which thinking about other situations can inspire new work and push existing work in new directions. 

I liked some of the ideas Gary suggested in the discussion. Such as an idea of mapping out the city with ranger poles i think this could become both a performance/video as well as using the data collected 2 make drawings. 

Another idea was to draw out on the ground the contour lines themselves in some sort of reverse mapping.  I think this could produce some interesti
ng results as well be a way to engage with a different audience for example shoppers on Briggate or students in college. Not sure yet how the view would engage and to what extent but would be interesting to find out and to find out if there where different engagements with different types of audience?

I think this could be done in a number of ways paint, chalk, tape or even a projection from above. 

I still do think my work will be driven with the intention of being shown in a gallery of some kind as at the moment i want to engage with an Art audience. But i do think maybe working with other audiences will be a good tool in developing ideas i have and maybe in future projects i will want 2 engage with non art audiences and so looking at them now will only help.


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