Thu, May 31 2018
(Above and below) These column capitals are the main reasons we visited Oxford. They were carved for the Oxford Museum of Natural History in 1859-60 by Irish brothers James and John O'Shea, along with their nephew Edward Whelan. Commissioned by John Ruskin, all the works were carved freestyle, without previous sketches, using only plant specimens from the botanical garden, and their sheer imagination, as references.
They are the protagonists of Sean Lynch's 2013 piece "A Blow by Blow Account of Stonecarving in Oxford", which we have been discussing with Sean for a while and finally saw in 2015 in Bordeaux. We continued learning more about this piece and its making during our joint adventure in Banff's "Geologic Time" residency programme last Fall.
Polycarbonate and brass screens and rope sculptures. Each screen corresponds to the exact measurements of one of the glass panels in the Upper Lawn Pavilion in Wiltshire, built between 1959 and 1962 by the British architects Alison and Peter Smithson (1928-1993 and 1923-2003).
(Above) Tacita Dean's "Landscape" exhibition premiered "Antigone", a new 1-hour long film and cloud paintings at The Royal Academy. Part 2 and 3 in the National Portrait Gallery (a retrospective of portrait films works) and at the National Gallery a two-room exhibition curated by the artist presents a selection of historical and contemporary still lives.
(Above and below) Batia Suter's work at The Photographers' Gallery. One of the nominees for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2018.
(Above) The 2018 awardee was Luke Willis Thompson with his striking film "Autoportrait" (also nominated for this year's Turner Prize).
Nicolas Lamas (above and immediately below) and Petra Feriancová (two following) two-person show "Becoming animal" at Tenderpixel.
(Above and below) August Sander's "Men without masks" at Hauser & Wirth included an extensive selection of rare large-scale photographs made between 1910 and 1931. The photographs were printed in a unique oversize format for inclusion in an exhibition at the Mannheimer Kunstverein in 1973.
(Above and below) 1960s vinyl sculptures by South Korean Seung-taek Lee at White Cube (Mayfair). Works have been recreated for the exhibition using urethane vinyl to achieve greater durability whilst retaining a similar visual quality.
(Above and 2 below) Last day to see Magali Reus solo show at South London Gallery.
(Above and two below) Osías Yanov's "Orphan Dance" at Gasworks.
(Above and below) Antoni Hervàs studio at Gasworks,
his 3-month residency is supported by Acción Cultural Española (AC/E).
(Above and 2 below) Joan Jonas exhibition at Tate Modern.
(Above) View of Trafalgar Square with Michael Rakowitz's "The Invisible Enemy Should Not Exist" featuring on the Fourth Plinth commission.
On the way to see Tacita Dean's-curated exhibition "STILL LIFE" at the National Gallery, a much-obliged stop in the room with Vermeer and Dutch still life. Jacob van Walscapelle (1644-1727) and Jan van Huysum (1682–1749) masters in flower painting.
Not photographed but also visited: Chisenhale Gallery, Matt's Gallery, Spruth Magers, Blain Southern, Pilar Corrias, Frith Street Gallery (both locations), Hollybush Gardens, Josh Liley Gallery, Kate McGarry, Mother's Tankstation, Modern Art (unexpectedly closed when it should have been open!, and so was Project Native Informant – which had a broken lift so had to go up 3 flights of stairs).
RELATED CONTENT:
2018, Antoni Hervàs, Batia Suter, field trip, Leonor Antunes, London, Nicholas Mangan, oxford, research, Sean Lynch, Tate Modern
Wed, Apr 20 2016
Nicholas Mangan, ‘Ancient Lights’ (2015). Installation views, Chisenhale Gallery, 2015. Co-commissioned by Chisenhale Gallery, London and Artspace, Sydney. Courtesy the artist; Labor Mexico; Sutton Gallery, Melbourne; and Hopkinson Mossman, Auckland. Photo: Andy Keate.
We have just wrapped up an interview with Melbourne-based artist Nicholas Mangan to be published by Sternberg Press as the catalogue of his forthcoming solo exhibition ‘Limits to Growth’, co-produced by Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA), Melbourne (opening July 20) and Institute of Modern Art (IMA), Brisbane (where it will be on view from October 29), it will later travel to Kunst-Werke Institute of Contemporary Art in Berlin (summer 2017).
The five-part interview weaves together a discussion of his recent works ‘Nauru, Notes from a Cretaceous World’ (2009), ‘A World Undone’ (2012), ‘Progress in Action’ (2013), ‘Ancient Lights’ (2015) and his newest piece ‘Limits to Growth’ (2016), to be premiered at Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA). Part of an ongoing dialogue with Mangan, it developed from a public conversation event at Chisenhale Gallery, London on 7 July 2015.
‘Limits to Growth’ references a 1972 report commissioned by the Club of Rome that analysed a computer simulation of the Earth and human systems: the consequences of exponential economic and population growth given finite resource supplies. The overlapping themes and flows of energies in the five of Mangan’s projects discussed in the interview might be read as an echo of the modelling and systems dynamics used by the simulation to try and better understand the limits of the world’s ecosystems.
Mangan is presenting ‘Ancient Lights’ (2015) at his Mexico City gallery LABOR on April 22, a work co-commissioned by Chisenhale Gallery in London and Artspace in Sydney.
RELATED CONTENT:
- Latitudes conversation with Nicholas Mangan on 7 July 2015 at Chisenhale Gallery, London;
- Cover Story, July 2015: Nicholas Mangan’s ‘Ancient Lights’;
- Locating Ancient Lights signs around London with Nicholas Mangan;
- Max Andrews, Feature on Nicholas Mangan, 'Landscape Artist', Frieze, Issue 172, Summer 2015;
- Mariana Cánepa Luna, 'What Lies Underneath', interview with Nicholas Mangan, Mousse Magazine #47, February–March 2015.
Wed, Feb 11 2015The February–March 2015 issue of Mousse Magazine (#47) includes the interview 'What Lies Beneath' between Melbourne-based artist Nicholas Mangan (1979, Geelong) and Mariana Cánepa Luna of Latitudes.
The interview centers primarily on discussing the artists' methodologies through two of Mangan's recent works: 'A World Undone' – currently on view as part of Witte de With's show 'Art in The Age of...Energy' (23 January–3 May 2015) – and his film and sculptural work 'Nauru - Notes From A Cretaceous World' which will soon be featured as part of the New Museum's 2015 Triennial: Surround Audience curated by Lauren Cornell (Curator, 2015 Triennial, Digital Projects and Museum as Hub) and artist Ryan Trecartin.
Read the full review here. Following is an excerpt of the beginning of their conversation:
'Dowiyogo’s Ancient Coral Coffee Table', 2010. Courtesy of the artist, Sutton gallery Melbourne and Hopkinson Mossman Auckland.
MCL: Unearthing
narratives embedded within matter has been at the very core of your
practice for some time now. Your most recent sculptural and film
works have inquired into natural materials, their transit and energy
flow and how their transformation – be it human-induced or
ecological – have a social, political and an economic dimension.
I'm particularly thinking of your 2010 project 'Nauru: Notes from a Cretaceous World' – featured at the New Museum 2015 Triennial– which focuses on the story of the tiny Micronesian island
Republic of Nauru and its financial collapse as a consequence of a
century of corrosive colonial exploitation of its phosphate ore
resources. Could you elaborate on how this notion of transformation
is explored in your sculpture works (traditionally static) and films
(moving image) and how you have come to interrelate the two in the
spatial narrative of your installations?
NM: As transformation is a process occurring in time, the necessity to
explore duration has led me to test moving image as a sculptural
possibility, to express not only the temporality of the assemblage,
but also the forces and drives that produce such aggregations. In the
video ‘Nauru: Notes from a Cretaceous World', narration sits over
found footage and material that I shot myself, providing an account
of Nauru’s material history as shaped by anthropogenic forces. The
narration attempts to draw out the various histories that are
embedded in material forms. In more recent projects, such as ‘A World Undone’ (2012)
and ‘Progress In Action’ (2013), I have attempted to produce an
intensified intersection between moving image and sculpture, enabling
the materials to narrate themselves.
'Nauru - Between A Rock and A Hard Place' installation view at Art Gallery Of New South whales 2009. Courtesy of the artist, Sutton gallery in Melbourne and Hopkinson Mossman in Auckland. Photo: Carley Wright.
'Mined over matter', 2012. C-print on cotton paper, 69 x 103cm.
Courtesy of the artist and LABOR Mexico.
'Matter over mined (for A World Undone)', 2012. C-print on cotton paper 69 x 103cm.
Courtesy of the artist and LABOR, Mexico.
'A World Undone', 2012 (video Stills). HD colour, silent, 12min continuous loop.
Courtesy of the artist and LABOR Mexico.
Mangan works with LABOR (México DF), Sutton Gallery (Melbourne) and Hopkinson Mossman (Auckland).
Related Content:
Visiting Curator Program, Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne, 12 May–7 June 2014 (28 April 2014).
'Nice to Meet You – Erick Beltrán. Some Fundamental Postulates' by Max Andrews on Mousse Magazine #31 (30 November 2011)
Interview 'Free Forms' with Lauren Cornell part of Latitudes' 2012–13 long-term research #OpenCurating, released on April 2013 via Issuu.
2015, Ecology, interview, LABOR, Mariana Cánepa Luna, Melbourne, Mousse magazine, New Museum, Nicholas Mangan
