Finding an exhibition space for my final major project is no easy task. White walls, other exhibitors whose work may distract from the impact of my own, restrictions on how items may be displayed and hung and of course potential costs of hiring a venue and/or the commission the owners may require if work is to be sold and not just exhibited.
A visit to the KARST Gallery and studios in Plymouth (http://karst.org.uk/) on 2nd November to see how others display their work proved to be inspirational. Under the collective title I Am My Own Primal Parent a number of artists (many associated with New York and Brooklyn) presented sculptures, textiles, paintings, sounds, films and photographs on walls, hanging from the ceiling and rising from the floor in the large white rectangle and adjoining lobby space.
“I Am My Own Primal Parent NARCISSISTER / TOMMY LANIGAN SCHMIDT / GREEM JELLYFISH / MELANIE BONAJO / REBECCA GOYETTE / FAITH HOLLAND / ADEHLA LEE / CHRIS CARR / SOL SAX / GO! PUSH POPS / LAURA KIMMEL / UNDAKOVA / LOTTE KARLSEN / JASMINE MURRELL / JAGUAR MARY X CURATED BY KATIE CERCONE 28.09.18 – 03.11.18 Astral beasts, galactic stunts, nightlife culturati, audiophiles and technophiles, absurdist neo-shamans and sacramental synesthesiacs comprise our I AM MY OWN PRIMAL PARENT exhibition, their bizarre prophecies, culinary listening, phantom phalli, trans-dimensional art-tourism and polymorphous nature castles and cults populate an impressive new terrain. I AM MY OWN PRIMAL PARENT is by no means a show about sex, or simply sacred kink. For many of these artists, conjuring your PRIMAL PARENT comes down to human beings as conscious actors in a matrix of creation which is by nature, sensual, binding, and multidimensional. Many work in sound, and likewise create artworks in whatever medium as a series of energetic ebbs and flows, of union and discord. Relationships, environments and situations frame the basis of their creative objectives, leaving current Art discourse ill equipped to digest their paranormal dimensions. These works offer tethers connecting an invisible order to the visible order, visions from the front running prophets of a fast forward generation determined to let the false idols crumble to dust. Please note this exhibition includes images and themes of an adult content. Parental discretion is advised.”(KARST 2018)
I liked the variety in using the walls ceilings and floors. Were finances no problem I could envisage fabrics hanging down from or draped across ceilings, floor to ceiling unframed images particularly of my Events Horizons growing series, some sculptures made from my collected beach debris on floors and walls and moving mobiles of Events Horizons images resembling the rotations of planets. Alternatively thinking outside the white box….all possibilities are being considered including investigating billboards and the sides of buses.
I did not fully connect with some pieces in the exhibition but found others drew me in to see how they were made and displayed ( Rebecca Goyette, 2014, ‘Dentate Umbrella’ and Adehla Lee 2018, ‘Serial Mom’ ) or because the presentation was intriguing and enticing (Jasmine Murell 2010, ‘ Calling all Moon Children Everywhere’) and in one case, mesmerising (Narcissister 2016, ‘Forever Young’). In relation to my beach debris project I related to the rusty cans and rugby balls recycled by Sol’Sax 2011, ‘My Afro-Deity Gets Down and Dirty in Contact Sports’. Described as a wooden sculpture I am left puzzled as the items used seemed to be exactly that and made of tin and rubber.
One regret I have is not knowing about this gallery sooner. I learned from a studio occupant that I had just missed a call for photographic images to be displayed in a future exhibition!
Sarah Newton Photography 