Work Experience
Kent Institute of Art and Design / University College for the Creative Arts, Rochester
2004 - 2006 - Lecturer (0.2 post) in Critical Theory to 3rd year students on Photography B.A. course.
Freelance art critic and curator
1996-present (Bibliography below)
Kent Institute of Art & Design, Rochester.
Lectures and Tutorials to 2nd and 3rd year students on B.A. Photography course - May 2001, March 2002. Course Leader Kevin Liggett.
Winchester School of Art
Lecture to students on M.A. Contemporary Art & Theory course - October 2001. Course Leader Brandon Taylor.
Kent Institute of Art & Design, Maidstone
Lectures and Tutorials to 2nd & 3rd year students on B.A. Editorial Photography course - May 2002. Course Leader Christopher Stewart.
Southampton Institute
Lecture and Tutorials to 2nd and 3rd year students on B.A. Photography course - March 2003. Course Leader Claudia Pilsl.
Camberwell College of Art, London
Lecture and Tutorials to 2nd year students on B.A. Photography course - June 2003. Course Leader David Strickland.
Manchester Metropolitan University
Lecture and Tutorials to 3rd Year B.A. Fine Art Students - February 2004. Course leader Pavel Buchler
Nottingham Trent University
Lectures and Tutorials to 2nd year students on B.A, Fine Art course - April 2002, May 2003, February 2004. Course Leader Duncan Higgins. Four days of tutorials to 2nd and 3rd year students on B.A. Fine Art course, Feb 14th - 17th 2005. Course leader Duncan Higggins
Loughborough University
Lecture and tutorials to 2nd and 3rd year B.A. Fine Art students. Course leader Mark Wright. May 2004 and February 2006.
Brighton University
Seminar and Critique of Fine Art Forum with 2nd year B.A. Fine Arts students. February 24th 2007.
Brighton University
Tutorials to 2nd year B.A. Fine Art students. Course leader Madeleine Strindberg. April 9th 2008.
back to topExhibitions Curated
Is there anyone home?: Images of Absence and Imminence
Gallery Westland Place, London. 19th May - 24th June, 2000.
Galerie Zurcher, Paris. 21st October - 24th November, 2000.
Artists: Uta Barth, Russell Chater, Robert Davies, Charlotte Gibson, Luke Gottelier, Rut Blees Luxemburg, Helen Maurer, Effie Paleologu, Elisa Sighicelli Sophie Smallhorn.
'Euro-Video'
Video evening, Gallery Westland Place, London, Friday 16th February, 2001.
Artists: Axel Antas, Giuseppina Esposito, Claudio Guerino, Marie-France & Patricia Martin, Maibritt Rangstrup, Rachel Reupke, Elin Strand, Nicole Wermers. Introductory talk by Alexia Defert.
Liminal/Minimal/Nominal: Architectural Traces
Gallery Westland Place, London. 10th March - 9th April, 2001.
John Hansard Gallery, Southampton University. 25th May - 7th July.
Artists: Rieko Akatsuka, Juergen Albrecht, Erieta Attali, Stephen Critchley, Cia Durante, Andrew Holligan, Luisa Lambri, Alex Morrison, Jan van der Pavert, Claudia Pilsl, Gwen Rouvillois, Joanna Salter, Heidi Specker, Christine Sullivan, Richard Walker, Nicole Wermers, Adam Wilson.
Bittersweet
Danielle Arnaud Gallery, London. 4th May - 10th June, 2001.
Artists: Kate Allen, Emma Bennet, Kate Bright, Magdalena Brzeska, Pip Dickens, Katie Deith, Mark Fairnington, David Hiscock, Nicky Hodge, Toyoko Kato, Deirdre King, Astrid Pawlowitski, Rebecca Stevenson, Roy Voss.
Light Matters
Shine Gallery, London. July 2nd - August 11th, 2001
Artists: Florencia Durante, Renata Hegyi, Nahoko Kudo, Neil Reddy.
Rising to the Surface
Gallery Westland Place, London. 17th September - 15th October 2001.
Artists: Clare Chapman, John Miers, Keith Robinson, Raymond Yap, Claude Temin-Vergez.
5 by 5
Hirschl Contemporary Art, London. January 30th - March 2nd 2002.
Artists: Cia durante, Renata Hegyi, Maggie Lambert, Astrid Pawlowitski, Erasmus Schroeter.
Soul Windows
DomoBaal Gallery, London. November 21st - December 24th 2002.
Artists: k r buxey, Machiko Edmondson, Abigail Hill, Eva Karapanou, Daniela Klein, Maggie Lambert, Paula Mettler, Marianne Oiamo, Olivia Monti-Arduini, Helen Sear, Michael Schwab, Russell Wickwar.
Amplifying Silence / Magnifying Stillness
Fondation d'Art Contemporain Daniel & Florence Guerlain, Les Mesnuls, France. May 24th - September 10th 2003.
Artists: Juergen Albrecht, Imamudin AlMaghrabi, Glyn Antle-Trapnell, Florian Balze, Peter Cleutjens, Charlie England, Daniela Gullotta, Nina Murdoch, David Ralph, Kaori Shiota, Yu Tajima, Laura White.
Slow Down (you're movin' too fast):The Art of Deceleration
Venue to be arranged.
Artists: Erika Allcorn, Dee Ferris, Ewan Gibbs, Alexis Harding, James Ireland, Helen Robertson, Vincent Le Roy, Natalie Stone, Jonathan Sullam, Annie Whiles, Anne Windsor.
Multicomplexificationalities
Bow Arts Trust, London. June 22nd - July 14th 2007.
Artists: Sophie Aston / Roland Biermann / Brignell & Raimes / Jack Brown / Jim Coverley / Sarah Harvey / Natuka Honrubia / Luca Song Jun Kim / Miho Sato / Robin Sewell / Ruth Solomons / Scott Sturgill / Mediha Ting / Laura White
Judging
Invited as Judge to Photosynkyria International Photography Festival, Thessaloniki, Greece. February 2002. (Winner Simon Norfolk).
Invited to Judge on BOC Emerging Artists Award (£20,000 Prize), London. July 2003. (Winner Tom Hackney).
Invited to judge on BOC Emerging Artists Award, London. July 2004 (Winner Mauro Bonacina).
back to topTalks
'Photoworks' at Maidstone
June 2002 'Absence and Imminence in Contemporary Photography'.
The Nunnery Gallery, London
March 2003, 'In Conversation with David Rayson'.
The Photographers Gallery, London
May 2003, Public Talk 'In Conversation with Frank Breuer'.
Castlefields Gallery, Manchester
October 2003 'In Conversation with Tom Hackney' at the opening of his exhibition - open to the public.
St.Mary Bow Church, London
23rd March, 2005. Panel Discussion,'Spirituality vs. Banality', open to public, on occasion of G.Roland Biermann's exhibition 'Apparitions: The Triptychs', on panel with David Jasper (University of Glasgow) Cedric Christie (London Artist), Jens Hoffmann (New York based curator).
Photoforum Conference - 'Spatial Practices: Photography, Video and Architecture'
April 29th 2005, KIAD Maidstone, gave talk - 'Photographic Genius: Framing A Sense of Place in The Photography of Architecture'
Bury St.Edmunds Art Gallery, Bury St.Edmunds
16th September 2005, in conversation with the artists at the opening of the exhibition 'Synthetic Reality'. (Victoria Forrest, Tess Glanville, Taegon Kim, Brad Lochore, Haroon Mirza, Ally Wallace).
Brighton and Hove Museum
24th October, 2006. Gallery Talk open to public, on Brighton Photo Biennial Exhibition, 'Nothing Personal' curated by Gilane Tawadros.
back to topChronological Bibliography
1996
'Vija Celmins' Star Quest'. Contemporary Art, Issue 13, Autumn 1996, pp 74-76.
1997
'Miguel Angelo Rocha at the Laure Genillard Gallery', Art Monthly No.202 Dec.'96/Jan.'97. Page 28.
'Craig Richardson at Cleveland Gallery', Art Monthly No.203 Feb.'97. Page 27-28.
'Richard Prince' at White Cube, Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 15. Page 78.
'Construction Sights: The Domain of Constructed Photography', Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 16. Pages 18-25.
1998
'Raids on the Beautiful: Beauty in the Art of the '90's', Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 17. Pages 50-55.
'Genevieve Cadieux' at Stephen Friedman Gallery, Parachute, No.90, April/June 1998. Page 54.
'Charles Avery: Portraits of People Who Never Existed', Entwistle Gallery. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 18. Page 70.
'Dominique Blain' at the Photographers Gallery, Parachute, No.91, July/Sept 1998. Page 69.
'Tending the Abyss: The Sublime Edge in Recent Art', Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 19. Pages 34-39.
'Alexis Rockman' at London Projects, Siksi, Summer 1998. Pages 86-87.
'Sites of Absence', Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 20. Pages 62-68.
'Walter Niedemayr' at White Cube, World Art, Issue 18. Page 82.
'Esko Manniko' at White Cube, Siksi, Autumn/Winter 1998. Page 97.
'Graham Fagen' at Matt's Gallery, Untitled No.16, Summer 1998. Page 25.
'The Book of Lost Cities: John Stathatos', Creative Camera, June/July 1998. Page 40.
'Elke Krystufek' at Emily Tsingou Gallery, Untitled No.17, Autumn 1998. Page 26.
'Traces of Habitation: Elisa Sighicelli', Creative Camera, Oct/Nov 1998. Pages 36-37.
'Elisa Sighicelli' at Laure Genillard Gallery, Art Press No.241, December 1998. Page 80.
'The Masque' at John Hansard Gallery, Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 21. Page 75.
1999
'General Idea' at Robert Prime Gallery, Parachute, No.93, Jan/Mar. 1999. Page 54.
'Alien Will: Gregory Crewdson', Creative Camera, Feb/Mar. 1999. Pages 20-23.
'Robert Davies: Water' at Jason & Rhodes, Creative Camera, Feb/Mar. 1999. Page 42.
'Miguel Rio Branco' at London Projects, Untitled, No.18, Spring 1999. Page 28.
'Mark Dean' at Laurent Delaye Gallery, Untitled, No.18, Spring 1999. Page 30.
'Alexis Harding: Andrew Mummery Gallery, London, England. Zingmagazine, Vol.2, Winter, 1999. Pages 174/5.
'Fischli & Weiss: White Cube, London, England. Zingmagazine, Vol.2, Winter, 1999. Pages 179/80.
'Angela Bulloch: Robert Prime Gallery, London, England. Zingmagazine, Vol.2, Winter, 1999. Pages 183/5.
'Uta Barth; New Works': London Projects, London, England. Zingmagazine, Vol.2, Winter, 1999. Pages 192/4.
'Peter Harris and Richard Forster' at Andrew Mummery Gallery. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 22. Page 64.
'Morimura's Smile' - Yasumasa Morimura at White Cube. Creative Camera, Issue 357, April/May, 1999. Pages 40/1.
'James Casebere' at the Museum of Modern Art, Oxford. Art Press, No.245, April 1999. Pages 76/77.
'Gregory Crewdson' Emily Tsingou Gallery, London. Art Press, No.246, May 1999. Pages 73/74.
'Through a German Lens: Reconstructing Space', Architectural Association, London. Blueprint, No.161, May 1999. Pages 70/71.
'Near and Elsewhere' - 'Landmarks' (Preview of Exhibition at The Photographers Gallery, London), Landscape Design, # 281, June 1999. Page 06.
'Tales Without Narratives' - Interview with Effie Paleologou, Creative Camera, Issue 358, June/July 1999, Pages 10-15.
'Towards Abstraction: The Painterly Photograph', Creative Camera, Issue 358, June/July 1999, Pages 24-29.
'Anna Gaskell' White Cube Gallery, London / MOMA Oxford, Art Press, No. 247, June 1999. Pages 67-68.
'Eroding the Signifier: The Painterly in Photography', Untitled, No.19, Summer 1999. Pages 30-31.
'Stepanek and Maslin', Laure Genillard Gallery, London, Untitled, No.19, Summer 1999. Page 34.
'Sarah Beddington: Hales Gallery, London, England'. Zingmagazine, Summer 1999. Pages 210-212.
'Andreas Gursky: Serpentine Gallery, London, England'. Zingmagazine, Summer 1999. Page 198-199.
'Effie Paleologou: BAC Gallery, London, England'. Zingmagazine, Summer 1999. Page 224.
'Rosemarie Trockel. Whitechapel Gallery, London'. Parachute, No.95. July/August/September, 1999. Pages 51-52.
'Autocannibal. Lindsay Seers.' Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 24. Page 57.
'Cornelia Parker: Frith Street Gallery'. Creative Camera, Issue 359, Aug/Sept, 1999. Page 46.
'John Wood and Paul Harrison - Obstacle Course and other works'. John Hansard Gallery, Southampton. AN Magazine, October 1999, Page 21.
'The Glass Border'. Danielle Arnaud Gallery, London. The gallery channel.com. Review pages, September, 1999.
'Roy Exley - Interview with Chila Kumari Burman'. The gallery channel.com. Features, September, 1999.
'Wolfgang Tillmans': Maureen Paley Gallery/Interim Art, London. Art Press No.250, October, 1999. Pages 69-71.
'The Lie of the Land: Near and Elsewhere'. The Photographers Gallery, London. Landscape Design. #284, October, 1999. Page 10.
'Art of the Luminous'. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 25, Oct/Nov 1999. Pages 28-33.
'Luke Gottelier: Idea as Image, Image as Phantom' Creative Camera, Issue 360, Oct/Nov. 1999. Pages 40-41.
'Hiroshi Sugimoto & Langlands & Bell'. Michael Hue-Williams, London. Untitled No.20, Autumn 1999. Page 34.
'Luke Gottelier' Entwistle Gallery, London. Art Press, No.251, November, 1999. Pages 75-76.
'Wolfgang Tillmans: 'Space Between Two Buildings'' Portfolio, #30. Winter 1999. Page 67.
'Game Theory'. Dom Hans van der Laan at the Henry Moore Institute, Leeds', Blueprint, December, 1999. Page 64.
'Michael Ashkin', emily Tsingou Gallery. Flash Art, January-February 2000. Pages 118-9.
'Seeing more than the sea' Kate Bright at the emily Tsingou Gallery. Urthona, Issue 12, Winter 1999, page 47.
'Michael Ashkin' emily Tsingou Gallery. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 26, page 61. (60)
'Lisa Yuskavage at greengrassi, London'. Zingmagazine, Winter 1999. Page 233.
'Kate Bright at emily Tsingou Gallery, London'. Zingmagazine, Winter 1999. Page 265.
'Kate Belton at Nylon Gallery'. Interview on Gallery Channel. Published December, 1999.
'Antje Majewski at Asprey Jacques'. Review on Gallery Channel News Pages, December, 1999.
'Nikki S.Lee at Stephen Friedman London - Preview'. Creative Camera, Issue 361. Dec/Jan '99/'00.
2000
'Rut Blees Luxemburg, Laurent Delaye Gallery'. Art Press, No.253. January 2000. Pages 75-76.
'Jane and Louise Wilson, Serpentine Gallery, London.' Parachute No.97, Jan/Feb/Mar, 2000. Pages 51-52.
'Distant Landscapes'. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 27, Feb/Mar, 2000. Pages 48-54.
'Francesca Woodman at The Photographer's Gallery, London'. Zingmagazine.Volume 3, Winter 2000. Page 237.
'Ross Martin: new paintings 1999'. AN Magazine, March 2000. Page 25.
'Audible Light': MOMA Oxford. Blueprint, March 2000. Page 64.
'Fiona Banner': Frith Street Gallery. Flash Art, March/April, 2000. Page 117.
'Jordan Baseman': Wigmore Fine Arts, London. Art Press, No. 255, March 2000, Pages 76-77.
'Jane Simpson': Asprey Jacques. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 28, April/May, 2000. Page 78.
'Straight to Video'. Design Week, April 21, 2000. Pages 16-20.
'A Brusque Contemplative': Howard Hodgkin at Anthony d'Offay. Urthona, Issue 13, Spring 2000. Page 35.
'Is there anyone home?' Exhibition catalogue essay. Gallery Westland Place, London. June 2000. Pages 4-9.
'Into the Interior: Images of Interiors by three European Photographers - Miriam Backstrom, Luisa Lambri and Elisa Sighicelli. Portfolio No.31. June 2000. Pages 4-11.
'Anticorps (Antibodies)', Galerie Zrcher, Paris. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 29, June/July, 2000. Page 36.
'Inner City Life': Photography and Modernist Architecture. Design Week, Vol.15, No.25, June 23, 2000. Pages 16-19
'And If There Were No More Stories' Stephen Friedman Gallery, London. Untitled. No.22, Summer 2000. Pages 30-31.
'Carl von Weiler', Matt's Gallery, London' Flash Art, No. 213, Summer 2000. Page 48.
'Nikki.S.Lee', Stephen Friedman Gallery, London. Parachute No.99, July, August, September, 2000. Pages 59-60.
'Hanging Out': Rocket Gallery, London, England, Zingmagazine No.12, Spring/Summer 2000. Page 227.
'Girl': The New Art Gallery, Walsall. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 30, September/October 2000. Page 62.
Craigie Horsfield, Frith Street Gallery. Art Press, No.260, September 2000. Pages 76-77.
'View from the Window': Museum of Liverpool Life. Blueprint, No.176, October 2000. Page 88.
'The Obscured Word and the Unuttered Sign': Excavating Sean Fairman's Enigmatic Narratives. Catalogue Introduction. The Blue Gallery, London.
'Part of the Process'. AN Magazine, November 2000. Pages 24-25.
'From Here to Betweenity' Arnolfini Gallery, Parachute / para-para, Issue 100, October/December, 2000. Pages 4-5.
'Digital Realities'. Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 31, November / December 2000. Pages 22-27
'AK Dolven at Anthony Wilkinson Gallery' Untitled, No.23, Autumn 2000. Page 46.
'Matthias Hoch: Private Eye' Portfolio, Issue 32. Winter 2000. Pages 50-55.
'Marie-France & Patricia Martin at Danielle Arnaud' Flash Art, November-December 2000. Page 108.
'Faisal Abdu'Allah at The Agency' Flash Art, November-December 2000. Pages 109-110.
'Gary Simmonds @ Laure Genillard, London' Zingmagazine, Issue 13, Autumn 2000. Page 208.
'Duchamp's Suitcase', Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol. Nu, Vol. 2, No.6. Winter 2000. Pages 85-6.
2001
'Liam Gillick: renovation filter:past and near future', Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol. Art Press, No.264, January 2001. Pages 72-73.
'Marie-France and Patricia Martin, Danielle Arnaud Gallery', Art Press, No.264, January 2001. Pages 73-74. (100).
'AK Dolven, Anthony Wilkinson Gallery', Art Press, No.264, January 2001. Page 74.
'Transcendent Light: The Sculpture of David Johnson', Essay in Imaginary Light, David Johnson - Catalogue for exhibition at The Roundhouse, London, 26th February - 25th March, 2001.
'Fiona Crisp' at Matt's Gallery, Contemporary Visual Arts, Issue 32, January/February, 2001. Page 72.
'Thompson and Craighead' at Mobile Home, London, Flash Art No.216. January-February 2001. Pages 118-119.
'Matthias Hoch at The Rocket Gallery' Blueprint, January 2001. Page 57.
'Duncan Higgins' at the Blue Gallery, London, CVA, Issue 33, March/April Page 63.
'Liebeslied / My Suicides' Rut Blees Luxemburg / Alexander Garcia Dttman - Book Review, CVA, Issue 33, March/April 2001. Pages 77-78.
'Fiona Crisp at Matt's Gallery' Art Press, No.266, March 2001. Page 75.
'Sean Fairman at the Blue Gallery' Art Press, No.266, March 2001. Page 76.
'Anton Henning at Entwistle Gallery, London', Flash Art, No.217, March/April 2001. Page 116.
'Phobia', Catalogue Essay for Martin McGinn Exhibition, at Houldsworth Fine Art, Cork Street, London. March 2001.
'Inside Out: Views of the Interior', Catalogue Essay for 'Qui est la', group exhibition curated by Philippe Hurteau in Angers, France. April 2001.
'The Graphite Workings', Catalogue Essay for exhibition catalogue of works of Christopher Cook, Hirschl Contemporary Art, London. April 2001.
'Salla Tykka, Lasso', Delfina Project Space, London. Nu, Vol III No.2, Spring 2001. Pages 82-83.
'The Vindication of Tlon. Photosynkyria 2001' CVA Issue 34, May/June 2001 Pages 76-77.
'Photosynkyria 2001, Thessaloniki, Greece' Art Press, No.268, May 2001.
'Trail Blazer: Photograph by Neil Reddy', The Sunday Review, The Independent on Sunday, 1 July, 2001. Pages 30-31.
'Photosynkyria 2001', Camera Austria, Issue 74/2001. Pages 77/78.
'Sophie Rickett', Emily Tsingou Gallery, London. Flash Art, No. 219, July-September 2001. Page 124.
'The Luminous and the Numinous: Luisa Lambri'. Camera Austria, Issue 75/2001. Page 84.
'Questions of Time and Place - The Photographs of Oliver Godow'. Catalogue essay for exhibition 'Ein Treppenhaus fuer die Kunst VI', Hannover, Germany. June - December 2001.
'Robert Davies' Commentary on the photography of Robert Davies for the 'Eyestorm' website. October 2001. www.eyestorm.com
'Open City' Museum of Modern Art, Oxford. Parachute, Issue 104 'para para'. Page 8.
'Identity Check: Roy Exley meets Sonia Boyce' a-n magazine, November 2001. Pages 30-31
'Claudia Terstappen' Hirschl Contemporary Art, London. Art Press, No. 273, October 2001. Pages 77-78.
'Dayanita Singh: Empty Spaces', Frith Street Gallery, London. Portfolio, No. 34, Winter 2001. Pages 60-61.
'Magnetic North' The New Art Gallery, Walsall. nu: The Nordic Art Review, Vol.III No. 6/01 Dec/Jan 2001. Pages 66-67.
'James Rielly' at Timothy Taylor Gallery, London. Flash Art, No.221, December 2001. Page 96.
2002
'Glenn Sorensen' at Corvi-Mora, London. Flash Art, No.222, January 2002. 130.
'Nina Murdoch' at the Blue Gallery, London. Blueprint, February 2002. Page 83.
'Denying the Detail - Claudia Pilsl'. Catalogue essay for exhibition at Fotogalerie Wien, Vienna. March 5 - April 3, 2002.
'David Burrows and Matthew Smith' at f a projects, London. Contemporary, March 2002. Page 107.
'Memorials of Loss - Camille Katsuragi' Catalogue essay for exhibition catalogue - Galleria Note Arte Contemporanea, Arezzo, Italy. March 2002.
'Process Photography'. Contemporary, April 2002. Pages 18-23
'Oliver Godow' at the Goethe Institute, London. Blueprint, May 2002. Page 83.
'Richard Wilson' Book Review. Contemporary, May 2002. Pages 70/71.
'Unscene', Catalogue essay for exhibition Unscene at Gasworks Gallery, London, May 2002.
'Textual Topographies - Gordon Cheung', Website essay for Domo Baal Gallery, London. May 2002.
'Oliver Godow' at the Goethe Institue, London. Art Press, No.281, July 2002. Pages 75-76.
'Nasrin Tabatabai' at Ibid Projects, London. Flash Art, No.225, July 2002.
'Robin Dance on Shikoku'. Next Level, 02/02, September 2002.
Hannah Starkey @ Maureen Paley / Interim Art, London', Camera Austria, No.79, Autumn 2002. Page 78
Oliver Marsden 'Suffusion' Blue Gallery, London, Zingmagazine, Issue 17, Autumn 2002. Page 248
'John Timberlake - Another Reality' @ Focal Point Gallery, Southend, Source, Issue 32, Autumn 2002. Pages 54-55.
Tatsuo Miyajima - Floating Time, Entwistle Gallery, London. Contemporary, September 2002. Page 84.
'Air Guitar' @ Milton Keynes Gallery, [a-n]For Artists, October 2002, Page 6.
'Shimmering Substance', Cornerhouse, Manchester, Art Press No.284, October 2002.
'Oliver Sieber' @ The Photographers Gallery, London, Art Press No.284, October 2002.
'Dietmar Lutz @ Emily Tsingou Gallery, London, Flash Art, No.228, October 2002. Page 106. 150
'20 Million Mexicans Can't be Wrong', South London Gallery, Blueprint, November 2002. Page 92.
'Deliberate Regression' @ Danielle Arnaud Gallery, London, Contemporary, November 2002. Pages 83-84.
'We are All Normal (and we want our freedom)' Edited by Katia Sander and Simon Sheikh. Black Dog Publications. Book Review. Contemporary. November 2002. Page 74.
'Mary Maclean' Catalogue essay for Jerwood Artists Platform re: exhibition at the Jerwood Space, London, 20 November - 8 December, 2002.
Erasmus Schroeter - 'Theatre of Light', Portfolio, Issue No.36. Pages 60-61.
'One Night in Paris: 'Cauchemar' by Rut Blees Luxemburg' @ Laurent Delaye Gallery, London, Source, Issue 33, Winter 2002. Pages 61-62.
Sam Basu at One in the Other, London. Flash Art issue no. 227 Nov/ Dec./ 2002. Pages 105/106.
2003
Lars Wolter 'Sportiv' at Rocket Gallery, London. Blueprint No.203, January 2003. Page 75.
Michal Rovner at Stephen Friedman Gallery, London. Camera Austria No.81, Spring 2003. Pages 76-77.
'YES! I AM A LONG WAY FROM HOME' at The Nunnery, London, catalogue essay for The Nunnery, Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, Sunderland, and Herbert Read Gallery, Canterbury.
Jonathan Horowitz at Sadie Coles HQ, London. Flash Art issue No. 228 Jan/Feb 2003. Page 114.
Inka Essenhigh at Victoria Miro Gallery, London. Art Press, No. 287, Feb 2003.
'Engaging Landscapes' psycho-geography at Hirschl Contemporary Art, London. Source, issue 34, Spring 2003. Pages 48/49.
'Structuring Paint': Deirdre King, catalogue essay for exhibition at Raid Gallery, Los Angeles.
'Bittersweet: Schizophrenic Beauty', essay, Blunt Edge 3, Spring 2003. Pages 16/17.
'Face' Peter Kennard at Gimpel Fils, London. Art Press. No.288 April 2003.
'Xtreme Houses' Courtenay Smith & Sean Topham (eds.), Prestel Publishing. Contemporary, No.49. Pages 74/75.
'The Sage from Seattle' The art of Mark Tobey. Urthona, Issue 18. Page 42.
'Paul Cunningham: Pointing at Thresholds'. Portfolio, Issue 37, Summer 2003. Page 70.
'Excursions into Limbo: The Liminal Paintings of David Ralph' Catalogue Essay for David Ralph's forthcoming exhibition at Robert Lindsay Gallery, Melbourne, Australia.
'the ulterior motive': 'Fabula' at the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television, Bradford. Source, Issue 35. Summer 2003. Pages 54/55.
'Larks in the Landscape: Sian Bonnell'. Next Level, Edition 01 Volume 02, Summer 2003. Pages 48/53.
'Psycho-geography' at Hirschl Contemporary Art, London. Camera Austria Issue 82, Summer 2003. Pages 85/86.
'Manufactured Landscapes: The Photographs of Edward Burtynsky' Review of book published by Yale University Press. Contemporary, No.52. July 2003. Pages 58/59.
'Laura Padgett's Intimate Tryst'. Catalogue essay in Laura Padgett: Conversation Pieces, published for her exhibition by Städelsches Kunstinstitut und Städtische Galerie Frankfurt am Main, July 2003.
'All of the Known Universe' James Ireland at Spike Island, Bristol. Flash Art, No.232. September 2003.
'Warehouses and Logos', Frank Breuer at The Photographers Gallery, London. Art Press, October 2003.
'James Rielly: More Questions than Answers' Catalogue essay for Galeria Distrito 4, Madrid, for James Rielly's exhibition there, October 2003.
Paul Hodgson at Houldsworth Gallery, London. Source, October 2003. Page 56.
'Elysium', Yao Jui Chung at Aspex Gallery, Portsmouth. Source, October 2003. Page 57.
'The Passive Eye: Pinhole Photography in the Digital Age'. Contemporary, No.56, October 2003. Pages 46 - 49. 180.
'Tom Ellis: Dead Hotel', Percy Miller Gallery, London. a-n magazine, November 2003. Page 8.
Rosa Loy at Entwistle Gallery, London. Flash Art No. 234, November 2003.
Craigie Horsfield 'Irresponsible Drawings' at Frith Street Gallery, London. Camera Austria, November 2003.
'Xtreme Interiors' By Courtenay Smith and Anna Ferrara, published by Prestel - Book Review - Blueprint, November 2003.
'Kunst Chaos Kraft: A Homage to Perec', Fash n'Riot, Edited by Anne Hardy Vol.2, Autumn 2003. Page 2.
'Invention of Hysteria' by Georges Didi-Huberman, MIT Press, 2003. Book Review. Contemporary, No.57, November 2003. Pages 57-58.
'So Much Unspoken So Little Revealed: Albrecht Tubke', Next Level, Vol.2, No,2. December 2003. Pages 132-135.
'The Celebrity of Place: The Paintings of Tom Hackney', in Tom Hackney: Suspended Belief , Catalogue for Castlefield Gallery, Manchester for the exhibition of paintings by Tom Hackney.
'Painting the Process' Bernard Frize and Callum Innes. Urthona, Issue 19 Winter 2003. Page 34.
'Doug Aitken at Victoria Miro', London. Art Press, No.298, March 2004. Pages 75-76
'Recent Work', Brighton Media Centre. Source, Issue 37. Winter 2003. Pages 56/57.
'To Be Honest', Phoenix Gallery, Brighton. Source, Issue 37. Winter 2003. Pages 58/59.
2004
'Between Half Light and Half Dark: The Lacuna'. Essay for poster and invitation fold-out for the exhibition 'Half Light' at Rockwell Gallery, London, January 22nd - February 24th, 2004. Max Attenborough, Gordon Cheung and Anne Hardy.
'Elisa Sighicelli'. Art Review, Volume LV, February 2004. Page 100.
'Wylie's World'. Exhibition Catalogue Essay for the exhibition of the work of Rose Wylie at Trinity Arts Centre, Tunbridge Wells February 2004.
'Last Landscapes: The Architecture of the Cemetery in the West' by Ken Worpole, Reaktion Press, London. Book review. green places, issue 02 February, 2004. Page 38.
'Emergency', Aspex Gallery, Portsmouth. a-n magazine, March 2004. Pages 24/25.
'Frank Breuer', Rocket Gallery, London. Source, Issue 38, Spring 2004. Page 55.
'Catherine Opie', Stephen Friedman Gallery, London. Art Review, Volume LIV, April 2004. Page 100.
'Last Chance to Paradise', Andrew Mummery Gallery, London. Zingmagazine, Issue 19. Pages 308/09. (200).
'Susan Meiselas - Carnival Strippers', Scout Gallery, London. Camera Austria, Issue 86, Summer 2004. Page 90.
'Move House' Sean Topham, Prestel 2004. Blueprint No. 221, July 2004. Page 84.
'Christiane Baumgartner: Freed from Speed' East International 2004 Catalogue essay. Norwich Gallery 2004. Pages 22/23
'Silke Otto-Knapp, Greengrassi, London. Flash Art , No. 238. October. 2004. Page 83.
'David Adjaye's Length x Height x Width' @ InIVA, London, Blueprint No. 225. November 2004. Page 108 catalogue essay
'Obstractivist'@ Hales Gallery, London. a-n magazine, November 2004. Page 18.
Saskia Olde Wolbers @ Maureen Paley / Interim Fine Art. Camera Austria, Issue 88. Page 89.
Dee Ferris @ Corvi-Mora, London. Flash Art, No.239, Nov/Dec 2004. Page 72.
2005
Gordon Cheung@Houldsworth Gallery, London. Flash Art, No.240, Jan. 2005.
Melanie Manchot, 'Tales of Russia' @ The Photographers Gallery, London. Blueprint No.229. March 2005.
James Rielly, 'Life of Rielly' @ Timothy Taylor Gallery, London. Flash Art, No.242, March/April 2005. Page
James Rielly, 'Life of Rielly' @ Timothy Taylor Gallery, London. Art Press, March 2005. Page
'Apparitions and Apparencies', catalogue essay for G. Roland Biermann exhibition, 'Apparitions: The Triptychs' at Bow Church, London, March 17 - April 9 2005.
'Sacred Bodies', catalogue essay for exhibition, 'Sacred Bodies' by Hetain Patel at Lauriston Gallery, Sale, April 2005.
'Tracking the Thresholds', catalogue essay for 'Illuminations', group exhibition at Fordham Gallery, London, 22 April - 22 May 2005.
'Oblivion by Number' catalogue essay for Belfast Exposed Photography on work of Catriona Grant. May 2005. Pages 5-10.
Katy Dove at the Pumphouse Gallery, London. , a-n magazine, May 2005. Page 7.
'Faces in the Crowd' at Whitechapel Gallery, London. Photoworks. Spring/Summer 2005. Pages 48-51.
'Journey into Space', catalogue essay for 'Synthetic Reality', group exhibition at Bury St.Edmunds Art Gallery, Bury St.Edmunds, Suffolk, October 2005.
Life is a Beach, essay on the Photography of Edgar Martins for 'anamnese', Portuguese Contemporary Art website archive, September 2005.
Short Tales / Tall Stories: The Video Work of Laure Prouvost, Essay for Lux Film and Video Website. www.lux.org.uk.
'Trac(k)ing theNeo-Romantic: The Return of the Romantic to Contemporary Art'. Urthona No.22, Autumn 2005. Pages 35-38.
2006
'Dystopia: The Accidental Theorist' - Edgar Martins. Feature in Hot Shoe Feb/March 2006. Pages 36-38.
Ori Gersht @ The Photographers Gallery, London. Flash Art, No.247 March/April 2006. Page 113.
Graham Ellard and Stephen Johnstone 'Motion Path' at De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea, Blueprint, July 2006.
Haris Epaminonda @ DomoBaal, London, Flash Art, No.249, July/August 2006.
Silke Schatz @ Anthony Wilkinson Gallery, London, Flash Art, No. 250. September/October 2006.
Liz Bailey 'On the Road' @ Tricycle Gallery, London. AN Magazine, October 2006.
'The Alchemy of the Lens: The Photography of Roland Biermann' text for the Thyssen Krupp 2007 calendar. Commission completed October 2006.
'Under the Influence: Loretta's Children' The Photography of Loretta Lux, Next Level, Edition 02, Volume 05. Winter 2006. Pages 130-137.
2007
Helen Maurer at the Pumphouse Gallery, London. Flash Art, No.252. January/February 2007.
Izima Kaoru at fa projects, London. Flash Art, No.254. May/June 2007.
'Becalmed and Bewitched: The Photography of Albrecht Tuebke' , Next Level, Edition 01, Volume 6. Summer 2007.
'But Derrida is Dead', slashseconds No.5, Spring 2007. Webmagazine at www.slashseconds.org
'Rasselstein Weissblechkalendar Projekt', Ag No.47, Spring 2007. Page 22.
'!!!' [Beefheart Lost his Baby but Found the Truth], Fash'n Riot No.4. Summer 2007. Page 30.
'Erasures of Time: The Photography of Martin Newth' in Slow Burn, catalogue for exhibition at Focal Point Gallery, Southend-on-Sea, September - November 2007.
'Wide Angle View: Nathan Coley's Take on Urban Realities', Next Level, Issue 12, Autumn 2007. Pages 64-67.
'Realities like Straws in the Wind', slashseconds No.7, Autumn 2007. Webmagazine at www.slashseconds.org
12 Essays for, Photo Art: Photography in the 21st Century published by DuMont Buchverlag, Köln, December 2007. [Essays on the work of:- Rut Blees Luxemburg / Sonja Braas / Natalie Czech / Ruud van Empel / Beate Gütschow / Izima Kaoru / Luisa Lambri / Florian Maier-Aichen / Taiji Matsue / Mika Ninagawa / Heidi Specker / Michael Wesely. Pages 62 / 70 / 110 / 130 / 166 / 210 242 / 270 / 278 / 314 / 414 / 462.
'Ebru Erülkü's Schizoid London', Hot Shoe, Winter 2007.
'Recycling with a Difference: The Paintings of Stephen Palmer', Vane Gallery, Newcastle - website. www.vane.org.uk, December 2007.
2008
'Paradise Re-Visited: The Paintings of Katie Deith', Text for exhibition catalogue for Danielle Arnaud Gallery, London. January 2008 (256).
'Luisa Lambri at Thomas Dane Gallery, London', Flash Art, Jan/Feb, 2008.
'Neo Rauch: Para', book review for Art World, Issue 3, Feb/March 2008.
'The Eye of the Beholder: The Paintings of Nina Murdoch' Urthona, Issue 25, Spring 2008. Pp 32-34.
‘Bittersweet: Schizophrenic Beauty’ in Art Without Art, Roy Oxlade & Marcus Reichert [Eds], Ziggurat Books, London. 2008. Pages 117-120.
‘The Exotics of Alienation’, essay for monograph on the Japanese photographer Izima Kaoru, to be published Autumn 2008 by Hatje Cantz publishers, Stuttgart, Germany.
‘Suky Best: Early Birds’, essay for the website of Animate Projects www.animateprojects.org October 2008 (260).
‘Free-fall Hero Refuses Help’. (extract), essay in slashseconds 9, www.slashseconds.org, Autumn 2008.
‘Zsolt Bodoni @ fa projects, London’, Flash Art, December 2008.
2009
‘Andy Harper @ One in the Other, London’, Flash Art, January / February 2009.
back to topExamples of Writing
Feature in 'Portfolio' No.36 Pages 60/61
Feature in ‘Portfolio’ No.36 Pages 60/61When the Leipzig photographer , Erasmus Schroeter, chooses a subject for his camera, that subject invariably undergoes a process of transformation. There is always a sense of theatricality about the way in which he achieves this transformation in his photographs, and this phenomenon has become even more pronounced in his most recent series, Komparsen (extras). In this series of staged photographs, despite his abandonment of the theatrical lighting, which has featured prominently in his previous work, theatricality is referenced through his use of theatre extras or 'bit-part' players, who, through the demeanour of these images are finally allotted a kind of stardom. To recruit the women who appear in this series, Schroeter perused the extras catalogues of the Theatres of Saxony, choosing women from that age range between youth and middle age, whose looks could be described as average rather than striking or beautiful. The demeanour of 'stardom' which is bestowed upon these women by Schroeter , through his construction of the images, is quite paradoxical. These women disabuse the stereotype of the star; missing are the makeovers that skilfully disguise any signs of ageing, in their place the overuse of cheap and garish cosmetics seems to achieve the opposite effect. Absent is the feline or languid pose, lacking is that 'aura' or charisma cultivated by the star and any appreciable trace of meaningful narrative is missing.
In Komparsen, the venue for Schroeter's photo-shoot of the women extras, is an abandoned agricultural showground , at Markleeberg, near Leipzig, which was formerly a GDR 'showpiece', part of their social engineering programme. Now a dismal, desolate place rife with all the signs and symptoms of neglect and dereliction - peeling paint, graffitti'd walls, weed choked paths and steps, where the bilious colours of the walls have become strangely incongruous. The irony here is heightened by Schroeter's depiction of the women, whose bright clothing clashes harshly with those walls in an anachronistic disharmony which brings a real sense of tension to these images. While highlighting its decay and neglect, these photographs seem to herald a false revival of this site, making a doomed attempt to afford it fresh credibility, a desperate rebirth which will need all the intensive care it can get - the prognosis is not good. Not only does this work carry references to a failed regime, but it also references the commercial film industry with its strict schedules, its invisible hierarchies, its veneer of reality and sumptuous transience, but also as a symptom of the excesses of consumer culture and the expression of that excess in its hyper-commercialism.
The female extras in these scenes have a mysterious, enigmatic air, they stare past the camera lens, into the distance, a strategy which, in turn, distances them from the viewer - despite displaying all the hallmarks of a formulaic motif - giving them an aura of untouchability. These women elevated to the role of stars by the mien of the images, could never be stars - any attempts at glamour here are compromised, reality is starkly magnified, fantasy has become merely a rudimentary shadow of its filmic referent. We are caught between two worlds here; the world of the paparazzi who stalk and poach the gloss of celebrity, and that of the documentary photographer who vainly attempts to capture reality. Schroeter's unorthodox use of colour in these images has evolved from his chromatic excesses in the series' which preceded this one, Bunker, Waffen and Lauben.
Schroeter's early work was made while he was living in Leipzig as an East German citizen, under the regime of the German Democratic Republic, when both reSources and opportunities for the artist were severely limited. This early work was all monochrome and was principally portraiture or social documentary, any critique of the communist system was , of course, not an option - Schroeter , like many former East German residents, was no stranger to the excesses of the Stasi. After he had the audacity to apply for an exit visa in order to work in West Germany, the Stasi confiscated his identity papers and replaced them with papers that branded him as an 'enemy of the state'. It is not surprising, therefore, that much of Schroeter's later work is a barely veiled critique of the failed ideologies that polarised millions of lives in his part of Germany for over fifty years.
In his series Bunker, Schroeter's photographs of Hitler's Atlantic Coast Bunkers around the coasts of Brittany and Normandy, transform them from the dour and desolate concrete monoliths that appear in Paul Virilio's book Bunker Archaeology, into alluring sculptural objects. His use of powerful theatrical-lighting rigs, floods these structures with vivid, seductive light, which has the effect of re-inventing them, elevating them, so that they shed their austerity like a butterfly sheds its chrysalis. As menacing as these structures appeared in the early 1940's - named Atlantikwall by Hitler, and guarding his newly occupied territories of France, Belgium, Netherlands and Denmark from attack by the Allies - they have now been emasculated by the ravages of time and ultimately mollified here by Schroeter's beautification process.
A similar strategy was followed by Schroeter in his Waffen series, where in a museum of military hardware in the former East Germany, and in military dumps in the forests there, a redundant array of Soviet-made weaponry has been transmuted into an impotent son et lumiere spectacle by Schroeter's coloured-lighting rigs, and so the travesty of beauty is visited upon the former military might of the Eastern bloc, which since the passing of perestroika has entered the realms of history. These newly benign, neutralised hunks of metal have become mute memorials which all but disappear beneath Schroeter's barrage of colour, in an irony which is both sweet and piquant at the same time. So, in Bunker and Waffen, with his colourful customisation of these relics, Schroeter raises an ironic epitaph over the bones of two failed ideologies.
If William Eggleston put the colour in photography, Erasmus Schroeter is putting the colour in colour photography. Like the Fauvists, he seems to be drunk on colour, and is not frightened to strive for hyperbole in his boldly colour-saturated images. Whereas he relied on powerful coloured lighting in his Bunker series, in his Komparsen images he has saturated the scenes with photographic floodlighting, which exaggerates the brightness of the women's clothing, their bleached or dyed hair and the sickly coloured hues of the painted buildings. Unlike his early work in the GDR, these images could never be described as documentary, not only are they carefully staged, but the aggressive presence of colour lends them an 'otherness', a strangeness that overwhelms and obscures what might otherwise be the subject matter of these works, but in fact becomes merely the armature upon which colour can play. In his essay titled 'The Black Paintings', the American painter, Ad Reinhardt summarise colour by stating that “Colour is always trapped in some kind of physical activity or assertiveness of its own”. It is this same 'physical activity' that projects the colour into the foreground in Schroeter's images, and its 'assertiveness' that infuses the otherwise prosaic scene with its new found but superficial vigour.
Schroeter is interested in the elevation of the peripheral, but his work straddles that fine divide where the newly elevated peripheral, and its transcendent state, with its new found aura, vie for precedence, the reality and the fantasy become Gestalt opposites. In other words his work is affinitive in that it brings together the peripheral and the vehicle through which that peripheral is elevated - by means of which it is able to transcend the prosaic - while making no secret of the transcendental processes involved. So Schroeter advertises his wiles, in fact he revels in them, and this critique of commercial photography, where the betrayal of illusion is the last thing that the advertiser wants (the illusion must prevail in order to retain its power of seduction) is an intrinsic part of his photography. In his Phenomenology of Perception, Maurice Merleau-Ponty states, “The real colour of things persists beneath their appearances, as the background persists beneath the figure.” It seems that Schroeter is taking this idea onto another level, as he urges the colours to take on a life of their own, to overwhelm the forms and surfaces of which they are an intrinsic part.
Schroeter's Komparsen images, with their strident 'in your face' demeanour, sit somewhere between the immediacy of Beat Streuli's Everyday series, snatched 'street shots' of urban dwellers picked out, seemingly at random from the crowd, and those poignant staged shots of Los Angeles rent-boys, drug addicts and drifters by Philip-Lorca DiCorcia in his Hollywood series which parody and undermine the superficial gloss that is Hollywood. In Bunker and Waffen, Schroeter adopts the role of undertaker, arranging the embalmed corporeal remains of those two failed ideologies, national socialism and communism, and laying them out for viewing before they finally depart this earth. Komparsen is somewhat more complex, but puts one in mind of a now famous statement that Roland Barthes made in his book Camera Lucida. Barthes stated, after looking at an 1852 photograph of Napoleon's brother, that “I am looking at the eyes that looked at the emperor”, we could equally claim, on looking at the 'Komparsen' images, that “We are looking at the eyes that avoided the stare of the Stasi”, and now, we might add, revel in its demise.
Exhibition Review in Camera Austria, Issue 88. Page 89
Saskia Olde Wolbers @ Maureen Paley Interim Art, London. 04 September - 03 October 2004The fantasy worlds to which the videos of Saskia Olde Wolbers transport the viewer have a distinctly schizophrenic quality. Visually they have the look of hallucinations - other-worldly visions seemingly generated by sleep deprivation, narcotic intoxication, madness or some other delusional agent. The poignant verbal or textual narratives that synchronize with the visuals are adapted from bizarre accounts of real life events that Wolbers has collected from newspapers, magazines, T.V. documentaries, or the grapevine. Half credible narratives, they nevertheless align with everyday reality, the voices, imbued with authority, bring words as absorbing and fascinating as all unorthodox biographies inevitably are.
In her 2002 work, 'Placebo', showing in the ground floor gallery, Wolbers challenges our hold on reality with visions of ghostly hospital rooms which seem to dissolve before our very eyes, huge globs and streaks of viscous white paint drift horizontally and lazily across our field of vision, languid palimpsests for that strange phenomenon, 'ball lighting' which is reputed to travel through walls and glide unimpeded but menacingly across the rooms of a house. These drifts of paint that stream from one wall only to be sucked in by the opposing one, are distinctly unsettling and equally menacing. A narrator, confined to a hospital bed, seemingly semi-comatose and paralysed, is condemned to a twilight world of claustrophobic surreality. Even more disturbing, as the narrative develops, is the knowledge that a bogus doctor (the 'Placebo' of the title) that roams this hospital, where the narrator is a nurse, had befriended her and, when she discovered his ruse, had tried to murder her by driving the car in which she was passenger, into a tree, and the resulting injuries now confine her to this demi-world that she witnesses from her bed. What begins as a bizarre but visually seductive spectacle ends up as a vehicle for an unfolding nightmare. This neo-Gothic tale of horror replaces Gothic baroque with a modern day extravaganza of fantasy equally ornate and texturally extreme, but arrived at via a very different route. H.P. Lovecraft would have willingly given his writing arm for such a facility with images.
The second installation, 'Day-Glo' in the upstairs gallery, offers an even more convoluted narrative. A Spanish farmer named Luis Zarzuela, emigrated to Australia to work in the opal mines, on making his fortune he returned to Andalucia and bought some land, initially to start a farm. When this project ran into difficulties some divergent thinking prompted him to create a ' Virtual Theme Park', in the 2000 hectares of now redundant 'Poly-Tunnels'. Loosely based on the landscapes of Australia which had such an impact on him, the visuals transport us across a stainless steel plateau punctuated by rows of steel studs, our route lined by a bizarre array of organic looking cyber-architecture, and stunted proto-vegetation which could be a glimpse into the esoteric world of nanotechnology - a topography that is more trippy than true. It transpires that Luis' wife began to disappear for days at a time into this virtual world, evidently to make a tryst with a younger version of Luis that she encounters there. When he finds out about this, and she disappears for three months, Luis decides to call and end to it and to sell his virtual theme park and have it shipped away complete with his now virtual wife who, his doctor thinks, could no longer manage the re-entry into reality.
While first impressions convince the viewer that these works are achieved through digital wizardry and chicanery, they are in fact arrived at through analogue video images of hand-built scenarios painstakingly created by Wolbers in her studio. It takes her a year to produce a seven or eight minute video. The fact that a lo-fi methodology has been used to achieve such exotic and sophisticated imagery with its futuristic mien makes this work all the more astonishing. While there is potential for preciosity here, the edginess of the narratives that Wolbers has created repeatedly rescues this work from that fate. A whole succession of viewers here are held in rapt attention - lives on hold - attesting to the unusual power of this work and affirming my conviction that Wolbers' is a name of which we are likely to hear a lot more.
Book Review in Contemporary, No.52. July 2003. Pages 58/59. MANUFACTURED LANDSCAPES
The Photographs of Edward Burtynsky, Roy Exley, Yale University Press 2003 £45.00Since 1984, the Canadian photographer Edward Burtynsky has been photographing the landscape. The landscapes in his large format photographs are not, however, of the Ansel Adams or Edward Weston schools, he eschews the idyllic, virgin landscape. What might have been Elysian scenes have here been chewed up and spat out, torn apart and ripped to shreds by industrial machines, or despoiled and polluted by the waste products of industrial processes. There is nothing politically didactic, however, about these images - an overwhelming beauty inhabits many of his photographs - his mission seems to be to open our eyes to the beauty that is often hidden within such desolation. His photographs leave us in no doubt as to the awesome scale of some of these sites which include quarries, open-cast mines, mine tailings, oil fields, ship-breaking sites and waste tips. He seems to be documenting here, evidence of an industrial sublime, finding, as it were, Blake's Jerusalem amongst those dark satanic mills.
In Burtynsky's words, these are scenes of “an organic architecture created by our pursuit of raw materials ..…The concept of the landscape as architecture has become, for me, an act of imagination.” One of the images in this book that most succinctly illustrates this sentiment, is his Rock of Ages 15, where a vast chasm hewn from solid granite, with its geometrical traceries of galleries, terraces, buttresses and cornices, is a sort of inverted architecture that has an uncanny visual affinity with those yawning American hotel atria so vividly documented by the German photographer Andreas Gursky. There is no doubt that the suggestion of grandiose modern architecture in these methodically worked rock faces has been amplified by the viewpoint of Burtynsky's camera. In another image, his Oxford Tire Pile 5 we see a soaring massif composed of millions of discarded car tyres creating its own spectacular landscape complete with cliffs and ravines, simulating nature's architecture. As subjects, these transformed landscapes are, in effect, ready-mades, in the tradition of Marcel Duchamp, Burtynsky, however, has sought them out, rather than 'happened upon' them. Although his methods maybe formal and the results might even be described as 'classical', his idiosyncratic choice of subjects and topical thematics give these photographs a very contemporary feel.
Although Burtynsky quotes Carleton Watkins, Edweard Muybridge and August Sander as influences, his photographs are essentially painterly in demeanour, his use of colour and his compositional techniques are more closely allied with painting than photography. His images are relentlessly driven by the search for awesome spectacle and overwhelming scale which while aesthetically engaging, visually compelling, are at times in danger of becoming a parody of themselves, risking the fate of the Victorian painter John Martin whose overblown apocalyptic visions eventually collapsed into cliché. A painter with whose work Burtynsky's stands critical comparison is Philippe Jacques de Loutherbourg, whose View of Coalbrookdale by Night (1801) makes an early reference to the industrial sublime, and whose An Avalanche in the Alps (1803) contains visual parallels with the scale and grandeur of some of Burtynsky's quarry photographs. The essays in this book by Kenneth Baker, Mark Haworth-Booth and Lori Pauli all engage cogently with the thematic and aesthetic contextualities that support Burtynsky's work, giving the reader a valuable overview of the work, and providing a framework within which we can view these compelling images. The debates they set in motion with their essays, help to anchor the visually seductive photographs, in this lavishly illustrated book - at the same time they rescue it from the status of 'coffee-table' book, to which it might otherwise have been consigned. This book, co-published by the National Gallery of Canada, in Ottawa, as a catalogue for their exhibition of Burtynsky's work, is a fitting retrospective survey of his considerable body of work.
Catalogue Essay - Apparitions and Apparencies: Photography as Metaphysics
The world is an illusion and art is the presentation of the illusion of the world. Paul Virilio, The Aesthetics of Disappearance [1]
There is nothing more powerfully apparent than the view of existence that we term reality. The fact that an empirically tested reality seems to become the more and more indisputable foundation for our culture is serving to excite an ever-increasing interest in virtual reality to compensate for the loss of the indeterminate - just as the technologically obsessed Victorians became attracted to the metaphysical worlds of the séance and the Gothic horror story as a compensation for the loss of the metaphysical. Giorgio de Chirico invented a series of new realities through which he expressed a metaphysical world inhabited by figures gleaned from the stories of Homer and Dante that haunted the archetypal plazas and arcades of classical Mediterranean cities. These paintings with titles such as 'The Enigma of the Hour', 'The Endless Journey', 'Nostalgia of the Infinite' and 'The Enigma of the Oracle', painted just before the first world war, seem to refute the ubiquity of modernity and its homage to the machine, whose juggernaut had edged closer and closer to war. In his book 'On Metaphysical Art' [2], de Chirico wrote “A work of Art must stand completely outside human limitations; logic and common sense are detrimental to it. Thus it approximates to dreams.” The photographic works of Roland Biermann relate to this same urge towards, and engagement with, the metaphysical which is subliminally contrapuntal to the headlong calamitous flight that Modernity takes from all that undermines the cold hand of science and its empirical objectivity. Biermann's staged photographs are inspired, rather than influenced, by such photographers as the American early 20th Century photographer F. Holland Day, and the American 20th Century photographers, Duane Michals and Francesca Woodman, all of whose works are ghostly and other- worldly and seem to be metaphors for that continuous discourse between the spiritual and the subconscious which animates the soul.
That our dream lives seem so outrageously alien to our everyday waking lives while they are obviously predicated on a visual language that aligns closely with reality, is always something of a mystery. That our dream lives while apparently out of our control can exert such strong emotive reactions is often something of a worry. That our dream lives are connected with our waking lives by such a tenuous and flawed thread of memory is frequently something of a frustration. Ultimately our dream lives and waking lives can only run parallel, they have their mutual relationships as each subliminally feeds off the other but there is a threshold, which continually denies their conjunction. The closest we come to a conscious connection with the dream world is in that immeasurable moment as we drop off to sleep where we are marginally conscious yet experience dream images, eidetic images, that roll across our consciousness during what is known as the hypnagogic state. On the sleep side of the threshold they are called dreams while on the waking side of the threshold they are called hallucinations and yet seem to be one and the same phenomenon.
The ghostly portraits and mythological tableaux of F. Holland Day and the early paintings of Giorgio de Chirico in which the mystical and mythological are interwoven, as in the work of the Surrealists - with whom he subsequently became associated - seem to draw their inspiration from the world of dreams. In that world there is a seamless synergy between fantasy and reality and yet this is imagery that is consciously conceived and created and so seems to inhabit that same territory - straddling the waking and dream worlds - as eidetic imagery. The photographs of the American photographer Francesca Woodman, who died in 1981 at a tragically young age, also seem to conjure up a dream world whose parameters she utilised as a road map in her constant search for identity, whose roots, anchored as they are in the soul, lead down to a subconscious, metaphysical world, the knowledge from which is hard won, the exploration of which is fraught with perils. This ethereal and ineffable threshold between sleep and consciousness and between the physical and the metaphysical - between this world and the next - has been engaged with by many artists and writers, it is a theme which, while constantly rising and falling into and out of fashion, simply will not go away, it challenges and fascinates in equal measure and each generation of artists and writers relates to it in a different way. The photography of Roland Biermann addresses this phenomenon through a series of visual psychological conundrums, which, as metaphors, both symbolize and signify an otherwise inaccessible metaphysical world. The carefully staged scenarios that create the framework of his images seem to be predicated upon a whole series of enigmatic finds that are the spoils of excavations into the world of the subconscious - elusive traces of a metaphysical otherness that evades glib explanations. Physical reality, as a foil to the ephemeral traces of the metaphysical, has become rather elusive in many of Biermannn's images, Apparition 2, 2000 is a case in point, where the body beneath the shroud-like veil is exposed only by those reflections revealed in the slick of murky water that lies beneath. The conundrum, posed here by a reality that is expressed only through its subliminal reflections, challenges not only the plausibility of our perception of reality but also our rejection of the metaphysical as its viable alternative.
The question whether or not scenes borrowing much of their symbolism and visual dynamic from the archetypes of Christian iconography can claim the attention of a contemporary audience is courageously addressed in these works. It seems fairly conclusive here that images and scenarios that so effectively engage with the workings of a human psyche that changes little, if at all, during the passage of millennia, are always going to be compelling. Far from being anachronistic these images are synchronistic in bringing timeless concerns and desires right up to date in a culturally relevant context. If we are to transcend the stressful grip that the demands of our day-to-day humdrum existence exert on our increasingly centrifugal yet myopic lives, then occasionally we have to step back and obtain a longer and wider perspective on things. No matter what our belief-systems are, or indeed whether we are believers or non-believers, our existential roots penetrate deep into our cultural history and by nurturing those roots and maintaining our sense of belonging, we ensure that we do not lose contact with that cultural history and consequently our identity. If this is an area that much contemporary art neglects then it takes extra courage to step out and address and spotlight the distinctive landmarks that are the signifiers of this particular cultural territory.
While Biermann's work could be compared to that of Francesca Woodman, one of the principal differences between their work is the context, while many of Woodman's photographs were taken in abandoned and derelict buildings, those buildings are all domestic in nature or scale, whereas the derelict or decrepit sites in which Biermann works tend to be industrial in scale, more heavy duty, more threatening, more impersonal, over and above this Woodman's work was principally autobiographical and self-searching, focussing on self-portraiture as self-examination, while any human presence in Biermann's images tends to be anonymous and symbolic. The agony of Christ at the Crucifixion is referenced. The Resurrection, or more importantly, the ascension (which is less connected with the theme of redemption) is symbolised through the sequential materialisation of apparitions, which while nominally reminiscent of Duane Michals' work - with disappearances, transparent presences, ghostly silhouettes - are visually and conceptually at variance. Biermann's images are more complex than those of the two above mentioned artists, they operate on several levels, while relating to the mythic, they also suggest access to another plane of existence. The apparitions that come and go are part speculative and part fantastic (this is the metafictional element).
Materialisation and de-materialisation, from the domain of Science Fiction also, of course, belong firmly in the tradition of theological metaphysics and although also inspired here by the graphic fantasies of H R Giger, which is distinctly sci-fi in mien, it is to theology and mythology that Biermann quite strongly refers in his enigmatic and ethereal photographs. The Apparitions series of photographs are distinctly 'other-worldly' and markedly alien in their oblique representation of a flawed humanity haunted by the dark consequences of its obtuse and arrogant stance against the natural order. There is a feeling that the scenarios presented by the Apparitions are a poignant warning that the second fall of mankind, wrought by his despoliation of his inheritance, might well be looming on the horizon. They are far from a celebration of darkness but rather a prophetic warning of its imminence. The ethereal presences here seem to offer a foretaste of loss, in the way that Bill Jacobson's wraith-like photographs of AIDS sufferers foretell of their lives fading into the void of death. Biermann's photographs whose visual simplicity belies the complexity of their messages beseech us to wake up before it is too late, we neglect what is beyond and behind the veil of here and now, at our peril. Unlike Jacobson's images, however, they warn of loss rather than signify it.
The triptych and diptych have their origins in medieval altar-pieces, in which each panel depicts a different narrative element from a particular sacred text. Biermann's diptychs, triptychs and multiple images share that same sacred quality, echoing such holy subjects as the pietà as well as representing that threshold between life and death that stretched between the Agony and the Resurrection. We might think of Christ in the tomb at Gethsemane with the boulder rolled against the entrance as we view Biermann's photographs of wrapped bodies. Contemporary mummification, with bodies wrapped in clingfilm, is a recurrent subject in his photographs where the bodies seem to be suspended in a limbo between life and the hereafter, straddling that threshold in whose thrall all sense of time collapses into dissolution (we are reminded here also of the ectoplasmic materialisations associated with those ghostly apparitions claimed by Victorian séances). Just as the shaman can access other planes of existence through the hard won portal of ecstasy, risking the rupture of that tentative thread of consciousness that keeps him or her connected to the real world, we also taste other realities here but via a far easier route. We can dip into and out of these mimetic approximations of metaphysical states, using our imaginations to glean a taste of the insights that Biermann enigmatically expresses in these sometimes disquieting images. Time has collapsed here also - there are no references here to specific temporal moments - there is rather a timelessness in which the era is immaterial, we sense here that maybe these are simply moments snatched arbitrarily from a continuum, just as the narrative possibilities here are veiled and allow the viewer to construct his or her own pseudo-narrative, so the disguised temporality allows us the prerogative to invoke a timeframe which is relevant to our own life experience. These phantasmic images seem to fall somewhere between the invocation of, and the imagination of, metaphysical traces. If, as Ted Serios claimed in the 1970's, he could photograph his thoughts, creating his bizarre and fanciful 'Thoughtographs' [3], then why should Biermann not be able to project his prolific imagination into photographic images - at least these 'sleights' of process convey the honesty of manual control - any trickery here is not denied - rather than those ubiquitously dishonest digitally manipulated images that assail us on a daily basis.
An artist who also explored the idea of the triptych and who refers to the Crucifixion in many of his early works was Francis Bacon. Bacon's enigmatic distortions of the human body, often suggesting torture, disfigurement and alienation take a bleak and nihilistic view of the human condition. We don't go unscathed by the isolation and anonymity imposed upon us by the demands of contemporary urban living, violence is offered to us at all levels in so many ways and on so many scales, Bacon seems to be saying. In his painting from 1950, 'Fragment of a Crucifixion', where large areas of raw canvas find a correlation in the bare and stark walls of Biermann's industrial settings, Bacon deconstructs the medieval archetypes of the crucifixion, in effect de-mythologising it and makes it more of a reality which renders it more immediate and more relevant within a contemporary context. It is this empowering through the updating of religious symbolism that also characterises much of Biermann's photographic work. The angst ridden and agonised figures of Bacon that are met in a more enigmatic and ambivalent form in Biermann, seem to illustrate and corroborate that memorable Dylan Thomas poem 'DO NOT GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT', they do indeed seem to 'Rage against the dying of the light', as in the third line of that poem, but their cries are not only silent but muffled and stifled. There is a sense of this stifling also about the figures that make partial, tentative appearances in the photographs of G Roland Biermann. His triptych, Apparition 10, depicts a ghostly wrapped figure floating inside a cylindrical steel armature. This figure is doubly imprisoned - stifled and restrained - firstly bound within the shroud and secondly embraced by the steel cage. A sense of tortured isolation is invoked here, a sense that the trussed and bound figure is no longer of this world be that in mortal or mental terms. Two indistinct figures appear in early Bacon paintings both enclosed within cage-like armatures, against dark stygian backgrounds as in Apparition 10. His Untitled (Crouching Nude), 1950-1 and Study of a Nude, 1952-3, both powerful images, they convey the effects of disaffection and alienation, of isolation. In Biermann's image, however it is a state of transience that is suggested, as this figure seems to be on the move, perhaps between a physical and a spiritual plane, the armature being a metonym for the former and the ghostly shroud for the latter. Biermann's images suggest the hope of transcendence, while Bacon's convey a sense of hopelessness, figures trapped by despair. Biermann's Apparition 14 and Apparition 16 are also eerily reminiscent of Bacon's 1949 grisaille painting, Study from the Human Body, where the face and part of the body of a ghostly male figure are partially obscured by a shower curtain, (and which David Sylvester vividly describes as being “like a wraith disappearing through the gap between two grey curtains”. [4]) just as Biermann's figures are partially hidden by sheets of industrial polythene. There is something that suggests repression in the way that Biermann's figures are curtailed and partially obscured, while their silence may well parallel that of Jesus on the Cross before he cried out 'Father why hast though forsaken me?' This agony and disaffection is amplified by the stretched portrait format of Biermann's images, which leaves little opportunity for the eye to rest and bring quiescence to their barely veiled violence.
Biermannn's photographic essays access the metaphysical in a distinctly contemporary context, not only do they summon the uncanny but also offer a unique and singular approach to the photographic image. His staged photographs are restricted to monochrome, reminiscent of those pristine, purist, art photography images of the 1950's and 60's, he uses a panoramic camera, designed to take landscape format images, to create a vertical, portrait format, and they present a disconcerting counterpoint of hard-blown industrial edges and surfaces with the vulnerability of nude, cling-film or fabric-wrapped bodies. Like the paintings of Francis Bacon, Biermann's diptychs and polyptychs suggest narrative sequences but paradoxically resist narrative interpretation. For these reasons I have avoided any attempt to compare his work with other contemporary photographic work. Biermann's enigmatic, fascinating images stand very much on their own, offering us a unique opportunity to re-assess the idea of the metaphysical within a post-modern and pluralistically atheist culture.
[1] Paul Virilio, The Aesthetics of Disappearance [Trans. by Philip Beitchman], Semiotext(e), New York. 1991. Pages 35/36.
[2] Giorgio de Chirico, 'On Metaphysical Art' (1917), in Memories [Trans. by M. Crosland], Peter Owen, London. 1971.
[3] See, Jule Eisenbud, The World of Ted Serios: 'Thoughtographic' Studies of an Extraordinary Mind, London, McFarland & Company. 1989.
[4] David Sylvester, Looking Back at Francis Bacon, Thames and Hudson, London. 2000. Page 54.
Interview with Shozo Michikawa by Roy Exley for 'Crafts' magazine.
In July this year, Shozo Michikawa, the renowned Japanese ceramicist was in England to open his exhibition at Galerie Besson, build two anagama kilns in Cumbria and run a ceramics workshop. During a short respite in his busy schedule Roy Exley managed to catch Michikawa to have a conversation about his work.
R.E. Shozo, there is something geological about the surface qualities of your work, they don't exactly replicate rock forms like the work of Claudi Casanovas, but one is very much reminded of volcanic tuff, of solidified lava, by the surfaces of many of your ceramic pieces.
S.M. It is interesting you should say this because I was born near the city of Hokkaido very close to Mount Usu, and lived there as a child. There was a lake in front of my house and a volcano behind. That volcano was really part of my life, and incidentally, it erupted violently and dramatically about thirty years ago. There was a wonderful natural beauty about that area. That nature was very important to me as I grew up, and my experiences there definitely had a strong influence on my work.
R.E. There is a raw energy in evidence in the tense twisted and ruptured surfaces of your vessels, which seems to express that precarious balance between harmony and chaos that epitomises the forces of nature.
S.M. Well, I like to let the clay speak for itself, as I work it I like to push it to its limits so that the nature of the clay to a certain extent dictates the surface forms of my work. I have used five different types of stoneware clay here, all from around Seto, where I have my studio. Seto is a renowned centre for ceramics in Japan because of the quality and varieties of the clay found there. I know now, after years of experience where to obtain the best clay around Seto.
R.E. Do you dig the clay yourself then?
S.M. Oh yes, I go out in my car with a spade and a sack and dig the clay myself, that is very important. Unfortunately the pit where I found my favourite clay has now been covered over by a new golf course so I had to make extra efforts to dig as much as I could before they began the work. But I still experiment with different clays as all potters do.
R.E. That word 'experiment' seems pivotal to the character of your work, is it an important aspect of your approach?
S.M. Of course, each new lump of clay presents a fresh challenge and each time I have to experiment with the ways in which that clay will resist or yield as I work with it, the strength and plasticity of the clay being expressed through the tensions held by its surfaces in the finished pieces, so different clays result in different pieces.
R.E. Are there any potters whose work inspires yours? I can think of three British potters whose raw forms and finishes might loosely be compared with yours, that is Ewen Henderson, Angus Suttie and Sara Radstone, although all, of course are very distinctive.
S.M. Well, the truth is I try not to look at other ceramicists' work as I am keen that others styles should not influence my work. First and foremost I am influenced by the forms and dynamics of nature - guavas and other tropical fruits from the Philippines have influenced the forms of some of the pieces in my current exhibition at Galerie Besson, for instance - but I also find other art forms inspiring, woodcarving, stone carving, sculpture in general, and architecture. I went into the showroom yesterday of a stone flooring specialist in London, where I saw some amazing sections of fossilised trees, I found those very beautiful and very inspiring. During my visit to Brussels this week I went into a bakery where they baked loaves whose extravagant crusts had a wonderful texture, a visual treat that will remain with me for a while.
R.E. So your next batch of ceramics may well emerge from the kiln looking like something we could eat.
S.M. Don't be surprised, you never know, I loved the textures of those loaves and every day I am alert to new visual inspirations in the world around me.
R.E. Your forms are very free, however the relationships between facets and edges seem very important, but it is obvious that you work in a very spontaneous way and that chance plays an important role. What is the main basis for the forms that you create?
S.M. Well, as I said before, the natural world is important, but of course, traditional Japanese ceramics, both their forms and functions, inform my work, although of course to the casual observer that will not be obvious.
R.E. Bernard Leach was instrumental in the 1950's in awakening western ceramicists to the importance of the traditions of Japanese ceramics and ultimately influential in the way those traditions began to inform studio pottery in this country. Shoji Hamada working alongside Leach was also an important part of this process; did echoes of this phenomenon have any effect on ceramics in Japan?
S.M. It is interesting that you should ask me that as one cannot find Hamada's work in Japan and European potters visiting Japan often ask me where they can find Hamada's work and my answer always disappoints them. For me Kouetu was more important, but of course in Japan we have always researched our own traditions. Shino glaze and the Seto Mingei style have always had an influence on my work. Of course the introduction of the Tea Ceremony in the 16th was a pivotal moment in the Japanese ceramics tradition, a real turning point that had a revolutionary influence on the type of vessels being produced and is important to this day.
R.E. Much of your work is unglazed giving it this raw lava-like finish, but looking at two glazed pieces in your current exhibition which are quite similar in form, the glazes seem quite different, one has a hard, reflective glaze with a pale uniformity about it, while the other mottled and opalescent with a slightly waxy finish, this glaze has a real warmth and richness to it which invites you to touch it. Can you tell me about these pieces?
S.M. Well actually they both have the same Kohiki glaze, but the first one was gas fired and the second was fired in a wood-fired kiln and of course the difference is striking, although the wood-fired kiln is less predictable it often produces a more beautiful finish, I enjoy working with wood kilns very much.
R.E. I believe you are going to be teaching a ceramics workshop at Higham Hall this month and that you are planning to build two wood-fired kilns up there, are you looking forward to this? As a woodcarver, I always find teaching as much a learning as a teaching experience; the dialogue between like minds can be so important and seminal.
S.M. Yes, I have worked at Higham Hall before. Last year I met Michael Stewart, a Fine Art tutor there, and really enjoy his company. We had some very interesting conversations, talking about not only ceramics but all the arts, I didn't know, for instance, before speaking to Michael that Paul Gaugin made pottery and I find this fascinating. I also met Geoff and Christine Cox, the organisers of Potfest in Penrith. This is an International Ceramics Festival with potters from all over Europe taking part. Geoff wanted me to build an anagama kiln as part of the festival for this year, so I will make one at Higham Hall near Cockermouth and another at the kiln park near Penrith. I am very excited about both and really looking forward to building them. Yes I'm sure it will be a really good experience working at Higham again.
R.E. Finally, Shozo, a ceramicist's studio is often more than a second home, how long having you worked in your current studio? How does being away from your studio for a while affect your work?
S.M. I have worked in my studio in Seto for twenty-six years now and I enjoy the continuity that has brought. However I also enjoy travelling and the new experiences that brings. Just as oriental pottery was taken along the Silk Road to Europe in the time of Genghis Khan and its styles were disseminated along the way, I would like to work in as many places between Japan and Europe as possible. I have worked in the Philippines, in Mongolia and England, and will be working in China, America and possibly Hungary next year - half of me is nomad and half sedentary - I enjoy creating and travelling equally, and look forward to both in the coming years.