The final movement of 'Fair Isle' at APS closed last Sunday. The benefits of this exhibition was that it enabled both emerging and mid career artists to make connections with artists and viewers outside of their usual art friendship groups. Special highlights of this exhibition includ Bettina Bruder's rubber band tango with Sach Catt's tension piece, Linden Braye's roller-pallete and white noise sound piece; and Rose Ann McGreevy's soulful, 'Interrupting the spatial plane' (2014).
Better than television: Weekly viewings each Sunday morning (in addition to being able to attend a few of the openings) enabled me to watch the exhibition expand and contract as if it were a set of lungs. With some conversations louder than others, and other works more conceptually orientated than others, the overall effect of this jazz-like exercise was that artists from each segment of the exhibition were able to play and to test their works within the experimental framework of a larger free floating conversation.
I hope that 'Fair isle' enabled participating artists to think deeply and critically upon their practice, i.e. how does this work directly engage with the premise; what does it mean to make this object and limit the materials used to three elements (or less/ or more); what does it mean to make this piece at this point in one's practice; how actively does one engage in other artist/s' practices to conceive their own response in an exhibition-laboratory; how do you signal and/or reference one's engagement with another artist's work through materials used or conceptual frameworks; or what does it mean to remake significant elements of a work shown two years earlier. Needless to say, these types of questions are endless and ongoing if someone is thinking and reflecting seriously on their practice.
Special thanks to Project Coordinators: Sue Callanan, Margaret Roberts and Emma Wise.
India Zegan 14/05/2014