The Archive

SECRET SOCIETIES - CAPC musee d'art contemporain - Bordeaux, France 2011 - 2012

2011-11-13T00:52:00.000-08:00

10.11.2011 -> 26.02.2012

SECRET SOCIETIES

To know, to dare, to will, to keep silence

An exhibition organized by the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt in collaboration with the CAPC musée d’art contemporain de Bordeaux.
How to present or represent the invisible? How to deal with it? Why and how, in this case, to make public what is secretive by nature? Although the exact meaning of the term “secret society” is disputed, several of the proposed definitions indicate that a degree of secrecy and secret knowledge should be present.

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For Simmel, secret societies have an external quality, which is protection and an internal quality,which is themutual trust between itsmembers to keep silent. In order to impose such silence on its members psychologically, they are asked right from the start to swear an oath with the threat of being sanctioned if they don’t abide by this oath. This gradual initiation of its members corresponds to the strong hierarchical structures of secret societies. One of the most important aspects that distinguish secret societies from open societies is precisely the importance they give to formulas, customs and rituals (the secret of the ritual). The aspect of “exclusion” that characterisesmost secret societies is always linked to a desire for freedom. Autonomy is the very essence of secret societies, but an autonomy, which flirts with anarchy. The term “secret society” is usually applied to organisations ranging from the common and harmless (collegiate fraternities) to mythical organisations described in conspiracy theories as immensely powerful, with selfserving financial or political agendas, global reach, and often satanic beliefs. Since ancient times, secret societies have been historically the subject of suspicion and speculation from non-members. Because some secret societies have political aims, they are illegal in several countries. In a certain sense, most secret societies are generally considered to be antisocial; they are believed to contain non-positive elements or that are outright harmful to the community at large. The most prominent ones, just to cite a few, range from the Freemason organisations, the Rose Cross, the Kabbalah, the Mafia, to the Ku Klux Klan or Al Qaeda.

Secret societies, in fact, mirror certain facets of contemporary art. Broadly speaking, one can even say, that in many ways the artwork, the artist and the art world’s mechanisms have always had connections to the way secret societies function but it is important to state that the links that exist are historically determined and one cannot generalise them. Or else one can easily reproduce an overromanticised idea of art as a form of resistance, or art as a cult. In a world structured and dominated by accelerated communication processes and exposure, secret societies question the “status quo” by their implicit refusal to participate. Thus the central interest of the exhibition is to carry out an artistic and cultural investigation of these movements in order to gain a better understanding of their mechanisms, as well as of their desires and motivations, which are also shared by the art sphere. For this process to be truly meaningful, it is crucial that it should not be confined to expose the desires and feelings that secret societies appeal to but it should explore these desires and feelings from the inside.

A hundred of artworks, paintings, photographs, sculptures, films and installations of more than fifty artists, including Dan Attoe, Armin Boehm, Steven Claydon, Enrico David, Brice Dellsperger, Gretchen Faust, Julian Göthe, Uwe Henneken, Benedikt Hipp, Jenny Holzer, Rashid Johnson, Terence Koh, Donghee Koo, Elad Lassry, Gabriel Lester, Goshka Macuga, Duncan Marquiss, David Noonan, Markus Schinwald et Carl Michael von Hausswolff and Michael Esposito.

Secret Societies is organized by the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt in collaboration with the CAPC musée d’art contemporain de Bordeaux. The exhibition was on show in Frankfurt during the Summer 2011.

Catalogue : Secret Societies. To know, to dare, to will, to keep silence.
With a preface by Max Hollein and Charlotte Laubard, texts by Michael Bracewell, Ina Blom, Gary Lachman, and Jan Verwoert and a dialogue between Cristina Ricupero and Alexis Vaillant. German, French and English edition, ca. 256 pages, ca. 150 illustrations, Snoeck, Cologne 2011, 34,00 €

Curator(s): Cristina Ricupero & Alexis Vaillant

SECRET SOCIETIES - SHIRN KUNSTHALLE - FRANKFURT, GERMANY - 2011

Secret Societies. TO KNOW, TO DARE, TO WILL, TO KEEP SILENCE
23. June - 25. September 2011

The exhibition is aimed at answering the question in how far secret societies also reflect certain mechanisms of contemporary art. Drawing on a combination of works of art and historical documents such as books, weapons, and Scotland Yard files, the exhibition pursues the nature of the secret along a labyrinthine course and discloses a range of bizarre and wondrous discoveries. The show’s circle of members includes such presumed artists as Enrico David, Gretchen Faust, Jenny Holzer, Joachim Koester, Terence Koh, Elad Lassry, Fabian Marti, Goldin+Senneby, Markus Schinwald, Ulla von Brandenburg, Carl Michael von Hausswolff and Michael Esposito, Cerith Wyn Evans, and Lisa Yuskavage. A certain degree of darkening will be inevitable, because the knowledge of secret societies has to remain obscure if it is to survive.

Curators: Cristina Ricupero and Alexis Vaillant, Paris

Project Management: Matthias Ulrich, SCHIRN

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Publications

Secret Societies

Secret societies—a somewhat intriguing theme in art context. The publication helps to implement the theme and presents correlations.

29,80 €

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List of works Exhibited

Font

2010

Ceramic, copper, wood, fabric, wire, wood, acrylic, wood stain and metal fixings

122cm 31cm x 31cm

Allegorical Reflections Part I

2010

Wood, vinyl, enamel and wood stain

88.5cm x 60.5cm x 3.2cm

Phantasmagoria

2011

Enamel, etched primer, spray paint, wood, glass and metal fixings

58cm x 42cm

External Compass

2010

Burn wood, varnish, metal fixing

32.5cm x 42.5cm x 2.5cm

Allegorical Reflections Part II

2010

Wood, vinyl, enamel and wood stain

88.5cm x 60.5cm x 3.2cm

THE THING IS THE THING - ASC GALLERY - LONDON

2011-11-12T01:03:00.000-08:00

5 November – 17 December 2011

Preview Friday 4 November 6-9pm

Monday to Saturday 1.30 – 5.00pm

SLAM LAST FRIDAYS / Artist’s Talk: Friday 25 November 6 - 8pm

www.southlondonartmap.com

The Thing is the Thing

This exhibition brings together artists whose work reflects an idiosyncratic response to science and technology. Integral to the work are archetypal elements such as the formalist principles of modernism reflected in colour, geometry and pattern, and re-examined in the context of science, technology or architecture. Alongside are iconographic images of fictitious modernist structures, as well as culturally mediated and personal reinterpretations of images and objects from both science and science fiction.

Taking Frank Stella’s famous epigram ‘what you see is what you see’ as a starting point, the title references endgame strategies. Steeped in the zeitgeist of 1960s minimalism, Stella’s statement can be seen as reflecting the final throws of the prevailing ism-centric and linear history of modern art. In stark contrast, John Carpenter’s 1981 classic The Thing takes some of the paranoia more commonly associated with 50s B movies and relocates it to the edge of the world in an Antarctic research laboratory. The carnage that ensues is spectacular, stretching science fiction towards an apocalyptic gore-fest of special effects and obliterations – an endgame that may be less cerebral but is no less memorable.

The Works

The collection of objects allude to the existence of a once active social group or order. Planetary constellations, acicular patterns and archaic transmitters hark to an age of discovery. The worn and aged surfaces suggest a utility, proposing an involvement in a symbolic act or experiment. Although humble in appearance the works strive to make sense of their environment. Their titles appear to offer explanations to enlighten but their capacity to do so has diminished. The objects, now redundant, become symbolic totems for a quest to make sense of one’s existence.

Orbitor

2011

Straw, acrylic and wood stain

94cm dia x 1cm

For We Tell Thy

2011

Bakelite, brass, wood, plastic, copper, metal fixings, acrylic, salt.

201cm x 36cm x 36cm

For We Tell Thy (detail)

2011

Bakelite, brass, wood, plastic, copper, metal fixings, acrylic, salt.

201cm x 36cm x 36cm

We Make Sense

2011

Wood, wax, acrylic, varnish and upholstery pins

54cm dia x 3cm

United in Different Guises XLIX

2011

Acrylic, varnish, cotton, bulldog clips

76cm x 45cm

United in Different Guises LXI

2010

Acrylic, varnish, cotton, bulldog clips

205cm x 138cm

United in Different Guises XLIV

2010

Acrylic, varnish, cotton, bulldog clips

76cm x 45cm

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Publication

ISBN 978-0-9565608-3-4

The Others - Turin - Italy

2011-11-08T01:20:00.000-08:00

The Anti-Library - Space - London 2011

2011-10-12T07:56:00.000-07:00

04 NOV–17 DEC ²⁰¹¹

THE ANTI-LIBRARY

LIBRARY: "… a private library is not an ego-boosting appendage but a research tool. Read books are far less valuable than unread ones […] You will accumulate more knowledge and more books as you grow older, and the growing number of unread books on the shelves will look at you menacingly. Indeed, the more you know, the larger the rows of unread books. Let us call this collection of unread books an anti-library."

- Nassim Nicholas Taleb

We encounter this provocation in the opening section of Taleb’s 2007 book The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. Citing author Umberto Eco (who himself maintains an impressive anti-library), Taleb goes on to espouse the virtue of the anti-scholar, “someone who focuses on the unread books, and makes an attempt not to treat his knowledge as a treasure, or even a possession, or even a self-esteem enhancement device.”

The possibility of an anti-library, as well as ideas of anti-knowledge and un-learning, informs a new project in SPACE’s LIBRARY gallery. For six weeks in November and December, the Anti-Library will house unread books gathered from over 150 invited contributors each asked to present a single book from their own anti-library, as well a short text outlining their selection. The project will include submissions from:

Oliver Laric, Cally Spooner, Arnaud Desjardin, Ed Atkins, Åbäke, Jamie Shovlin, Am Nuden Da, Pieternel Vermoortel, Mike Sperlinger, Kathy Noble, Maria Fusco, Kate Owens, Gavin Everall, Ian Law, Francesco Pedraglio, Athanasios Argianas (amongst many others).

The Anti-Library will be displayed within an environment developed by Fay Nicolson and Oliver Smith, in which all the books and short texts submitted by participating artists will be available to handle and read.

SPONSOR

bloomberg on

Artist in Residence - The Glenfiddich Distillery - Dufftown, Scotland 2011

2011-10-01T02:21:00.000-07:00

GLENFIDDICH RESIDENCY - DUFFTOWN, SCOTLAND 2011

http://timellis-glenfiddich-residency.blogspot.com/

Exhibition 2: 30th September - 16th October

Progress Progress Progress / The Happy Valley

The collection of works proposes the existence of a social group or order. Orchestrated from what seem like disparate sources, the author has arranged what appear to be artefacts from a once active society. The characteristics of this society ranges from harmless brotherhoods to specific financial and political objectives. The works operate at various tiers of this social structure from aspiration and indoctrination to exportation and exploration. Conjuring notions of clandestine rites, converted knowledge and exclusivity of members, the collection offers a glimpse of and an engagement with the mechanisms for social order.

From Left to Right: 'With Form becomes Meaning / The Happy Valley', 'For it is the Young that will continue the Progress', 'The Bearers', 'Sun Charmer' and 'The Ambassadors' .

From Left to Right: 'For it is the Young that will continue the Progress', 'The Bearers' and 'The Ambassadors' .

From Left to Right: 'For it is the Young that will continue the Progress', 'The Bearers', 'The Ambassadors', 'Sun Charmer' and 'For all that is Worthy, We Stand For This'

From Left to Right: 'With Form becomes Meaning / The Happy Valley', 'The Bearers', 'For it is the Young that will continue the Progress', 'The Ambassadors' and

'For all that is Worthy, We Stand For This'

Through Form Becomes Meaning/ The Happy Valley

Leaves, Butterflies, acrylic, metal fixings, varnish, plastic, glass

2011

For It Is The Young that will continue The Progress

Wood, paper, acrylic and metal fixings

2011

The Ambassadors

Wood, metal fixings, plaster, acrylic, varnish, felt, flagons

2011

For All that is Worthy, We Stand for This

Chrome, enamel, wood, acrylic and metal fixings

2011

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List of Works: Progress Progress Progress / The Happy Valley

Through Form Becomes Meaning/ The Happy Valley

Leaves, Butterflies, acrylic, metal fixings, varnish, plastic, glass

2011

For It Is The Young that will continue The Progress

Wood, paper, acrylic and metal fixings

2011

The Ambassadors

Wood, metal fixings, plaster, acrylic, varnish, felt, flagons

2011

For All that is Worthy, We Stand for This

Chrome, enamel, wood, acrylic and metal fixings

2011

For the Bearers

Copper, plastic, bakelite, Iron, wood, ceramic and metal fixings

2011

Sun Charmer

Copper, plastic, wood, acrylic and metal fixings

2011

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Exhibition 1: 12th August - 18th September

Tondi

Acrylic, wood stain, varnish, metal on barrel ends

2011

Tondi the plural of Tondo refers to the shape of the work, a term used to denote a circular work of art. A common characteristic of all Tondi being that the background is largely omitted allowing the foreground to be the main subject of interest. The centres or foregrounds in both works transform the structures or backgrounds from which they have originated. One alludes to heraldic imagery taking the form of a shield, the other a scroll taking the form of a trophy. Both surfaces are worn and split but looked after suggesting a utility. There function now sits somewhere between a communitive role and the symbolic.

For Those Who Are Our Greatest

Acrylic, enamel, varnish, metal fixings and plastic

2011

The work takes the form of an empty worn plaque or registrar. Using symbolic imagery specific to the area a gilded header and surround frame the work. The colour and design allude to a sense of grandeur and importance. Its title and text conjure notions of persistence and endurance, perhaps withstanding some great feat. Although empty it acts as a proposition for qualifying what is deemed worthy.

SECRET SOCIETIES - SHIRN KUNSTHALLE - FRANKFURT, GERMANY - 2011

2011-08-06T05:39:00.000-07:00

SECRET SOCIETIES - SHIRN KUNSTHALLE - FRANKFURT, GERMANY - 2011

Secret Societies. TO KNOW, TO DARE, TO WILL, TO KEEP SILENCE
23. June - 25. September 2011

Man has always been fascinated with secret societies and their clandestine rites, their covert knowledge, and exclusive circle of members. The character of secret societies ranges from harmless brotherhoods to powerful associations with very special financial and political objectives. Particularly in times of crises, secret societies provide surrogate values for the prevailing political, social and technological systems of order.

The exhibition is aimed at answering the question in how far secret societies also reflect certain mechanisms of contemporary art. Drawing on a combination of works of art and historical documents such as books, weapons, and Scotland Yard files, the exhibition pursues the nature of the secret along a labyrinthine course and discloses a range of bizarre and wondrous discoveries. The show’s circle of members includes such presumed artists as Enrico David, Gretchen Faust, Jenny Holzer, Joachim Koester, Terence Koh, Elad Lassry, Fabian Marti, Goldin+Senneby, Markus Schinwald, Ulla von Brandenburg, Carl Michael von Hausswolff and Michael Esposito, Cerith Wyn Evans, and Lisa Yuskavage. A certain degree of darkening will be inevitable, because the knowledge of secret societies has to remain obscure if it is to survive.
Curators: Cristina Ricupero and Alexis Vaillant, Paris
Project Management: Matthias Ulrich, SCHIRN

___________________________________________________________

Publications

Secret Societies

Secret societies—a somewhat intriguing theme in art context. The publication helps to implement the theme and presents correlations.

29,80 €

___________________________________________________________

List of works Exhibited

Font

2010

Ceramic, copper, wood, fabric, wire, wood, acrylic, wood stain and metal fixings

122cm 31cm x 31cm

Allegorical Reflections Part I

2010

Wood, vinyl, enamel and wood stain

88.5cm x 60.5cm x 3.2cm

Phantasmagoria

2011

Enamel, etched primer, spray paint, wood, glass and metal fixings

58cm x 42cm

External Compass

2010

Burn wood, varnish, metal fixing

32.5cm x 42.5cm x 2.5cm

Allegorical Reflections Part II
2010
Wood, vinyl, enamel and wood stain
88.5cm x 60.5cm x 3.2cm

'FRIENDSHIP OF THE PEOPLES' - Simon Oldfield Gallery - London - 2011

2011-08-03T07:46:00.000-07:00

'FRIENDSHIP OF THE PEOPLES' - Simon Oldfield Gallery - London - 2011

Curated by Tim Ellis and Simon Oldfield

EXHIBITION INFORMATION

Friendship of the Peoples

Friendship of the Peoples unites a group of 40 artists through a framework that is structured around the concept of “community” – a word derived from the Latin communitas; a broad term for fellowship or organized society.

The show explores the very human and primeval desire to belong to something greater than one’s self. Traditionally a "community" has been defined as a group of interacting people organized around shared common values and interests. A longing to belong manifests itself on a local level within physical communities, which grow and develop to become more established. Communities are amorphous; sometimes getting stronger, sometimes becoming lost – but what remains constant is the individual’s desire to assert their identity.

The concept of building a community is at the core of the show and is reflected in the process of selecting each artist as well as what each artist will be asked to submit. The curatorial approach creates a foundation group of 20 artists to form the basis of the community, who then each propose one other artist to participate in the exhibition; expanding the community.
Crucially, there will be no overt or deliberate shared intent or theme, other than the objective to create a community. The core unifying factor is that all artists will be required to submit work that conforms to the idea of a poster which follows these specific requirements:

· Material: paper

· Size: A1

The poster was chosen because of its role as an effective tool of communication and because of its undiscriminating nature of its content. The origins of the poster date back to the late 19^th century when the printing industry perfected colour lithograph. This advancement allowed information to be uniformly mass-produced. As a consequence, standards and particular restrictions were imposed, such as shape and size, creating a standardized format for communication.

Friendship of the Peoples proposes a greater shared function beyond that of the individual. The nature of the chain coupled with the ethos behind the poster allows for a transparent manufactured community. Consequently, the collective works will function as a group that sits somewhere between a communicative role and the symbolic; allowing an engagement with notions of the individual existing within a community.

To Live Beyond Ones Usefulness

Acrylic and Varnish on A1 paper

2011

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ISBN 978-0-9568329-2-4

The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition - London - 2011

2011-08-02T02:20:00.000-07:00

Invited Artist

ISBN 978-1-907533-22-8

'SONS OF PIONEERS' - FURINI CONTEMPORARY - ROME, ITLAY - 2011 - Solo Exhibition

2011-08-01T02:37:00.000-07:00

Tim Ellis - Sons of Pioneers

Tim Ellis, United in Different Guises - Midday on the Mount, 2011

Wondering about the unexpressed possibilities of the artefact, altering the purpose to which it was originally put with the intention of reassessing its value and function, bringing out the process that leads a found object to take on a different cultural value.
Tim Ellis’s practice is based on the juxtaposition of culturally different materials and objects and probes both their formal value and their original purpose, obliging the viewer to raise questions about notions of functionality, authorship and display. Through mental relations and the imperceptible alteration of forms, the young English artist declares a sort of relative commitment to the concept of artefact and that of artifice, to the principle of creativity and seriality.

The title of the exhibition refers to the idea of being threatened by the weight of history, while it is laid out as if it were a proposal for the beginning of a new ideology. Both sculpture and painting - models, trophies and testimonies to something bigger - focus their tension on that juncture in perennial balance between the fact and the historical object, between its manufacture and its distribution, suggesting reflections on the role of artifice within the process of production of meaning.

On this occasion the paintings use exactly the same emblem, a sort of iconic monument or totemic construction whose colour varies with the season and the time of day, and in this way opposes the inevitable ravages of time. These works continue the series of progressively numbered paintings grouped under the title United in Different Guises. Proposing as they do a dual function, with a role of representation as well as communication, at the root of their imagery lies an intentional fusion of signs and design, a visual strategy that is then recomposed and codified under a more generically symbolic appearance. Through technical devices such as the bending of the support, the scratching and the progressive and gradual aging of the surface and the colour, the painting itself is transformed into a succession of functional propositions. What is offered to the gaze is in the end an object that brings into question the notions of symbolism and authenticity, allowing the final image to go beyond the confines of painting itself.

Bio: Tim Ellis (Chester, 1981, lives and works in London) studied at Liverpool John Moores 2000-2003 and the Royal Academy Schools 2006-2009. His Solo and Group shows include ‘The Tourist’ 2011 (Solo) Spacex, Exeter, England, ‘A Foundation for Exchange’ Primopiano Lugano Switzerland 2010 (Solo). ‘The John Moores Painting Prize 26’ The Walker Art Gallery Liverpool 2010, ‘Newspeak - British Art Now Part I.’ Saatchi Gallery London 2010. ‘Tag 3 to 36 New London Painting’ Brown Gallery London 2010. ‘New Sensations’ The A foundation London 2009. ‘Alexandre Pollazzon Presents’ Alexandre Pollazzon London 2008, ‘Falling from an Apple Tree’ Wilde Gallery Berlin 2008. ‘Premiums’ The Royal Academy London 2008. ‘The Last Gang in Town’ Arena Gallery Liverpool 2006. Forthcoming exhibitions include ‘Secret Societies’ Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, Germany.

Tim Ellis | Sons of Pioneers
May 4 – July 16, 2011
Opening: May 4, 6:30pm
Furini Arte Contemporanea, Via Giulia 8, Roma
Open days: Wensday-Friday 1-7 pm, Saturday 3-7 pm
Info: +39 06 68307443, info@furiniartecontemporanea.it
Website: http://www.furiniartecontemporanea.it/

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Installation Views

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Associated Information

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Links

http://www.furiniartecontemporanea.it/eng/news/news/

http://furiniartecontemporanea.blogspot.com/

The Aesthetic Trust - 2011

2011-07-05T08:11:00.000-07:00

http://theaesthetictrust.co.uk/show-and-tell/united-in-different-guises-lxi-tim-ellis/

The Aesthetic Trust - 2011

Show: United in Different Guises LXI, single duvet cover, acrylic paint and varnish. Tim Ellis.

Tell: “The painting is part of a sequence of works that share the same title ‘United in Different Guises’ and are numbered accordingly. The title refers to a proposed shared function. This function sits somewhere between a communicative role and the symbolic. At present they total 68 and will continue to grow indefinitely but employ different motifs dependent on the context they are displayed in.

“The imagery used is a mixture of signage and design: which is reconstructed to form a door or window. This particular piece was designed for an introductory space for a recent solo show. The scale and material quality mimics the appearance of flags and banners and is emphasised by folding, cuffing and gradually aging the paintings so a suggested utility appears.

“The origin or inspiration for the works came out of a desire to create something that questioned notions of symbolism and authenticity but it was also my attempt to create something that functioned beyond the realms of painting. All my works respond to an idea/statement that I have as a starting point; ‘A being has a primeval desire to want to belong to something greater than ones self’.

“I see this picture/painting as an object that had or still has some greater meaning. It’s still a painting but it represents something shared, perhaps social or political but always as a proposition. This particular work is a later piece in the series, which have gradually developed to form backdrops for other works. I see these new larger works functioning more as landscapes, to some extent allowing my other works to populate them.

“Potentially these things could act like divides partitioning spaces or may even be used as materials for structures. I find that as the making process begins other ideas spring up. A lot of developments come from installing and thinking about display, these then reinform the work back in the studio or sometimes when curating a show, requiring sometimes some drastic modifications.

“As with anything there are always mistakes. The success rate is quite high because of the rigid framework the piece exists in means anything can be painted on its surface. Sometimes it falls down to taste and colour, other times I end up over distressing the picture and have to start again. These things are not delicate or precious to me and can take a good beating in the studio.”

Photo: John Melville

Info: This work was recently on show as part of Tim Ellis: The Tourist at Spacex, Exeter.

www.spacex.org.uk
www.timellis.org

'THE TOURIST' - SPACEX - EXETER - 2011 - Solo Exhibition

2011-07-05T08:03:00.000-07:00

'THE TOURIST' - SPACEX - EXETER - 2011 - Solo Exhibition

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Press Release - 01.03.2011

Spacex is proud to present the first

solo show by London based artist Tim Ellis. The Tourist will include a series of new paintings and sculptures that respond to each main space within the gallery.

The exhibition was conceived as a journeyman’s view over three gallery spaces. The first room features a figure as a prompt or signifier for the show leading into an installation housing a variety of shelving structures, screens and tables to juxtapose symbolic objects and artefacts.

The final space will contain monuments displayed next to large draped banners. These draw inspiration from graphic tourist posters from the 1930’s, and will act as landscapes for sculptures to sit in. This space will be seen as a construct of the second manifesting itself in a mixture of totemic assemblages.

Ellis continually explores the idea that every object, whether in isolation or as a collection is dependent on a creator, mediator and audience, and as a consequence inherits their aspirations, values and intentions.

The Tourist seeks to explore the way cultural objects and symbols can be consumed. The title refers to a way of positioning the viewer when navigating the work. This position being one of a tourist, exploring a wide variety of opposing objects and ideas in such a way that removes their original intention or what they commonly represent. This shift in value offers the opportunity to question their purpose and meaning within a new or altered context.

With perceptions of cultural sentiment and social significance addressed, the viewer will be invited to engage with notions of symbolism, artefact and artifice.

Introductory Text 01.11.10

This spring Spacex will present The Tourist, the first

solo exhibition by London based artist Tim Ellis. A new body of work will be produced for the exhibition, including painting and sculptural work.

Working primarily with found materials, Ellis reconfigures the original intention of various objects giving them new value. This shift in value offers the opportunity to question their purpose, authorship and meaning within a new or altered context. Weaving together historical fact and invention, the viewer is invited to engage with notions of symbolism, artifact and artifice.

Examining the process where by art and craft objects from one culture come into close contact with that of another, the work centres around the idea of each being wanting to belong to something greater than their original intention.

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Exhibited Works

Gallery 1 - Installation View

From Left: 'The Tourist' 2011, 'United in Different Guises' LVI 2010

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Exhibited Works

Gallery 2 - Installation View

From Left: 'Through Authority We Serve' 2011, 'Growing Old Together 2011, Founding Fathers 2011.

From Left 'Growing Old Together' 2011, 'Towards a Common Understanding' 2011.

From Left: Founding Fathers 2011, 'For Their Eyes' 2011.

From Left: 'Through Form Becomes Meaning' 2011, Founding Fathers 2011.

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Exhibited Works

Gallery 3 - Installation View

From Left: 'All Seeing 2011, 'Backdrop I/To Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever' 2011, 'Willing Servant' 2011, 'Lectern' 2011.

From Left: 'Lectern' 2011, 'Willing Servant' 2011, 'Backdrop II/To Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever' 2011.

From Left: 'All Seeing 2011, 'Backdrop I/To Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever' 2011, 'The Arrival' 2011, 'Willing Servant' 2011, 'Lectern' 2011, 'Backdrop II/To Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever' 2011, 'The Fearful' 2011.

From Left: 'Backdrop II/To Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever' 2011, 'The Fearful' 2011, 'Interloper' 2011, 'The Subordinate' 2011, 'Wellwisher' 2011.

From Left: 'Wellwisher' 2011, 'Backdrop III/To Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever' 2011, 'The Subordinate' 2011.

From Left: 'Interloper' 2011, 'The Fearful' 2011, 'The Subordinate' 2011, 'Wellwisher' 2011, 'Backdrop III/To Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever' 2011, 'The Arrival' 2011

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List of Works

Gallery 1

1.The Tourist

Wood, acrylic, felt, brass and metal fixings

160cm x 31cm x 31cm

2011

2.United in different Guises LVI

Acrylic, varnish, cotton and Bulldog clips

220cm x 220cm

2010

Gallery 2

1.For Their Eyes

Cane, wood, metal fixings

186cm x 73cm x 16cm

2011

2. Founding Fathers

Wood, cane, plastic, brass, ceramic, bronze, metal fixings and grass

180cm x 80cm x 30cm

2011

3. Through We Authority serve

Wood, metal fixings, plastic, card and linen

55cm x 30cm x 81cm

2011

4.Through Form Becomes Meaning

Plastic, brass, glass, cardboard, iron nail, acrylic and wood stain

28cm x 16cm

5. Towards a Common Understanding

Copper, iron nails, acrylic and wood stain

110cm x 98cm

2011

6. Growing Old together

Wood, felt, acrylic, plaster, brass and metal fixings

103cm x 38cm x 38cm

2011

Gallery 3

1.Backdrop I / To Live Long and maybe one day forever

Acrylic, varnish, cotton and Bulldog clips

220cm x 220cm

2.Lectern

Acrylic, ply wood, metal fixings plastic and found objects

177cm x 39cm x 39cm

2011

3. Willing Servant

Acrylic, ply wood, metal fixings plastic and found objects

90cm x 34cm x 34cm

2011

4. Backdrop II /To Live Long and maybe one day forever

Acrylic, varnish, cotton and Bulldog clips

220cm x 220cm

5. Interloper

Acrylic, ply wood, metal fixings plastic and found objects

125cm x 46cm x 46cm

6. The Fearful

Acrylic, ply wood, metal fixings plastic and found objects

91cm x 27cm x 27cm

2011

7. The Subordinate

Acrylic, ply wood, metal fixings plastic and found objects

113cm x 27cm x 27cm

2011

8. Well-wisher

Acrylic, ply wood, metal fixings plastic and found objects

167cm x 58cm x 58cm

2011

9. Backdrop III /To Live Long and maybe one day forever

Acrylic, varnish, cotton and Bulldog clips

220cm x 220cm

10. The Arrival

Acrylic, ply wood, metal fixings plastic and found objects

170cm x 39cm x 39cm

2011

11. All Seeing

Acrylic, ply wood, metal fixings plastic and found objects

160cm x 33cm x 33cm

2011

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Articles

Editor’s Pick – Top International Shows: March 14 – March 21, 2011

By Rebecca Wilson · March 14, 2011 · Top 10 Shows, Worldwide · Tagged: Featured

Carla Busuttil
18 March – 28 April 2011
Josh Lilley Gallery
London, UK
www.joshlilleygallery.com
Drawing on her own family histories – of both an escape from genocide, and an emigration to a society founded upon racial prejudice and exclusion, Carla Busuttil presents 20 new paintings in Rug & Gut & Gum which explore her investigation into abuses of power and violence, focusing on the individuals or groups of people responsible for such acts. The knowledge and experience of her Armenian relatives fleeing Turkey at the beginning of the 20th century, and her own birth and childhood in South Africa during the height of apartheid – have both enlightened and darkened her perceptions of humanity and its struggle for control. Through the rendering of these ambiguous characters – executed in her expressionistic brush-strokes, build up of paint, and boldness of colour – Busuttil seeks to place them and their actions up for account.

French Window: Looking at Contemporary Art through the Marcel Duchamp Prize
18 March – 3 July 2011
Mori Art Museum
Tokyo, Japan
www.mori.art.museum
For ten years, an elite association of contemporary art collectors known as ADIAF has hosted what has become one of France’s most prestigious art awards, the Marcel Duchamp Prize. To celebrate the award’s first decade, this exhibition presents the work of 28 artists, including all of the winners of the Grand Prix, selected finalists and also Duchamp himself. Among the winners of the prize, whose works are in the exhibition, are Thomas Hirschhorn, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Cyprien Gaillard. Saâdane Afif and Tatiana Trouvé.

Tim Ellis: The Tourist
12 March – 30 April 2011
Spacex
Exeter, UK
www.spacex.co.uk
‘The Tourist’ is the first UK solo show by London-based artist Tim Ellis. The exhibition includes a series of new paintings and sculptures that respond to each main space within the gallery. The exhibition seeks to explore the way cultural objects and symbols can be consumed, the title encouraging the viewer to reflect on his or her navigation of the works. Ellis’s work raises questions about the idea that every object, whether in isolation or as a collection, is dependent on a creator, mediator and audience, and as a consequence inherits their aspirations, values and intentions.

Sterling Ruby: Paintings
24 February–9 April 2011
Xavier Hufkens
Brussels, Belgium
www.xavierhufkens.com
Sterling Ruby’s interdisciplinary practice incorporates sculptures, collages, ceramics, paintings and videos, which act as markers and metaphors for the burdens that plague contemporary existence. Of the disparate forms in Ruby’s practice, the paintings are the most formally abstract. His large color-field canvases, made entirely with spray paint, contain hallucinogenic and elusive visions, hinting at images, which never quite come into focus. Ruby’s paintings translate acts of defacing and demarcation into a kind of painterly transcendence. The paintings included in this exhibition have a darker palette; Ruby’s garish colors are covered with layers of black paint, as if the artist were now engaged in defacing his own works. The shroud-like darkness of these canvases and the white paint drips in the foreground suggest crying or mourning. They seem to push the artist’s own level of masking and obfuscation into an outward and emotional manifestation of a very contemporary sadness.

Andro Wekua
12 March – 5 June 2011
Kunsthalle Fridericianum
Kassel, Germany
www.fridericianum-kassel.de
In his installations, sculptures, collages, paintings and films, Andro Wekua links collective and personal memories to create haunting, disturbing representations. He combines motifs he finds in magazines or photo albums with paint to create complex, kaleidoscope-like collages. This is Andro Wekua’s largest exhibition to date, showing many new sculptures including a group that conjures up the heavily destroyed and abandoned buildings of Sochumi, the city in Georgia where he was born. He also presents a new film in which he blends science fiction and horror elements.

19 Shows about Painting
12 March – 31 May 2011
Platform China Contemporary Art Institute
Beijing, China
www.platformchina.org
If you have any interest in contemporary Chinese painting this show is a must-see. Platform China Contemporary Art Institute are launching an annual exhibition with 19 solo shows of painters in the same venue. Every artist has been given their own space in which to display their work, and each of the 19 shows has its own title, theme as well as the artist’s curatorial and personal individual statement. The artists in the exhibition are: Bi Jianye, Huang Liang, Jia Aili, Jin Shan, Liao Guohe, Li Qing, Liu Weijian, Lin Yen Wei, Ma Ke, Qin QI, Qi Wenzhang, Sun Xun, Sun Wen, Song Yuanyuan, Wu Guangyu, Xiao Bo, Xiao Jiang, Xu Ruotao, and Zhou Yilun.

Lise Sarfati
17 March – 30 April 2011
Magnum Gallery
Paris
www.magnumgallery.fr
The New Life is a major series of photographs by Lise Sarfati which draws a portrait of the young American people she encountered on a long journey through the United States, taking in the cities of Berkeley, Austin, Portland, Oakland, Berkeley, New Orleans and Los Angeles. Everyday places – a bedroom, a house or a garden – become the stage for a suspended time where dreams can be formed.

Aernout Mik: Communitas
1 March – 8 May 2011
Jeu de Paume
Paris, France
www.jeudepaume.org
This retrospective exhibition conceived in close collaboration with Aernout Mik brings together a selection of his works from the last ten years, with an emphasis on the most recent, including his new video installation, Shifting Sitting, produced specially for the occasion. Eight installations are presented in a setting designed specially by the artist, which treats these architectural constructions as an integral part of the work. “My pieces are about political or social events, but they are not direct images of those events. They act a bit like flashes which you can recognise but not precisely locate.”

Ajit Chauhan
11 March – 2 April 2011
Jack Hanley Gallery
New York, US
www.jackhanley.com
Through abstract construction, repetition and (flattened) movement Ajit Chauhan’s erased LP’s have materialized into something like “a plaid, hypnotized into a rhythm.” In previous series, the sanded flat works deconstructed the figure to experiment with a mass produced anonymity. Hair, eyes and limbs, the figurative was rendered abstract. This new body of work, however, imposes new forms onto the static LP’s through erasure. The title From the Pencil Area is taken from the writer Robert Walser, who wrote in a condensed form called “micrograms” or “the pencil method.” He wrote poems and prose in this diminutive hand, the letters measuring a millimeter in height. Like Walser’s tendency to favor the micro over the macro, Chauhan has similarly moved on to a higher form of abstraction.

The Royal Family
12 March – 2 May 2011
Hayward Gallery
London, UK
www.southbankcentre.co.uk
The curators at the Hayward Gallery have decided to devote their Project space to an exhibition of contemporary artists’ representations of the House of Windsor ahead of the royal wedding in April 2011. The show presents works in a range of media that examine the individual family members, as well as the signs and signifiers, of the celebrated and peculiar institution of the British royal family. Artists featured include Adam Dant, Hans-Peter Feldmann, Alan Kane and Tony Oursler, among others.

In May 2006, Rebecca Wilson brought her expertise from 14 years in book and art magazine publishing to the Saatchi Gallery, where she launched an online daily magazine for the gallery's expanding website. In 2007 she created New Sensations, a prize for art students which identifies and supports the most exciting emerging artists. The prize is run in the UK with Channel 4 and will be launch in North America in 2011. As well as working on Saatchi Online, she is Associate Director of the Saatchi Gallery in London. Prior to joining The Saatchi Gallery, Rebecca was editor of ArtReview, and before that deputy editor of Modern Painters.

Tim Ellis: The Tourist

Tim Ellis, 'The Tourist', 2011. Photo: John Melville

REVIEW

Tim Ellis - 'The Tourist'

Spacex, Exeter
12 March - 30 April 2011

Reviewed by: Mark Leahy »

The new work presented in Tim Ellis’s solo show The Touristat Spacex, Exeter prompts narrative responses from the visitor. Ellis distributes the work across three spaces each of which has a different character. Room 1 is a display space, while in Room 2, there is a more intimate or domestic quality, and Room 3, feels like a seaside promenade. The colours vary also, with the items in Room 2 being more brightly coloured, and with a variety of materials across the rooms that include fabric, metals, wood and glass. There are different surface treatments as found objects are painted and patinated, are rubbed down and worked over. Ellis’s works are funny, with elements of beauty; they are complex and inspire curiosity in the viewer, multiplying layers of possible meaning without arriving at any final story.

Unfolding in three acts, the exhibition’s first Room offers us a guide in the shape of ‘The Tourist’, a cast brass figure of a day-labourer, dressed not in leisurewear but in a long apron and boots. The figure stands open-mouthed, leaning back a little, his weight on his heels and calves. Placed here on a complex plinth, a little below my eye-level, he stands in miniature, but monumentalised. Heavy-shouldered and wearing a soft cap, he might have stepped from a nineteenth-century realist painting. Perhaps he represents one of those market workers who laboured in the Paris area of Les Halles before it made way for the Pompidou Centre. Displaced by a tourist attraction and cultural institution he reappears here as our guide. Will he tell us what’s going on? Can we rely on him? Standing in for the artist, he doesn’t have to tell us anything; we can each work out our own story.

The works in Room 2, the most domestic of the spaces, suggest the accoutrements of an Edwardian bachelor’s parlour, initially reminding us of a pipe rack, billiard cues and library. The recognisable, if not familiar, objects have been modified and extraneous elements added. In ‘Growing Old Together’ eight wands or walking poles, topped with meerschaum heads, are gathered in an umbrella stand, their varied features offering a set of characters to play out some game, to prompt storytelling. One has an artist’s hat, another a peaked cap like a telegraph operator, one has the hooked nose of Punch, another wears a fez; they appear as types, characters for a game whose rules are not provided, a cast in search of a play.

On the wall hang three kitchen implements, ‘Towards a Common Understanding’, each marked with an emblem echoing playing cards or regimental stripes. These reflect other ordering systems, other taxonomies. A collection may operate by an explicit rule of potential completion, as the collector strives to find all examples of a particular object. Or, a collection may have an implicit rule where the viewer intuits that objects are linked by some quality, by colour, by provenance, or by an association that is clear only to the collector. Ellis’s assemblages suggest organisational systems, but the elements are unstable as they shift in and out of belonging, as their roles change from move to move.

The copper patens of ‘Towards a Common Understanding’ each hang from a forged iron nail, specifically mentioned in the list of materials. A nail forged by a figure like ‘The Tourist’, offering evidence of the labour involved in making a tiny and potentially insignificant element of the show. This draws attention to the artist’s work of making, and to the other mode of hanging used, the bulldog clips that hold the ‘Backdrop’ paintings in Room 3. These incidentals take on significance, becoming clues in the wider game of the exhibition, linking to a pair of bulldog bookends in Room 2 by a brand name that has become genericised .

A set of flimsy grass and bamboo bookshelves is titled ‘Founding Fathers’. Each of its five shelves sports a trophy pair of bookends, on one, twin bulldogs, on another, little gun carriages and cannons. ‘Saucy Jane’, a tri-master, sits doubled propping absent books, while below her, dark abbots stand paired and shelved available for duty, framing a gap between them. Two eagle heads escaped from or overlooked by Marcel Broodthaers’ Musee des Aigles occupy the top shelf, no longer on speaking terms, they face left and right, ghost volumes behind them.

‘Through Authority We Serve’ presents six columnar items resting on a pipe rack placed on a small side table. Each has a round stamp or signet symbol on their visible end, suggesting another set of tokens or character marks, like counters in a board game, or indicators of attribute and status in role-playing games such as World of Warcraft. The title may refer to an imperial or hierarchical structure, with the symbols echoing the pyramid on US printed currency, or the Pentagon, or Freemasonry. Ellis’s titles add a layer of suggestion, propositional rather than definitive, they can feel cut from a longer text, or distorted through mishearing.

In Room 3 are three large banner-like works titled ‘Backdrop: To Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever’. We may recognise the material of these paintings as duvet covers, king size they are large squares of doubled fabric, with the poppers for the opening evident along their top edge. These utilitarian fabrics have been worked over to transform them into densely weighted drapes, their surfaces thickened and slicked to sheen dully in sky blue, marine blue, or grass green. In flat colours, sharply edged, the central compositions are framed in biscuit or taupe with two cream roundels at their lower edges. These tarpaulins have been rolled in and unfurled, opened for another performance, a sideshow, a seaside show. They propose a Punch-and-Judy or bearded-lady world of funfair and holiday, unpopulated or open to peopling by the figures in the room before them.

These eight figures, loosely grouped in their tableau, stand square on to us as we enter their space. The tallest, ‘Lectern’ is about my height at 177cm, the smaller ones about as tall as five-year olds. They have the air of personages, facing us, listening to us, sounding at us, or giving the impression of these activities while in fact being unseeing, mute or unhearing. And are they gendered? This one, ‘Interloper’, in pale blue and ivory, with a glass head and tapered to narrow feet is female? ‘Lectern’, the tallest, in shades of green, with doubled large enamelled lightshade ‘face’ and doorknob features is male, isn’t he? And that must be his little daughter with him, ‘Willing Servant’ in a floor length skirt?

The titles make this attribution of gender less easy, tricky to simply designate the young girl a ‘willing servant’ as it suggests more complex domestic dramas than the uncomplicated colours of the tourist fantasy encourage. The sculptures also suggest pieces in a board game, chess or Cluedo or some variant of this, with their uprightness, and their round heads. This one here, ‘The Arrival’ might be the king or queen, as that’s a crown on top, or at least a teapot lid crowning it. And who is she, ‘Well-wisher’, in the ornate choker? The titles can define the characters as functions in a drama, with attributes or tasks within some action that will be played out here, in some story to be played out by our moving them, our re-imagining their provisional relationships.

Tim Ellis’s exhibition The Tourist puts in play a drama of emotional labour as the visitors, tourists here also like the artist, consume the signifying and meaningful objects and installations. Experiences and sensations are proffered which can be enjoyed or absorbed while in the same moment and stories or rationales are generated for them. The Tourist offers the visitor an engagement in aesthetic labour and narrative play, taking on both the role of the worker and of leisured participant.

Writer detail:

MARK LEAHY is a writer, artist and project manager. Recent critical writing is included in Performance Research, Fracjika, Blackwell Companion to Digital Literary Studies, and Salt Companion to John James. He curated ‘Public Pages’ for the conference Poetry and Public Language (Plymouth University, 2007). His poetry sequence 'Swatches' was published by Acts of Language (December 2009). He presented live works in Live Art Falmouth (June 2008) and Performance Market (Plymouth, January 2010). He was MA Programme Leader at Dartington Campus, University College Falmouth and continues to supervise PhD candidates at Falmouth.

Venue detail:Spacex »
TIMMY THE TOURIST

We are met at the entrance to the gallery by a laid-back tourist. He tells us that his name is Timmy. In his experience, he says that all tourists are united in different guises but that they come in many shapes and many sizes. This fact is celebrated by the cream and black banner hanging on the wall. Further he explains that we are to take a self-guided tour of two rooms which contain artefacts that he has collected on his travels.

The first room is screened off at the doorway by a cane, wood and sea grass folding screen so that only bona-fide visitors can view the precious objects inside. Entering the room we are met by many objects, some familiar and others unfamiliar. To the right is an open bookcase, also made of cane, wood and sea grass. On its shelves are five pairs of book-ends but no books. We can only guess why the books are missing and what they might have been. Perhaps the eagle heads were used to support books about America and the bulldogs were used for books on Britain. Maybe the miniature field guns housed military history and the Saucy Jane galleons were for books about exploration. The Shaolin monks could represent several things: martial arts, religion and meditation.

To the left is something that looks like an overgrown umbrella stand containing eight long black rods. These rods are similar to the black rod used at the opening of Parliament. However, instead of a gold lion at the top, these have miniature clay busts of what appear to be famous personalities. We can only speculate who these characters are and what they might be saying, if we could hear them speak:

That’s the way to do it! (Mr. Punch)
Non! (Charles de Gaulle)
I declare these Hanging Gardens open! (Nebuchadnezzar)
Today Asia, To-morrow the World! (Genghis Khan)
Something will always turn up! (Mr. Micawber)
You will do it my way! (Kaiser Bill)
There be giants, Sancho! (Don Quixote)
All the world’s a stage ! (David Garrick).

Hanging on the wall near the set of rods are three skillet-like metal objects. One has a red, upside-down, lance-corporal’s stripe painted on it and the other two have a white circle in a pale green rectangle. Again we are not sure what these objects are but, if they were ever used for cooking, presumably one belonged to the head chef and the others to the sous-chefs.

By the back wall of the room is an object that is familiar. It is a rack containing ink stamps. Some of the stamp symbols are recognizable, for example, a single line of railway track and a five-pointed star, but others do not appear to have any meaning. However the title suggests that, at some time, they all gave permission to do something. Hanging on the wall above is a medium-size medallion, with a glass front and a gold-coloured frame, showing a grey and white shape of a lily-like flower. Again the meaning is obscure but the title suggests that it is something to do with form.

So we move on to the next room This room has been set out very much like a church with objects facing the window at the far end, Near the doorway is a modified lectern shape. It has two circular discs like dish aerials, back-to-back, on top. Possibly they were used to amplify the sound of the preacher’s voice as he preached to his congregation. Or maybe the lectern was used by a Roman senator as he addressed The Forum. However these religious and political connotations are not borne out by the rest of the objects in the room. Most of these are coloured wooden pedestals with varying shapes of old-fashioned glass lampshades on top. This time the titles provide an indication of a hierarchical organisation: All-Seeing, Willing Servant, Well-Wisher, The Subordinate, Interloper, The Fearful, and The Arrival. The Arrival is slightly different from the rest because it has a red ball at the top with trumpet shapes in the positions of ears. Could it be that these are all representations of alien beings who are under the control of the Lectern? Perhaps we’ll never know the answer. We do know that the coloured banners on the walls are wishing that We Live Long and Maybe One Day Forever.

As we leave we tell Timmy that we have really enjoyed the thought-provoking exhibition. We also remark that he must have travelled to the far corners of the world to find the exhibits. He told us that many of the pieces had been made using found objects. Others had been obtained through junk shops and car-boot sales and, very occasionally, something had been bought on E-bay.

Joe Loxton
17th March 2011

45 Preston Street, Exeter EX1 1DF

markleahy.net

JOHN MOORES PAINTING PRIZE 2010 - THE WALKER ART GALLERY - LIVERPOOL

2011-07-04T05:49:00.000-07:00

ISBN 978-1-902700-43-4

JOHN MOORES PAINTING PRIZE 2010 - THE WALKER ART GALLERY - LIVERPOOL

______________________________________________________________________

Jury

Gary Hume

Photo: Georgie Hopton

Gary Hume was born in Kent in 1962 and lives and works in London and upstate New York, USA. He is renowned for paintings distinguished by a bright palette, reduced imagery and flat areas of seductive colour. Hume first received critical acclaim with a body of work known as the 'Door' paintings. His recent solo shows include Kunsthaus Bregenz (2004) and the Kestnergesellschaft, Hannover (2004). Recent group shows include Tate Britain, London (2004) and Louisiana Museum, Denmark (2004).

Alison Watt

Photo: Marcus Latham

Alison Watt was born in Greenock in 1965 and studied at Glasgow School of Art from 1983-88. From 2006 to 2008, Watt was the Associate Artist at The National Gallery in London, the youngest artist in the scheme's history. Her solo exhibition 'Phantom' (2008) explored her enduring fascination with one particular painting in their collection, Zurbaran's 'St. Francis in Meditation' (1635-9). In 2003, she was shortlisted for the Jerwood Painting Prize and was awarded an OBE in 2008.

Ged Quinn

Ged Quinn was born in Liverpool in 1967. He studied at Ruskin School of Drawing, Oxford and Slade School of Fine Art. He has had many solo shows including 'Utopia Dystopia' at Tate St Ives (2004) and 'My Great Unhappiness Gives me a Right to your Benevolence' at Wilkinson Gallery, London (2007). His painting 'There's a House in my Ghost' was exhibited in the John Moores 25 exhibition in 2008. He also exhibited work at Tate Liverpool as part of the Liverpool Biennial during the same year.

Goshka Macuga

Photo: Dennis Schoenberg

Goshka Macuga was born in Poland in 1967 and lives and works in London. She studied at Wojciech Gerson School of Art, Warsaw; Central Saint Martins School of Art, London; and Goldsmiths College, London. Goshka Macuga has been nominated for her solo exhibition 'Objects in Relation', 'Art Now' at Tate Britain and her contribution to the 5th Berlin Biennial for Contemporary Art. In 2008 she was nominated for the Turner Prize and in 2009 exhibited work at the Venice Biennale.

Sir Norman Rosenthal

Photo: Royal Academy of Arts, London, © Phil Sayer 2000

Sir Norman Rosenthal was born in Cambridge in 1944 and is a freelance curator and writer. He became Exhibitions Secretary of the Royal Academy of Arts in 1977, where he stayed for 30 years, overseeing loan exhibitions and working with distinguished curators. Sir Norman Rosenthal has already been awarded the highest Honours and Decorations from the Italian Republic, Federal Republic of Germany, French Republic and the Federal Republic of Mexico. In 2009 he contributed an essay to the Anish Kapoor exhibition catalogue which was written to accompany the artist's show at the Royal Academy.

Prizewinners

Exhibiting Artists

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Text - Tim Ellis

'United in Different Guises XXXXIII', Tim Ellis

2009, Acrylic and varnish on cotton and bulldog clips,
202.2 x 135.5 cm

Artist's statement

This painting is part of an ongoing series that shares the same title, 'United in Different Guises', and which are numbered accordingly. The title refers to a proposed shared function. This function sits somewhere between a communicative role and the symbolic. The source imagery used is a mixture of signage and design which is reconstructed to form gendered symbols.
The paintings' scale and material quality mimic the appearance
of flags and banners. By folding, scuffing and gradually ageing the paintings, a suggested utility appears. What is left is an object that questions notions of symbolism and authenticity, allowing the work to function beyond the realms of painting.

Biography

Tim Ellis was born in Chester in 1981. He studied at Liverpool John Moores University 2000-03 and the Royal Academy Schools London 2006-09. He lives and works in London. Group shows include 'The Last Gang in Town' Arena Gallery Liverpool 2006, 'Premiums' Royal Academy of Arts London 2008, ' Falling from an Apple Tree by Mistake' Wilde Gallery Berlin 2008, 'New Sensations' A Foundation London 2009, 'TAG From 3 to 36: New London Painting' Brown Collective London 2010 and 'Newspeak: British Art Now' Saatchi Gallery London 2010. His solo exhibition ' A Foundation for Exchange' was at Primopiano Lugano Switzerland 2010.
http://www.timellis.org/

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Press

Six local artists short-listed for John Moores Painting Prize

By Laura Davis on Aug 20, 10 04:00 PM in Visual arts

THERE are five local artists short-listed for the John Moores Painting Prize this year - four originally from Liverpool and one from Chester. I interviewed them via email for a feature in today's Daily Post but they had so much to say I couldn't fit it all in the piece.
Here then, are their full answers. The Walker is keeping the exhibition tightly under wraps so I was only able to get hold of one of the short-listed works (left) - Refractions (Robert Hooke) by Jason Thompson, who is one of National Museums Liverpool's object dusting team.

JASON THOMPSON
How did you become a member of the object dusting team? What does the job involve? Which venues do you work in?

I have worked for NML for over 12 years now. For the first 6 and a half years I was an attendant and for all but the first 6 months I was an attendant at the Walker.
When I started there I immediately thought how amusing it would be to get my own work into the John Moores so that I could guard my own painting, but was soon disappointed to learn that staff members where not allowed to enter. Attendants spend more time with paintings than anyone, its quite a unique position to be in. The exhibits can become as familiar to you as furniture in your own home.
I was always part-time as an attendant so that I would still have time to paint and a few years ago they wanted to reduce the numbers of part-time attendants, at the same time the job in the dusting team came about and as it was part-time I applied and luckily I got it. Not the most exciting story.
There are only 3 of us (Arthur Roberts and Fiona Campbell and me) and we are all part-time. We work in ALL of NML's museums and galleries in a continuous never-ending cycle. we don't have conservation qualifications but we are trained by conservators to take the dust off the acquisitioned objects and their environments. we use vacuums and brushes and ladders and scaffolds and motorised platforms to get as much dust as we can.
Obviously it is a never ending task, as soon as you clean an area it starts to settle again, but our job is to prevent it from building up so much that it damages the objects. Its simple work, quite monotonous, doesn't pay much and you have to be very careful but the good bit is we get close up access to all the museums artifacts, and my fellow dusters are delightful company!
What was it like to discover you are on the short-list?
It was very exciting and a bit unreal really. Everyone into painting knows its the biggest painting prize. When you enter something as big as this it's a bit of a lottery, you know some people will be picked but the chances of you being among them are so slim. You just cannot predict what the judges will be after so you just do what you can do and hope for the best.
Just getting through to the 2nd round felt like such an achievement. I have a couple of friends from art college days who have been in previous shows and old tutors have been in it, but there have been so many important names involved throughout it's history that it's amazing to have some association with them, however brief. I'm very happy!

What was the reaction of your colleagues?
All my colleagues and friends from work who have known about it have been really great. Hardly any have actually seen any of my paintings but everyone still wished me well and kept their fingers crossed for me when they heard I was in the 2nd round. There are quite a lot of creative, arty types working in non-arty jobs in the museums and galleries and all the painters appreciate what a big deal it is to be chosen for this.
When did you first hear of the John Moores Prize?
To be honest I cannot remember a time when I didnt know what the John Moores Painting Prize was. I must have heard about it when I was a child, but i cant remember. It was probably by being aware of the John Moores and that it was accessible to me in my home town that I became aware of contemporary art in general.

Did the fact that it is run by the Walker make the news more special?

Of course yes. When I was growing up there was no Tate Gallery in Liverpool. The Walker has been an institution to the people of Liverpool for generations. There are bits of art everywhere now but when I was a child the Walker was the only place everyone knew of where you could go to see what I would have called "real" art and the John Moores was when I got to see "real" art by artists who are actually still living!
My earliest memory of seeing paintings was when my dad took me to the Walker, I think it was an Escher show. It means so much to me to have a painting hung in the Walker, and for it to be there as part of a John Moores selection is perfect. Every painter would want to be in it for professional reasons but being born and bred in Liverpool and having worked at the Walker for so long it just means so much personally too. Maybe it's like a band playing a big gig in their home town.

Where do you hope being shortlisted for the prize will lead you?

I have heard people say that being in the John Moores was a turning point for them. I don't know what will come of it, I don't really involve myself much in the local art scene so I am very much an unknown around here as I am everywhere, so it will be interesting to see what its like to get a bit of attention.
I am under no illusions regarding the difficulties of existing as a painter, especially when you aren't based in London and especially in the current economic climate. I'm not expecting it to be like someone waving a magic wand but it certainly can't do me any harm. It's very exciting.

Please would you describe your short-listed painting?
This is where it gets tricky. Its hard to describe a painting properly, especially your own. I wouldn't want to on the whole, they are supposed to be non-verbal experiences, sorry, I know you understand this but it always needs emphasizing... having said that, I like to read what people write about paintings as much as anyone. I'm very glad you said "describe" rather than explain by the way! (I can only describe my methods and materials as I am convinced that if a painting is to have any kind of "meaning" it is to be found in the "DNA" of what it is made from and the way in which it was made.)
My paintings tend to be small. I rely on an intimacy of drawing and smallness helps with that. I use enamel paints mainly, and thick varnish layers. I always paint on wooden panels. Usually, my paintings are slowly built up out of many many layers. They usually take months to achieve what I am after but not always. Each layer is quite considered for a very long time, then the actual painting is quick. Layers of varnish separate the layers like punctuation separates sentences.
I have absolutely no idea what a painting will end up like when I start. If I do have an idea I tend to kill it very quickly or the length of my process suffocates it. Its to do with preserving the fluency of the process of making it. Usually parts get repeated or echoed or copied and a self-generating structure starts to appear. They grow so slowly though that many structures wax and wane in the process. I usually look to natural forms, mainly botanical and anatomical structures, as metaphors to explain how my paintings grow or explain what I am after.
I am fascinated by the feedback processes which are thought to have evolved into the hallucination of consciousness. I have begun to use optical devices as a way of objectifying and mechanising certain procedures and to generate randomness.
I named this painting after Robert Hooke as he was a figure who I am interested in and admire.

Why are you drawn to painting as a medium?
I am drawn to lots of media. I just love to make things in general. I have itchy fingers that like messing about with stuff and doodling. For some reason though painting seems to be the one that "works" for me. It just seems to work with the way my mind works. I like the fact that you dont need to rely on anyone else to do it. I like the stillness in time of a visual image that gradually unfolds (as opposed to the narrative time of, say, a film or piece of music).
The process of visual perception and replication is very interesting and is important in how we form ourselves to exist in the world. If you look at any survey of contemporary painting the variety of what is going on is incredible. It's probably a very good time to be a painter, everything is allowed and there is such a history to build on. Just enough people care and just enough people don't care to make it interesting.

NEAL JONES (Entry: Orange Paving)
Please would you describe your short-listed painting?
The picture isn't easily described, if it was, it wouldn't be worth doing - it is more poetic and mysterious. It's more of a thing really - colours, textures, wooden structure. It is an attempt to represent a quality of space, both ordered and organic, triumphant and collapsed. The colours and forms come from some of the ramshackle details of my allotment garden, where I paint in a greenhouse.

Why are you drawn to painting as a medium?
I enjoy the looseness of it, but also the lack of 'concept'. I like how direct it is, to do and to see.

What was it like to discover you are on the short-list?
Quite shocking really, I thought this was a more difficult painting than last time and I was also expecting worse luck.

When did you first hear of the John Moores Prize?
If you are a painter the John Moores prize seeps in, you catch glimpses of it in the backs of catalogues and you continually keep one eye on it to see what painting is doing now.Â

Did the fact that it is run by a gallery local to you make the news any more special?
I live in London, but I was born in Liverpool and my parents too, so that makes me feel connected and especially happy to return and proud to be involved again.

Where do you hope being shortlisted for the prize will lead you?
I don't think too far ahead, I am happy where I am in terms of the work, if I can continue(buy paint and buy time)- that's great, shows like this I find celebratory and symbolic, but my 'career' is always a mystery.

Breugel Camp by Neal Jones, shortlisted for the John Moores Prize in 2008

TIM ELLIS (Entry: United in Different Guises XXXXIII)

Please would you describe your short-listed painting?

The painting is part of an ongoing series that share the same title 'United in Different Guises' and are numbered accordingly. The title refers to a proposed shared function. This function sits somewhere between a communicative role and the symbolic. The source imagery used is a mixture of signage and design; which is reconstructed to form gendered symbols.
Their scale and material quality mimic the appearance of flags and banners. By folding, scuffing and gradually aging the paintings, a suggested utility appears. What is left is an object that questions notions of symbolism and authenticity, allowing the work to function beyond the realms of painting.
Why are you drawn to painting as a medium?

For the particular work I submitted, painting was the most appropriate medium, it suitted the language I wanted to use. I make both sculptures and paintings that use particular materials to do a job. Painting on a large piece of fabric did that job.
What was it like to discover you are on the short-list?
I was very pleased to be on the shortlist, I thought I hadn't got in as I hadn't recieved anything through post. I only found out because my girlfriend went on the John Moores website to have a look. My acceptance letter is still somewhere lost in London

United in Different Guises XIV, by Tim Ellis

When did you first hear of the John Moores Prize?
I first heard about the John Moores at an early age, my art teacher said that we should all have a look at it. I remember skipping school with a couple of mates to go and see it, sounds a bit geeky but there was something exciting about it, perhaps its diversity. I supose so

Did the fact that it is run by a gallery local to you make the news any more special?

I always went there when I lived in Liverpool, do really know, probably not, it's just good.

Where do you hope being shortlisted for the prize will lead you?
I suppose its one of those things that validates your practice, it's a great show to be in and its had some very good artists in it, It's a privilege to be in it, that's enough I think.

RICHARD HARRISON (Entry: Mountain Peaks)

Please would you describe your short-listed painting?
It is an imaginary abstracted landscape, inspired by trips to Iceland and to the rocky mountains in the US, and to the Laurentian mountains outside Montreal in Canada. Landscape evokes strong emotions, and this painting is intended to do the same. The palette is deliberately restricted to black and white in order to evoke the emotional opposites of light and dark, good and evil, hope and despair, and to hopefully transport the spectator to some "other" space.

Richard Harrison with Triassic (2010)

Why are you drawn to painting as a medium?
Painting is the closest thing I know of to embarking, whilst awake rather than in a dream, on a journey into the void of blank and empty space without actually having to get into a starship or a time machine. The raw canvas, primed and ready, beckons to me and the exploration can begin. Memories are invoked, objets and bodies are observed, imagination is harnessed, and chance and happy accident can play their part.
The paint flows, it takes on a life of its own, and I become part of that "flow", the universal field of infinite potentiality, whereby It is as if my hand is directed by something, I know not what, that is inside of me and yet outside of me.

What was it like to discover you are on the short-list?
It was tremendously exciting as I have been entering the competition, hitherto unsuccessfully, ever since I first heard about it.

The Shape of Things to Come

When did you first hear of the John Moores Prize?
When I started my BA at Chelsea Art College in London in 1984.

Did the fact that it is run by a gallery local to you make the news any more special?
Yes, particularly so. When I was a child growing up in Liverpool, my mother used to take me and my younger sister Christina to the Walker Art Gallery, and we'd look at all the marvellous Victorian paintings, and my father, who was Chairman of the building committee at Liverpool Anglican Cathedral, and who managed to finally get the Cathedral finished and opened by the Queen in 1978, used to take us to Sunday Matins at the Cathedral every week. It has to be said that both of these parental "outings" used to rather bore me and my sister.
Now, as it says in the book of Corinthians, I have "Put away childish things" and I think differently, and I am very proud that my large Triptych " Crucifixion : At The End ... A Beginning" now hangs in the ambulatory of the Anglican Cathedral, and I will be very proud when my sister Christina and I come on September 16th to see my painting hanging in the Walker Art Gallery, the cradle of our childhood art history lessons!

Richard Harrison's Triptych, now hanging in the Ambulatory, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral

Where do you hope being shortlisted for the prize will lead you?
Although I exhibit regularly at London's Albemarle Gallery, and sell paintings worldwide to private collectors, my work has not been noticed by Corporate Collections and by Public Galleries in London and throughout the UK. I would hope that being shortlisted for the prize might bring my work to their attention.

STEVEN PROUDFOOT (entry: The Party)

Please would you describe your short-listed painting?
'The Party' my shortlisted picture, is in oil paint on paper which is then glued onto board (70cm X 100cm). I work on paper as it is convenient and easy to store although once I go over a metre I generally use canvas, even then I prefer to stretch the canvas over board which makes it heavier but it ensures the firm surface I enjoy working on.
The picture is based on an engagement party of a friend of ours' daughter (Rosemary and Jenny). I had forgotten my camera and used my mobile to record the happy event. I didn't intend to work from them, but once I'd downloaded the images I really liked the (totally unintended) subtle, unusual lighting effects. I never use a flash as a matter of course, as the bright light flattens the form and makes it less interesting.
After lots of studies and two versions of the complete composition, spanning more than eighteen months, I only just managed to finish the final composition in time for the John Moores submission date!
The painting describes an intimate moment and attempts to combine Vermeer's calm interiors with Velasquez's handling of paint.
All the people in the painting are friends and acquaintances: Rosemarie (our friend) is cutting the cake, Jenny and Anthony (the happy couple) are opposite her and Rosemarie's father, brother-in-law and his wife, sister, and various children are running about.

Gleeson's Bar, Dublin

Why are you drawn to painting as a medium?
What I am trying to do when producing art is to aesthetically excite myself and others(!). Having tried other disciplines at art college painting has always maintained its central place, although I also have produced prints and photographs over the years.
What thrills me the most is the traditional art of creating space out of a flat surface. I like non-figurative work but don't feel inclined to actually produce it myself.
As a painter my hero is Velasquez whose handling of paint is unbelievable as he manages to produce spectacular mark-making which magically transforms into solid form as one moves back from the image. Oil paint is a fantastically flexible medium and I love using it. I find acrylic doesn't have the same qualities.

Evening at Josie's by Steve Proudfoot

What was it like to discover you are on the short-list?
I was astonished when I found out I was one of the 258 to get through to stage 2 so to actually make the last 45 of the shortlist is staggering!
Entering the John Moores was part of a cunning plan; having left work to paint full-time I need to bring myself and my work to public attention. The time honoured way is to hoof around galleries with one's portfolio and/or send out images, but I decided to enter competitions instead. The John Moores was the largest one I have entered so to actually be included is unbelievable.
After all most of the other shortlisted artists are established and have solid London gallery connections.

When did you first hear of the John Moores Prize?
You probably won't believe me when I tell you that I have known of the John Moores since I was a child. I used to visit the Walker from about 10 years old - on my own! I love paintings and love the gallery. I even loved the old fashioned Edwardian gents toilet which was near the entrance with its enormous brass fittings.
The Jack Smith 'Creation and Crucifixion' particularly impressed itself upon me at that young age. I have subsequently visited nearly all the following competitions.
My favourite Walker picture is the Lucien Freud 'Interior near Paddington' I am one of the odd few who prefer his early work!
I am still a regular visitor having brought my wife and sons over the years.

Did the fact that it is run by a gallery local to you make the news any more special?
As is obvious from my previous answer I'm thrilled and delighted, as a scouser, that my painting will be in the Walker and in Liverpool. The competition has attracted some very great British artists since the late fifties, so to be amongst such company (if only for several months) is very exciting.
It's important to bear in mind that although I have always produced my own work I have neglected exhibiting. Hopefully the John Moores will prove to be a springboard to future developments.

Where do you hope being shortlisted for the prize will lead you?
Fame and fortune!
I am hoping, being included will raise my profile.
I have recently had a website constructed and would like to have a solo exhibition and sell some work!

The Royal Academy of Arts - Schools Annual Auction - 2010

2011-07-04T05:45:00.000-07:00

The Royal Academy of Arts - Schools Annual Auction - 2010

NEWSPEAK: BRITISH ART NOW - SAATCHI GALLERY - LONDON 2010

2011-07-04T05:36:00.000-07:00

Tim Ellis’s unique approach to art-making crafts a ubiquitous logic from the haphazard and coincidental. By drawing mental and tactile relations between materials and subtly altering their forms, Ellis highlights a sensitive interlacing between artifice and natural order. In Ellis’s work found objects such as plates, vases, and Christmas tree ornaments are reconfigured to become assemblages of totemic significance. His practice revolves around his idea that “a being has a primeval desire to want to belong to something greater than oneself. This ‘wanting to belong’ manifests itself in both the production and consumption of cultural artefacts. Whether in isolation or as a collection, artefacts are dependent on a creator, mediator and audience. My work juxtaposes a culturally diverse collection of objects questioning their value and original purpose. The viewer is forced to engage in the notions of value, authorship and display.” Ellis often treats his readymade components with slight interventions, such as faux finishing bric-a-brac so they appear as more stately materials, or editing motifs to co-relate to other objects in the group. Through these minute alterations Ellis strives to engender his work. Conceiving each piece as male or female, he fabricates an instinctive harmony or ‘genetic bonding’ through the objects’ aesthetic handling. In his museological presentation, paintings are completed on pillowcases, and elaborate stands are designed at both plinth and kitchen countertop height, some replicate Victorian plant stands; blurring the domestic and exotic, their familiar scaling becomes a template of karmic measurement. His sculptures, which stand in as archaic transmitters, receive and refract all the various elements from their mysterious towers: Chinoiserie and Delft pottery, Viking shields, alchemical orbs, and trade union-like banners, prized relics both real and fake, all speaking the same cryptic language of universality and timelessness.

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Exhibited Works

New Symphony - Simon Oldfield Gallery - London - 2010

2011-07-04T05:20:00.000-07:00

New Symphony - Simon Oldfield Gallery - London - 2010

Selected Artists

Katie Cudden
Tim Ellis
Sam Plagerson
Douglas White

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Press Release - Rhiannon Pickles

Continuing to work with the best young and emerging British artists, Simon Oldfield Gallery is delighted to announce New Symphony, an exhibition of new works by four leading sculptors.

Artists Tim Ellis, Katie Cuddon, Sam Plagerson and Douglas White are known for their interest in and examination of our contemporary culture and the objects within it. Individually, each artist displays a widely differing perception of the world and their interests and approaches differ enormously, swerving from the nature of fame and its constructions, to the complexities of the human psychological condition. As a group, their work in this exhibition casts light on man’s perception of himself and how he chooses to represent this.

Having trained in a ‘post-YBA’ environment, these artists do not use shock as a tactic with which to make a point but reference instead a wide web of ideas – both visual and conceptual – with which to tease a response from the viewer. They also frequently make use of appropriation, as a means of taking something from its familiar and accepted circumstances and placing it in a fresh perspective, where it can be considered anew. New Symphony questions notions of authorship, identity (on both a personal and societal level), value and beauty, and as such presents insights into one of the main discussions within British art and society today.

Tim Ellis examines how mankind chooses to represent himself through the cultural artefacts commonly seen in homes and everyday surroundings. His practice revolves around the idea that a being has a primeval desire to want to belong to something greater than oneself. This ‘wanting to belong’ is manifested in both the production and consumption of cultural artefacts. Whether in isolation or as a collection, artefacts are dependent on a creator, mediator and audience: Ellis explores the meanings behind many of these objects, taking and reestablishing them in a new context that in turn questions both their value and their original purpose. In doing so, and by allowing the relationship between the original and the ‘new’ to be made manifest, he highlights furthermore the tensions between historical fact and fabrication.

Katie Cuddon has worked across a range of media but primarily makes drawings and painted clay sculptures that frequently represent what seems to be a ‘detritus’ of the human body as representative of its psychological conditions, following in the same classical tradition as artists such as Auguste Rodin or Hans Josephsohn. Texture and colour jostle with each other, each vying for a role that both describes and conceals her work, as pummeled and kneaded surfaces and semi-recognizable forms are whitewashed over, swathed, and bound-up within themselves. Cuddon’s ‘takings’ of the human body elicit a series of semi-conscious responses in the viewer that are felt far more on an emotional level than one that can immediately be explained. Combined with this seeming serious, shy and corporal approach, the subject matter of her works frequently steps into a realm of dark humour, tempered by the Surrealistic love of game playing that merges (for instance) the public with the private, as in Cock Microphone.

Sam Plagerson is particularly interested in the ideas of Edward Bernays (the ‘father’ of public relations and advertising). His forthcoming body of work to be exhibited at Simon Oldfield Gallery is wholly derived from publicity and fashion imagery. To date, perhaps his best-known work is Elle, a ceramic bust portrait of Jennifer Lopez, painstakingly detailed and perfect in every sense. Plagerson’s practise explores how images control and affect their viewer, aiming to induce a reappraisal of imagery that has become over-familiar and banal. By specifically investigating the magazine crop (by transplanting these highly edited and perfected images into three-dimensional form) Plagerson unpicks the depicted gestures and expressions, allowing the viewer to see and understand the construction and arrangement of the images themselves. By deconstructing – and thus removing – the usual frames around such images, the viewer can focus on information that is not normally registered, such as how the image has been cropped and created for mainstream consumption.

Douglas White works frequently with found objects. Finding beauty and mystery in things most people would ignore, such as an exploded tyre or the root system of an upturned tree. His works are imbued with a poetry that speaks of an alchemical transformation of ‘base’ materials into something new, beautiful and worthwhile, and they pulse with a new energy. Tapping into ideas of renewal and rebirth, White’s sculptures, installations and drawings offer a means of possible salvation from man’s destructive presence upon earth, while his inspirations and subject matter are frequently based on myth, referencing (for instance) the ancient Greek myth of Icarus, poetry, or the native American Indian dream catchers that catch the nightmares and protect sleeping children.

Simon Oldfield Gallery use their profit to support charitable organisations such as The Whitechapel Gallery through the patron programme. In addition to the exhibition programme, the gallery also supports emerging artists by providing studio facilities. Simon Oldfield is the founder of The Bloomsbury Studio,mwhich opened
in 2008, offering subsidized live/work spaces for young artists.

2010 has also seen Simon Oldfield Gallery working with the Contemporary Art Society in support of their centenary programme. The gallery provided studio/living accommodation to Yane Calovski, who is developing an exhibition for Tate Britain that opens in May 2010.
Simon Oldfield Gallery
http://simonoldfield.com
First floor, 9 Henrietta Street
London, WC2E 8PW
Tel: 0044 (0) 7970 719 962
Email: art@simonoldfield.com
Opening hours: Tuesday-Friday 10am-6pm; Saturday 11am-5pm

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Installation Views

The Catlin Guide 2010 - New Artists in the UK

2011-07-04T03:41:00.000-07:00

The Catlin Guide 2010 - New Artists in the UK

ISBN 978-0-9564570-0-4

A FOUNDATION FOR EXCHANGE - PRIMOPIANO - LUGANO, SWITZERLAND - 2010 - Solo Exhibition

2011-07-01T12:14:00.000-07:00

Solo Exhibition
A Foundation for Exchange - Primo Piano - Lugano Switzerland - 2010

Press Release

‘A Foundation for Exchange’ Lugano Switzerland 2010

‘A Foundation for Exchange’ is best described as a response to the idea that a being has a primeval desire to want to belong to something greater than ones self. This ‘wanting to belong’ manifests itself in both the production and consumption of cultural artefacts. Whether in isolation or as a collection artefacts are dependent on a creator, mediator and audience. The exhibition juxtaposes a culturally diverse collection of objects questioning their value and original purpose. The viewer is forced to engage in the notions of value, authorship and display.

The collection corrupts and transforms the values put upon cultural artefacts. Every culture principally has its own distinct set of values and beliefs, which are transferred to the things around them. This transferral manifests itself in the thoughts and values of the creator, curator/mediator and viewer and therefore, the production and consumption of cultural artefacts. Through trade, cultural objectives become re-appropriated into other forms. Therefore, artefacts and images change from potent forms of communication to objects of fashion and aestheticism. Once the original is appropriated an informed copy enters the world creating a new set of values and a secondary history of its own. The focus becomes the co-existence of both original and copy and the tension between historical fact and fabrication. This subsequent tension allows an engagement with the notions of artefact, artifice, creativity and invention.

The paintings although individual, bear the same title ‘United in Different Guises’ and are numbered accordingly. The title refers to a proposed shared function. This function sits somewhere between a communicative role and the symbolic. The source imagery used is a mixture of signage and design; which is reconstructed to form gendered symbols. Their scale and material quality mimic the appearance of flags and banners. By folding, scuffing and gradually aging the paintings, a suggested utility appears. What is left is an object that questions notions of symbolism and authenticity, allowing the work to function beyond the realms of painting.

Tim Ellis 10.02.2010

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Installation Views

From Left to right: Three Tiers 2010, Allegorical Reflections 2009, Souvenir 2010

From Left to right: Four Quarters 2010 and Three Tiers 2010

From Left to right: Four Quarters 2010 and Three Tiers 2010 (Detail)

From Left to right: Three Tiers 2010 and Allegorical Reflections 2009

From Left to right: United in Different Guises XXIII, United in Different Guises XXI, United in Different Guises XXVII,United in Different Guises XIII,United in Different Guises XIV,United in Different Guises XII

From Left to right: About Face 2010, United in Different Guises XXIII, United in Different Guises XXI, United in Different Guises XXVII

From Left to right: About Face 2010 and Souvenir 2010

From Left to right: Him and Her 2010, Three Tiers 2010 and United in Different Guises X 2010

From Left to right: Him and Her 2010 and United in Different Guises X 2010

TAG From 3 to 36: New London Painting - BROWN - London - 2009

2011-07-01T10:38:00.000-07:00

TAGFrom 3 to 36: New London Painting

January 7 - February 6, 2010

Angus Sanders-Dunnachie Hoping to be proved wrong

PRESS RELEASE

EXHIBITIONS:

Tag Images

Artist List (In order within the three threads. Underlined names are the initial three artists who were asked to contribute by Brown)
Gabriel Hartley Mali Morris Alex Scarfe Stewart Cliff Tom Livesey Tom Bull David Northedge Andy Wicks Alex Carmichael Lyle Perkins Geraldine Swayne Howard Dyke Clare Price Stephanie Moran Marcus Cope Luke Rudolf Annie Hemond Hotte Gorka Mohamed Robin Kirsten Jill Mason Tim Ellis Jack Newling Angus Sanders-Dunnachie Yohei Yashi Yo Okada Miho Sato Juan Bolivar Karen David Lee Maelzer Dale Adcock	Rannva Kunoy Alexis Marguerite Teplin Sophie von Hellerman Cullinan + Richards Milena Dragicevic * David R. Fenwick
* Cullinan + Richards asked David R. Fenwick to participate, in addition to Milena Dragicevic

_________________________________________________________________________

For Immediate ReleaseExhibition Dates: January 7 – February 6, 2010
Opening Reception: January 7 from 6-8PM

Tag: From 3 to 36.
New London Painting.

For the exhibition – Tag – Three London-based painters have each been asked to invite
one other London-based painter they like or admire, who will then invite another, and so
on. This has resulted in 36 artists being invited to participate, each with their own unique
style of painting.
Tag was a way to allow each artist to ‘curate’ or organize the next step in the exhibition,
in a similar way to exquisite corpse, where each person asked to contribute is aware of
the person who precedes and follows, but is unaware of what is being contributed.
Similarities appear between artists within each tagged thread, often marking a close
understanding of the invited painter’s work. Viewers may examine each work, and
decipher influences or contrasting differences.
Tag also perhaps gives a better survey of current London-based painting than a single
organizer could give – as abstract and figurative painters, recent graduates and more
established artists, and a variety of mediums and sizes are shown here side by side.
The rules each artist received when asked to participate were the same:

Each participating artist must be a painter who resides in Greater London
Each person must contribute one painting, smaller than 90 x 90 cm
Each artist will ask one other artist to participate, until 15 artists are included

As there was a given time frame, many artists were quick to respond and participate.
However, as any exhibition with rules would likely discover, the rules can also break
down. In one thread, an artist was unresponsive after agreeing to participate, leaving
a short space of time to try and finish the chain. Therefore, another artist was asked
in their place, who then asked two artists in order to try and create separate branches
and a longer thread. Although this thread is still the shortest of the three, this directional
shift adds greatly to the basic idea of Tag – that surprises and turns in an exhibition,
or an artist’s work, trump any rules.

Artist List
(In order within the three threads. Underlined names are the initial three artists who were
asked to contribute by Brown)

Gabriel Hartley
Mali Morris
Alex Scarfe
Stewart Cliff
Tom Livesey
Tom Bull
David Northedge
Andy Wicks
Alex Carmichael
Lyle Perkins
Geraldine Swayne
Howard Dyke
Clare Price
Stephanie Moran
Marcus Cope
Luke Rudolf
Annie Hemond Hotte
Gorka Mohamed
Robin Kirsten
Jill Mason
Tim Ellis
Jack Newling
Angus Sanders-Dunnachie
Yohei Yashi
Yo Okada
Miho Sato
Juan Bolivar
Karen David
Lee Maelzer
Dale Adcock

Rannva Kunoy
Alexis Marguerite Teplin
Sophie von Hellerman
Cullinan + Richards
Milena Dragicevic
* David R. Fenwick

* Cullinan + Richards asked David R. Fenwick to participate, in addition to Milena Dragicevic

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TAG
From 3 to 36: New London Painting

January 7 - February 6, 2010

WORKS

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http://www.browngallery.co.uk/TAG.html

New Sensations - A Foundation - London - 2009

2011-06-30T11:22:00.000-07:00

The Judges

Artist Gavin Turk; Ralph Rugoff, director of the Hayward Gallery, London; critic Louisa Buck; and Alison Jacques, owner of Alison Jacques Gallery in London.

Selected Artists

Oliver Beer
Andreas Blank
Nick Goss
Regine Peterson
Rachel Adams
Maurice Citron
Natasha Conway
Richard Cook
Laura Culham
Tim Ellis
Jenifer Fergie
Camilla Holder
Dong Yong Kim
Ryan Leigh
Mikhak Mirmahoudi
Nick Mobbs
Ann-Maria Pfab
Jack Thorne
Amy Petra Woodward
Thomas Yeomans

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INSTALLATION VIEWS - THE ROYAL ACADEMY SCHOOLS SHOW - 2009

2011-06-27T08:14:00.000-07:00

From Left to Right : Four Quarters, Heraldic Son, Broadcast, Tableau, In a Beginning Lies an End, For the Good of All, With Trade becomes Union, Diagrammatic Emblem, Rebuke.

From Left to Right wall: United in Different Guises I, United in Different Guises II, United in Different Guises III, United in Different Guises IV, United in Different Guises V, United in Different Guises VI. sculptures: In a Beginning Lies an End, Four Quarters.

From Left to Right: Diagrammatic Emblem, Rebuke, Allegorical Reflection

INSTALLATION VIEWS - THE ROYAL ACADEMY SCHOOLS SHOW - 2009

Selected Works

United in Different Guises I
United in Different Guises II
United in Different Guises III
United in Different Guises IV
United in Different Guises V
United in Different Guises VI
Four Quarters
Heraldic Son
Broadcast
Tableau
In a Beginning Lies an End
For the Good of All
With Trade becomes Union
Diagrammatic Emblem
Rebuke
Sun King

THE ROYAL ACADEMY SCHOOLS SHOW - THE ROYAL ACADEMY LONDON - 2009

2011-06-26T11:33:00.000-07:00

THE ROYAL ACADEMY SCHOOLS SHOW - THE ROYAL ACADEMY LONDON - 2009

Artists

Caline Aoun
Joanna Bryniarska
Peter Linde Busk
Nicky Carvel
Tim Ellis
Nick Goss
Eemyn Kang
Julian King
Alex Knell
Alana Lake
Robert Leech
Jack newling
Robert Pratt
Ben Pritchard
Catherine Story
Katherine Thomas
Barbara Wolff
Maria Zahle

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Graduates 2009

Caline Aoun

Joanna Bryniarska

Peter Linde Busk

Nicky Carvell

Tim Ellis

Nick Goss

Eemyun Kang

Julian King

Alex Knell

Alana Lake

Robert Leech

Jack Newling

Robert Pratt

Ben Pritchard

Catherine Story

Katherine Thomas

Barbara Wolff

Maria Zahle

THE FUTURE CAN WAIT - LONDON - 2008

2011-06-26T11:27:00.000-07:00

THE FUTURE CAN WAIT - LONDON - 2009

Selected Artists

Angela Bartram
Kei Benger
Emma Bennett
Kiera Bennett
Appau Boakye - Yiadom JR
Gordon Chung
Christopher Davies
Helen Dowling
Tim Ellis
Nadine Feinson
Andrea Gregson
Neil Hamon
David Hancock
Aisling Hedgecock
Alex Hoda
Luke Jackson
Sam Jackson
Monica Ursina Jager
Chia En Jao
Rebecca KidsonGayle Chong Kwan
Adam Latham
Juliana Cerqueira Leite
Robin Mason
Rui Matsunga
Kate McGowan
Hugh Mendes
Alexis Milne
Jock Mooney
Alex Gene Morrison
Richard Moon
Tasmin Morse
Gavin Nolan
Margeret O'Brien
Janak Odedra
Kim Rugg
James Russell
Miho Sato
Piers Secunda
Domonic Shepherd
John Stark
Erik Tidemann
Gavin Tremlett
Will Tuck
James Unsworth
Miranda Whall

ALEXANDRE POLLAZZON - LONDON - 2008

2011-06-25T13:42:00.000-07:00

ALEXANDRE POLLAZZON - LONDON - 2008

13th September - 11th October

Selected Artists

Robert Dowling
Tim Ellis
Nick Goss
Michael Pybus
Jia Jia Wang

FALLING FROM AN APPLE TREE - WILDE GALLERY - BERLIN - 2008

2011-06-25T13:37:00.000-07:00

FALLING FROM AN APPLE TREE - WILDE GALLERY - BERLIN

11th July - 9th August 2008

Selected Artists

Maurizio Anzeri
Luca Bertolo
Tim Ellis
Nick Goss
Gian Domenico Sozzi

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WHAT'S ON THE WALLS - RA MAGAZINE - 2008

PELES EMPIRE - 2008

Interview with Barbara Wolff and Katharina Stoever

Included Works

Tim Ellis
Gabriel Hartley
Mark Leckey
Karl Orton

PAINTERS GLANCE - RHENANIA KUNST HAUS - COLOGNE GERMANY - 2008

2011-06-25T12:44:00.000-07:00

PAINTERS GLANCE - RHENANIA KUNST HAUS - COLOGNE GERMANY - 2008

10th May - 22nd May 2008

PREMIUMS - THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ART LONDON - 2008

2011-06-25T12:42:00.000-07:00

PREMIUMS - THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ART LONDON - 2008

Caline Aoun
Joanna Bryniarska
Peter Busk
Nicola Carvell
Tim Ellis
Nick Goss
Eemyun Kang
Julian King
Alex Knell
Alana Lake
Robert Leech
Jack Newling
Robert Pratt
Benjamin Pritchard
Catherine Story
Katherine Thomas
Barbara Wolff
Maria Zahle.

Home > Exhibitions > Premiums

Premiums 2008

8—17 February 2008
In the Sackler Wing of Galleries
Sponsored by Mizuho International plc

Evening on Matador, Barbara Wolff. Mixed media, 4.55 m x 4 m The Premiums exhibition is a selection of the best contemporary work being produced by second year students studying at the Royal Academy Schools. This year, the show will highlight works by eighteen RA Schools students.
The exhibition, which provides an excellent opportunity to view new work by emerging artists, will include art in a variety of media including painting, sculpture, video and photography.
The students exhibiting in the show are: Caline Aoun, Joanna Bryniarska, Peter Busk, Nicola Carvell, Timothy Ellis, Nick Goss, Eemyun Kang, Julian King, Alex Knell, Alana Lake, Robert Leech, Jack Newling, Robert Pratt, Benjamin Pritchard, Catherine Story, Katherine Thomas, Barbara Wolff and Maria Zahle.
The RA Schools offer students the opportunity to develop their ideas and working practices on a unique three-year postgraduate course. Attracting students from across the UK and Europe, the Middle East, Asia and America, the RA Schools have established an international reputation, and are renowned for the creativity of their students.
Find out more about RA Schools
All works in the exhibition are for sale.
Opening hours and admission
Open to Public:
Friday 8 February – Sunday 17 February 2008
10am–6pm daily
Late night openings: Fridays until 10pm

INTERCEPTOR - PELES EMPIRE - LONDON - 2007

2011-06-25T12:27:00.000-07:00

INTERCEPTOR - PELES EMPIRE - LONDON - 2007

Jack Newling
Tim Ellis

RITUAL ABUSE - THE BOYS HALL - LONDON - 2007

2011-06-25T12:24:00.000-07:00

RITUAL ABUSE - THE BOYS HALL - LONDON - 2007

28th September - 6th October

Gemma Anderson
Robert Bidder
Harry Burden
James Burke
Tereza Buskova
Tim Ellis
Fiona Fouly
Richard Gasper
Felix Handley
Kathleen Herbert
Alexander Hoda
Julian King
Wai Lau
Ryan McClelland
Michelle McKeown
Rob Pratt
James Ryan
Thomas Smith
Matthew Taylor
James Unsworth
MD Williams

THE ROYAL ACADEMY SUMMER SHOW 2007

2011-06-25T12:17:00.000-07:00

THE ROYAL ACADEMY SUMMER SHOW 2007

ISBN-13:9781905711192

HALF CUT FOR CONFIDENCE - INDEPENDENTS LIVERPOOL BIENNIAL 2006

2011-06-24T13:40:00.000-07:00

HALF CUT FOR CONFIDENCE - INDEPENDENTS LIVERPOOL BIENNIAL 2006

THE LAST GANG IN TOWN - ARENA GALLERY LIVERPOOL 2006

2011-06-24T13:38:00.000-07:00

THE LAST GANG IN TOWN - ARENA GALLERY LIVERPOOL 2006

GOING NATIVE - MERCY - LIVERPOOL 2006

2011-06-24T13:36:00.000-07:00

GOING NATIVE - MERCY - LIVERPOOL 2006

SELECTED ARTISTS

Tim Ellis
Malini Vivian
Kathy Wu
Nahida Yassan
Tenzin Yonten

JERWOOD DRAWING PRIZE 2005

2011-06-24T13:32:00.000-07:00

JERWOOD DRAWING PRIZE 2005

JERWOOD SPACE LONDON
PITVILLE GALLERY CHELTENHAM
RENNIE MACKINTOSH GALLERY GLASGOW
BAYART CARDIFF
THE GALLERY DORSET

SELECTION PANEL

PROFESSOR STEPHEN FARTHING RA
PROFESSOR MARTIN KEMP
DR SARAH SIMBLET

OPEN PARR - LIVERPOOL - 2005

2011-06-24T13:27:00.000-07:00

OPEN PARR - LIVERPOOL - 2005

ANNA BENSON
PETER CAMERON
CATHERINE CHART
TIM ELLIS
GARETH JONES
ANNA KETSKEMETY
CHEK-HUO LEUNG
SUE MASSEY
FRANK MOORE
MARIANNE
STEVE STROBE
NICK SYKES

HAYVEND LABORATORIES 2004

2011-06-24T13:23:00.000-07:00

HAYVEND LABORATORIES 2004

MANCHESTER CORNERHOUSE
BALTIC CENTRE FOR CONTEMPORARY ART
ARNOLFINI BRISTOL
ICA LONDON
HAYWARD GALLERY LONDON
WHITECHAPEL GALLERY LONDON

)Backet THIS( - MERCY - ARENA GALLERY - LIVERPOOL BIENNIAL OF CONTEMPORARY ART 2004

2011-06-24T13:19:00.000-07:00

)Backet THIS( - MERCY - ARENA GALLERY - LIVERPOOL BIENNIAL OF CONTEMPORARY ART 2004

SEFTON OPEN - ATKINSON GALLERY SOUTHPORT - 2003

2011-06-24T13:11:00.000-07:00

SEFTON OPEN - ATKINSON GALLERY SOUTHPORT
20th OCTOBER - 22nd NOVEMBER 2003

EXIT REVIEW - STATIC - 2003

2011-06-24T13:00:00.000-07:00

EXIT REVIEW - STATIC - LIVERPOOL - 2003

Reviewers

Cecilia Anderson
Bryan Biggs
Lewis Biggs
John Byrne
Michael Connor
Paul Domela
Colin Harrison
Pippa Koszererk
Marie-Anne McQuay
Joanna Spitzner
Imogen Stidworthy
Paul Sullivan

ISBN 0-9546498-0-X

The Archive

SECRET SOCIETIES - CAPC musee d'art contemporain - Bordeaux, France 2011 - 2012

SECRET SOCIETIES

Secret Societies. TO KNOW, TO DARE, TO WILL, TO KEEP SILENCE23. June - 25. September 2011

Publications

Secret Societies

THE THING IS THE THING - ASC GALLERY - LONDON

The Others - Turin - Italy

The Anti-Library - Space - London 2011

Artist in Residence - The Glenfiddich Distillery - Dufftown, Scotland 2011

SECRET SOCIETIES - SHIRN KUNSTHALLE - FRANKFURT, GERMANY - 2011

Secret Societies. TO KNOW, TO DARE, TO WILL, TO KEEP SILENCE23. June - 25. September 2011

Publications

Secret Societies

'FRIENDSHIP OF THE PEOPLES' - Simon Oldfield Gallery - London - 2011

The Royal Academy Summer Exhibition - London - 2011

'SONS OF PIONEERS' - FURINI CONTEMPORARY - ROME, ITLAY - 2011 - Solo Exhibition

Tim Ellis - Sons of Pioneers

The Aesthetic Trust - 2011

'THE TOURIST' - SPACEX - EXETER - 2011 - Solo Exhibition

Editor’s Pick – Top International Shows: March 14 – March 21, 2011

About the author

Tim Ellis - 'The Tourist'

JOHN MOORES PAINTING PRIZE 2010 - THE WALKER ART GALLERY - LIVERPOOL

Jury

Gary Hume

Alison Watt

'United in Different Guises XXXXIII', Tim Ellis

Artist's statement

Biography

Six local artists short-listed for John Moores Painting Prize

The Royal Academy of Arts - Schools Annual Auction - 2010

NEWSPEAK: BRITISH ART NOW - SAATCHI GALLERY - LONDON 2010

New Symphony - Simon Oldfield Gallery - London - 2010

The Catlin Guide 2010 - New Artists in the UK

A FOUNDATION FOR EXCHANGE - PRIMOPIANO - LUGANO, SWITZERLAND - 2010 - Solo Exhibition

TAG From 3 to 36: New London Painting - BROWN - London - 2009

New Sensations - A Foundation - London - 2009

INSTALLATION VIEWS - THE ROYAL ACADEMY SCHOOLS SHOW - 2009

THE ROYAL ACADEMY SCHOOLS SHOW - THE ROYAL ACADEMY LONDON - 2009

THE FUTURE CAN WAIT - LONDON - 2008

ALEXANDRE POLLAZZON - LONDON - 2008

FALLING FROM AN APPLE TREE - WILDE GALLERY - BERLIN - 2008

PAINTERS GLANCE - RHENANIA KUNST HAUS - COLOGNE GERMANY - 2008

PREMIUMS - THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ART LONDON - 2008

Premiums 2008

INTERCEPTOR - PELES EMPIRE - LONDON - 2007

RITUAL ABUSE - THE BOYS HALL - LONDON - 2007

THE ROYAL ACADEMY SUMMER SHOW 2007

HALF CUT FOR CONFIDENCE - INDEPENDENTS LIVERPOOL BIENNIAL 2006

THE LAST GANG IN TOWN - ARENA GALLERY LIVERPOOL 2006

GOING NATIVE - MERCY - LIVERPOOL 2006

JERWOOD DRAWING PRIZE 2005

OPEN PARR - LIVERPOOL - 2005

HAYVEND LABORATORIES 2004

)Backet THIS( - MERCY - ARENA GALLERY - LIVERPOOL BIENNIAL OF CONTEMPORARY ART 2004

SEFTON OPEN - ATKINSON GALLERY SOUTHPORT - 2003

EXIT REVIEW - STATIC - 2003

Secret Societies. TO KNOW, TO DARE, TO WILL, TO KEEP SILENCE
23. June - 25. September 2011

Secret Societies. TO KNOW, TO DARE, TO WILL, TO KEEP SILENCE
23. June - 25. September 2011