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DAVID BATCHELOR: MY OWN PRIVATE BAUHAUS
Perfectly pitched work pays tribute to the revolutionary art movement
Titled, says the Dundee-born artist, after ‘a phrase that has been hanging around the studio for a few years’, the timing of this exhibition has a certain ‘now or never’ sense to it, given that 2019 is the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Bauhaus by Walter Gropius. Working here largely in sculpture and painting, Batchelor – whose work and writing is based around the application of colour – pays understated tribute through the use of geometric shapes, particularly the square, circle and triangle, each of which has been fi ltered through his own style. In the centre of the room, ‘Dogdays’ is a series of lumps of
coiled cable, each one in uniform colours, transformed far beyond their original use. There are sheets of graph paper with perfectly shaped patterns picked out in rainbow colours and black silhouette objects highlighted with a wash of spraypaint; ‘paintings’ created with large dollops of commercial paint, dried to a soft shine; painted tin lids arranged in gravity-defying towers atop blocks of concrete; and, in the long shelving arrangement of the title piece, sheets of painted paper, refl ective gels and broken plastic drawing tools arranged in perfect aesthetic arrangements. None of this is any accident, but a measure of how perfectly pitched and controlled Batchelor’s practice is. (David Pollock) ■ Ingleby Gallery, until 28 Sep, free. ●●●●●
14–26 Aug 2019 THE LIST FESTIVAL 93
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