REVIEW ART
One of thousands: a hand-painted 0 by Maurice O’Connell
ROSS SINCLAIR & MAURICE O’CONNELL
CL‘A, Glasgow until Sat 20 Apr.
More complex than Celtic knotwork, the reality of Scotland involves myth- making on a grand scale. Negotiating
l l
: increases ten-fold.
? ('t'llit' ('mss is a highly charged ; artwork. The act of hammering in a nail
interacts with the work. there is ' untiervingly. a sense of complicity.
’I‘ransmission. is a variation on a theme lirst worked on by ()no in her early 3 years as an artist. In a career spanning
personal identity in the 905, the Oscar-
laden popularity of a film like Braveheartconfirms this, but sharply contrasts with Hollywood’s psychological version of a triple Glenmorangie. Boss Sinclair’s Real Life Rocky Mountain at CCA is a refreshing glass of spring water in comparison. With humour and thought, he exposes aspects of our collective psyche, simultaneously lamenting and
between the artworld and real life. it 'I‘ransmission's show of work by four women, .11 (it'll/it'irull l/l Illt’ ll'ur/(l ()i
1 York event orchestrated by ()no. which 3 saw a performer coolly describe
celebrating perceived culture north of :
Hadrian’s Wall.
Sinclair has transformed Gallery Two into Theme Park Scotland — a land populated by stuffed animals, carpeted with nylon grass and plastic waterfalls. From a vantage point high on a artificial mountain, he sings meaningful songs - emotional, ancient, modern, home-grown and ‘foreign’ - but all around, the world is take. The contradictions are transparently obvious but combined with the power of his chosen icons, guitar-playing Sinclair and his installation strike resonant chords.
Massively kitsch but also friendly, painful, sad and hopeful, he lays bare a slice of Scotland. As the only living exhibit, the Scottish Man (Sinclair), does not offer an alternative view but whether you accept or reject the underlying myths, his work remains braw and thought-provoking stuff.
Running in parallel, Irishman Maurice O’Connell is also encamped at CCA producing 60,000 hand-painted 0’s. His pursuit of the perfect freehand circle is laudable but by 8,000 it was as elusive as the Holy Grail. Pinned to the wall, however, the combined affect of the 0’s is hypnotic. Given the significance of ’0’ in mediative practice, the space is now perfect for contemplation. Contemplate the shape. Contemplate O’Connell - painting, what makes him the artist? Contemplate judgement — when is something perfect? Either this is a shallow exercise or one with truly cosmic significance. l veer towards the latter, transcending judgement and all the constraints of personal identity. Ooomm . . . (Paul Welsh)
live uncluttered drawings from a series lllus/ru/lmzs (i/Q'Wt’mm'y are intimate — a
llIiflEEIIIIIIIIIIIII
think on global iniquities. the work by
A GRAPEFRUIT IN THE WORLD OF PARK
'l'm/ixmlsximt (fuller): (ilusgmr lilllll Sal () Apr.
Standing in a bright white space is a small but sturdy wooden cross. It's a potent image. perhaps all the more in a gallery situation which engages the viewer to contetnplate. But hammer a nail into the cross (as one can. hammer and nails are provided) the potency
Yoko ()no’s Hummer .-I Null In —
not only brings to mind the Crucifixion ------------ ~ but countless cruel deaths that litter world history. This is literally “hammered home' as the nails are called coffin nails. and as one keenly
dialogue between shards of her history and present day reflection. At times cheery. at others bleak. they don't leave one guessing. lint l'in‘kml My Mont/t — .S‘lllth/H’tl My Head Against The Wall, l lliis l3 — .-lml You were Nothing But I’ll/1‘ lit-ll is no drama scene but one packed with pathos.
New Yorker Mary Ileilmann shows three bright and boisterous abstracts. Within the confines of colour zones, her brushwork manoeuvres the paint to different levels of intensity. In (ioml Iilntlllml a spread of litne green paint has dripped to create stalaetites of virulent colour and this marriage of fluidin and painterly control works.
Slightly lost in all this are Judith
This work. especially made for
35 years. ()no was at the forefront of Flaws in the (308'. Setting out to provoke and break-down divisions
favoured urban spaces to the gallery. And with a slight ironic twist.
l’urk. takes its name from a I()()I New
peeling fruit and counting hairs on a dead child to an atonal soundtrack. If ()no‘s work pricks the conscious to
.»l ('lti/niu/imi: Rough. Miniature and meticulous and consisting of was pencil shavings set to form circles. there‘s a touching fragility to them. Yet in an exhibition that succeeds in showing work by four very different artists they hold their own. (Susanna Beaumont)
London-based Tracey Emin is a highly personal excavation of her past. Her
bF-‘k‘ ..,‘\; A
Knocking on wood: Yoko 0no’s Hammer A Hall In: Celtic Cross
Art on the net: Pope And Guthrie’s on-the-road-made artwork
Dean‘s four versions of Installation I’m
IEEEEEIIIIIIIIIIIII HYPEBTEXTJDURNAL
http:www. unity. co. uk/hypetext/ journal/ until Sat 13 Apr.
Armed with laptops, modems, cameras, scanners and a directory at web sites, artists Karen Guthrie and Nina Pope are en route for the Western Isles. While the 18th century travelling duo, Boswell and Johnson, whose steps they are retracing, carried only ink and parchment, Guthrie and Pope’s journey is a new media adventure. They are into 905 technology and are out to explore the creative and documentary potential of the Internet.
They left Edinburgh in mid-March in a Mini Metro. Cruising the highways, taking in local sites and stopping for lunch in Iay-bys, Guthrie and Pope imput daily diaries and visuals on to their web site. For Boswell and Johnson it was two years before their journal appeared in print, but with technology at their fingertips Pope and Guthrie’s Hypertext Journal is virtual illustrated tourism.
‘Eventually we came to the Bullers of Buchan that Boswell and Johnson both described . . . had my first rush here with the “walking in their footsteps” feeling,’ says Pope on the Net. ‘Today was a bit of a dawn to dusk thriller from my managing to retrieve from the autoteller my cash card that it consumed last night to our piece de resistance — a visit to Slains Castle,’ writes Guthrie. She then turns their story into a near comedy concerned more with the quality of the nearest Tesco and her companion’s inability to handle the Metro’s gearstick.
But there is more to this four-week travelogue than a French and Saunders style of entertainment. Guthrie and Pope, both graduates of Edinburgh College of Art, with the use of video, photography and sound recording, are feeding down the modem an array of visuals. Their Pieces web page shows artworks made on the road. Fading, enlarging and shifting with colour, these works are visual delights. There’s a Feedback page and regular on-Iine chats as they take the highways and by-ways to the Western Isles. (Tanya Stephan)
Edinburgh’s Cyberia at 88 Ilene ver Street, 220 4403, is acting as a venue where access to the web site and e- mail are on offer at reduced rates.
The List S-IS Apr I996 57