Art
DRAW‘NG AND pA'NT'NG work: the 30,000 pieces created in fashion and graphic design in 'NSTALMT'ON THE HOLOCAUST the midst of the Holocaust within Prague, but her life after art school LESLEY .FOXCROFT ARTWORKS OF MARIANNE . . Sleeper, Edinburgh, until GRAN-I- the ghettos and labour and brings new meaning to the term Fri 7 Jun .. Art Gallery & Museum, Kelvingrove, concentration camps themselves. ‘struggling artist’. Her work ranged Glasgow, until Sun 30 Jun ... Marianne Grant’s sketches and from illustrations for cards and Lesley Foxcroft says of her , , A drawings in this exhibition are sketches exchanged for food to work: 'the most descriptive among this unique collection. They drawings commissioned by Josef statement I can give {is} . . . are the literal fragments of lived Mengele of inmates selected for to say that I use card and experience in Theresienstadt and medical experimentation in paper to draw. I like to work Auschwitz to the liberation of Auschwitz. It was this particular with flexrble materials I can Bergen-Belsen and the journey to a experience, in which Mengele handle and deal with myself. refugee camp in Sweden. watched as she drew, which The col0ur is deit-irli‘iHKXl by Out of the context of the underpins the exhibition subtitle: ‘l the natural colour of the Holocaust, the little sketches, knew I was painting for my life’. material and the work can watercolours and drawings of These witness accounts make a reSLilt in being two or three- street life in the Theresienstadt fascinating contribution to the dimensional.’ ghetto seem charming. They appear debate over media saturation and And that is not a bad as innocuous scenes of our desensitisation to Holocaust description of what yOu will countryside, cafe culture and imagery. Grant’s work, while find at Sleeper. One wall of colourful, cluttered, living spaces sometimes expressionist in style, is the gallery has been 'drawn' not unlike Josef Herman’s Glasgow of a selective but unsentimental on with wide masking tape. drawings of 1940—43 recalling his vision. Even in Bergen-Belsen her Taking the central point of Warsaw childhood. But the captions simple line drawings and the wall and working to the put the work into a frame of watercolours treat their subjects as edges. Foxcroft has taped a reference: the countryside she individuals rather than a crowded repeated geometric design. . . .. depicts is glimpsed beyond ghetto mass, undermining Nazi attempts The pattern dryides the craii Literal fragments of lived experience walls and the café is a mock-up, to dehumanise and strip inmates of into two squares. the Nazi propaganda set up in their identity. The image of a design on one half being the While contemporary artists such as anticipation of a Red Cross corpse, a beautiful woman with red unmasked area of the other Rachel Whiteread and Christian inspection. The apparently hair lying naked and twisted square. Boltanski have focused on bohemian living quarters are the beneath a birch tree, is l was told that it‘( w: :‘r‘is ‘responses to’ or ‘memories of’ the sum total of a family’s meagre compassionate and tragic, stark draWirig ‘yOU can de'ernizne Holocaust, this exhibition highlights possessions, crowded into a corner. and strange. that the gallery space is a small section of another body of As a teenager, Grant studied (Susannah Thompson) made up of I‘.“.’O Cubes placed side by side: i‘rt‘w Foxcroft 's ‘-.'.'Or'k aliox. s ou ergqu SHOW MIXED ME DH learn this is beyond me. but RSA 1761'“ ANNUAL EXH|B|T|0N MIKE pETER _ DECEREBRATOR it's nice to have the .nside McLellan Galleries, Glasgow, until Sun 2 Jun 000 Collective Gallery, Edinburgh, until Sun 9 Jun O. “08 0'“ ROW?” Elm Ha'l'S deSign pltrlOS()l)l‘.',p The As with any group show; the task of )resentzng so than; .‘ro'ks artist's response t > the
in an .nterestng and stin‘u‘atn‘g way s a (laur‘tang one. Ur‘tfortunateiy this shot-r lacks Curatorzg ort.
HOUSGO ll‘. the vast Mch-ifar‘ Gaiteres for the first hundreds of paintings cran‘rr‘ed close together. w:th no G'sce'rilble ef‘or’. to group according to style. subject n‘atter or even colour. makes \iewing a chailenge.
But having said that. sf you are DTGlJZ‘thd to spend some tin‘e here. your patier‘oe wall be reu'rarded. \‘Jrihen‘ina Barris- Gral‘ain's April l/ is a sun‘ptuous mix of' ri ,h. red abstract forms. Pelt) Reeves Co/rrposite Terrain — blocks of coo. 'r‘uteo co'ours — reveal l‘lS response to the landscape.
Of the 't‘o’e Curious exhints. Et‘l‘.'.'ard Suri‘ir‘ert<>i‘.'s throne- ‘3K6- chair. American Cover. cc"=."e:.s "egality albet covered a Chintz. anee fragile sculptural form ‘ Nico a Rounagh ()(jk‘ show. but on searching l 1k .- b r“. bags or saCks u'raiting to be failed. Here. she takes a .. . .. (JISCO‘.’(’;lC(.l a long and shore structure and turns it rnto a beautfui and (lee-cate '.'.'ork Decerebrator by Mick Peter cons:stent career in the UK
gallery space. clearii, essentiai in making the work. seems only partsth committed. Her rigour wanes when you inspect the corners of the drax'rnig to discover that at these CruCIal pOints. the symitietn,‘ of filled and empty space is lost. and the masking tape has been tr'irr'tmed.
l was not fan‘riliar with Fo><crofts n'rork before this
of art. Euan Han'ey's C'ft’rdel. an angular orange rustco cured and abroad. This show is
steel sotiipture was rightly asrarded the Benno Scnotx Pri/e for Hard a skip or two for filthy rubbish. glue it all together then not out of place x'ritli'n the
the most promising work exhibited by a yoang scuibtor. add some spurious freeforrn poetry a silly floor plan and discrete and connOisseu" Other highlglits include: Hettie Haxworth's retro-iner red Jress notes that allude to international themes: it's a trick led programme at Sleeper.
crroejar forms: a :rall of paentsngs by Craigie Aitcnson of lizs that has got riiore than one student through their final show. but I'm afraid it wir! 'iot g“
‘a'i‘rzar iceuraggied dogs and crucifiXion scenes: Alex Maui's t‘s Just slightly embarrassing when a commendany Vibrant down as one of 'ny
bust of Jon." Byrne. x'rith p nched. narrow face. exaggerated gallery begi Is to take such an artist's work seriously beyond faVOur'ites.
moustache and hair flosrv'xg f)é.t(3k'.'.’€tfdf$i and Vt/lliifl' Rodgers the rarefied confines of art school. lJennifer McGuire-
.voradedal Look ar'io ook Agar/7. used for the extirbitror '5; To ‘rlecereberate' means to remove the brain. a large
:,_i‘r;lic't‘,'. iHelen Mon ghan section of the brain or to cut the spinal cord at the level of
the brain stem of a person or animal. 80 it follows then that this is work for a lobotomrsed generation. relentlessly cheery rn the face of all seriousness. Of the nine pieces on SHO‘JJ. Five Bar Gate —- an oblong plastic and clingfilm food carton that looks as if it has recently been raided of its contents ~ and Fountain are the most accessible. The loriiiei' is a clear V sign to the Viewer. while the latter actuth iooks like some work v-ras put into its trough and tap lll()'.ll(l(,‘(l plastic construction.
The centre piece. Dr>cerebrator'. is a strange structure: a miniature model that is part Fylingdalt-Es. part twm towers and ‘.‘.ll()|l\/ odd. The best thing here though is one of his videos called Ho/lrs Brown. a Pythonesgue cartoon involuing tenement houses and a large hand. With Bob Dylan's version of 'li'aya Na Gilali' dubbed over the top. ~ Look Again by Willie Rodger Dylan. he saves the day every time. lPaul Dale: Beam Stack (1998)
L93 Lia. ti .‘ THE LIST 81