MIXED MEDIA
Art
ILL COMMUNICATION DCA, Dundee, until Sun 23 Mar 0...
The history of hip hop is a diamond example of Marshall McLuhan’s predictions of medium-equals-message mix’n’match media. Ill Communication, appropriately, takes its title from the Beastie Boys’ ‘Sure Shot’ while leaning heavily on McLuhan’s Understanding Media as the loose foundation for this group show.
The general objective is a consideration of the ways in which artists employ communications media, highlighting ‘some of the more absurd or neurotic aspects of human interaction’ along the way. First up is a Steam Powered Internet Computer by Jeremy Deller and Alan Kane, a curious machine fusing antiquated technology harking back to the Industrial Revolution with the internet-saturated IT of today.
Techno art pioneers Jenny l-lolzer and On Kawara invoke a less distant technological past. As precursors to the contemporary work, On Kawara’s telegrams and l-lolzer’s ubiquitous LED ‘truisms’ are interesting as both historical relics and art works. They underline that even cutting-edge
PHOTOGRAPHY 8. FILM
GORDON MATTA-CLARK: THE SPACE BETWEEN
CCA, Glasgow, until Sun 23 Mar moo
The breadth and depth of this show is little short of stunning and. like the late Gordon Malta-Clark's work. unfolds in a never-ending series of questions about architecture. construction. deconstruction. performance. space and the microcosmic politics of urban living.
This is because Matte-Clark was one slippery customer. His works are easily described — most revolve around cuts made into the fabric of condemned buildings — but they are indefinable. open-ended interventions. When Malta-Clark sliced a building right down the middle. the making of the cuts was a performance of sorts. and this theatricality continues as visitors negotiate the newly unstable space.
But Malta-Clark documented his actions too. and these unconventional (not to mention beautiful) photographic prints. sketches and texts do much more than simply record works that. by their very nature. are transitory. Attempts to define the nature of these layers of practice — whether action or dOCument — is equally tricky.
Try to pin down Malta-Clark as. say. a sculptor. and you must deal with the fact that he literally deconstructed buildings. removing to create. un-making. Which doesn't s0und much like sculpture. Even his stated aims don't get. as with each explicitly political attempt to condemn the demolition of existing built landscapes to make way for the new. Matta-Clark himself demolished. replacing existing forms with the new. This retrospective is one more Matta- Clark cut into the urban landscape: after a visit. you will never look at a building in the same way again. (Jack Mottram)
Walls
86 THE LIST 13—27 Feb 2003
Phillipe Parreno’s Speech Bubbles
technology can quickly appear dated. Nevertheless, l-lolzer’s and Kawara’s contributions undoubtedly hold their own here, and while the medium may be retro, the message remains fresh.
Chris Evans’ Radical Loyalty centres on the construction of a sculpture park in a small industrial town in Estonia. Evans has taken on the mantle of consultant to the directors of several large
corporations. Their task is to express what radical loyalty means to them and it’s Evans’ job to help them represent their ideas visually. The exhibition presents the first three proposals alongside Evans’ beautiful entrance sign and his ‘artist’s impression' of the completed park.
Evans’ work-in-progress scratches at a myriad of ideas: regeneration policy (often featuring sculpture parks), political sculpture (in the context of post-Soviet Baltic states), ethical capitalism, authorship/ownership of artwork, internationalism . . . the list goes on and it’s hard not to be impressed by the scope of the project both practically and conceptually.
In contrast, Phillipe Parreno’s Speech Bubbles are, literally, lightweight. A mass of helium-filled balloons at the entrance to the gallery, these blank speech bubbles seem to absorb and carry the conversation of gallery- goers below. They’re cute, but less
not be the most visually arresting show, but as a mish-mash of intriguing thought-provocation, it resonates far beyond the gallery. (Susannah Thompson)
Detail of Span Dancing
SCULPTURE JIM LAMBIE: KEBABYLON
lnverleith House, Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh, until Sun 23 Mar 0”
Charity shops in Stockbridge must have been rubbing their hands with glee when Jim Lambie walked in. Buying up handbags of all shapes and sizes. from leopard skin designs to the gold variety. and raiding their standard collection of vinyl (ie pre- 1980s). the Glasgow artist has made an exhibition out of people’s cast-offs.
The best example of turning everyday objects into something new is Span Dancmg. Lambie has detached the straps from his handbags and fixed them onto the walls to create a sprawling mass of twisting colour. A Jackson Pollock in 30. It's a simple enOugh idea. but it works extremely well within the space. their forms echoing the leafless skeletal trees visible through the gallery's windows.
Upstairs is almost like being on a bad trip. Lambie's trademark psychedelic floors have been replaced with black
gaffer tape arranged in a herring-bone pattern. Mirrors are
placed on gaudy. paint-dribbled. stone-like forms while pop
stars from the last 30 years stare at yOu from their album sleeves. Lambie likes to create the works in the space in a matter of days. and this is all too apparent here.
On the whole. this is an interesting show and Lambie's ability to create something visually appealing from nothing is admirable. For sheer inventiveness and energy. Lambie reigns supreme. (Helen Monaghan)
than diverting. III Communication may
ARCHITECTURE RENEWING, REBUILDING REMEMBERING
The Lighthouse. until Fri 14 Mar O”.
As America reels from the prevailing prospect of conflict. Renewmg, Rebuilding, Re/iie/iibering opens at a poignant time. It is curated by the Van Alen Institute of New York With the aim of inspiring its citizens With constructive responses to natural and man-made disasters, The exhibition focuses on seven Cities and how their inhabitants have commemOrated and rebuilt them after incomparable loss. Featured are Beirut's public art installation to reclaim its war tOrn districts; Berlin's infOrmation pomt risnig above the ruins of the Wall: an earthquake in San FranCIsco offering an opportunity to redevelop the waterfront;
Rebuilding the roof of the National Library, Sarajevo, 1996
Kobe's innovative response to temporary housmg after a devastating earthquake (taking flat-pack to the extreme and putting lkea to shame): a terrorist attack in Manchester allowmg the City to rebuild its centre better than before; Oklahoma City's international deSign competition for a memorial and Sarajevo's restoration of public landmarks after years of civil war.
The exhibition is segregated into seven p0ints which enables a comparative VleW of the overall prOject. Each section displays the reconstructive process through images and information arranged against a makeshift scaffolding backdrop.
But most moving is the research area that charts the aftermath in New York, showing the graphic reality of an unforgettable day. The focus is not on devastation but reconstruction. and the prospect of hope in the face of extreme adversity. The thought now is whether New York will be the only city that needs it. (Sorcha Dallas)