INATALLATION. FILM AND WORKS ON PAPER
PLANTING THE TELE Mary Mary, Glasgow, from Sat 25
Nov-Sat 13 January 2007
Glasgow has seen very little of Hayley Tompkins of late. but she has returned in a Curatonal capacity in Planting the Te/e at Mary Mary Gallery. bringing together new work by seven artists: Anne-Marie Copestake and Karla Black. both from the UK. Ernst Cararnelle from Austria. Joachim Koester (pictured) from Denmark. Helen Mirra from the US. and Bojan Sarcevic from France. Some of the names will be very familiar. while others. exhibiting for the first time in Glasgow. will soon become so. The exhibition will also present reprinted documents. editions and films by a further four international artists. with a reading area for the visitor to peruse some of their texts. Rivette's film Ce/ine and Julie Go Boating (1974) will also be playing. intentionally recreating the familiar multi—media atmosphere that we are bombarded with in our ‘everyday’ life.
This c0uld be a very difficult exhibition to pull together. With too many ideas. aesthetics. voices. and media vying for the viewer's attention. But. like most of the exhibitions that gallerist Hannah Robinson has tackled in this space. we should expect to see work of the highest duality. with Tornpkins' selective and keen artistic eye drawing all of these disparate elements together with ease. Tompkins hopes that the mass of information will mirror our domestic setting. where one frequently reads with the telly on in the background. pictures on the wall and other visual stimuli attempting to solicit eur attention. In order to further this homer feeling. she wrll fill the gallery with pot plants.
But this is not a ‘no-brainer' installation relying on a few puns and props. The exhibition's main thematic is the exploration of the philosophy of memory. ‘the recall. or revisit'. as the curator puts it. the idea that the distant and the near are pulled together by the reflecting subject (the reflecting; subject in this situation being Tompkins herself as curator. who threads her own personal narrative. reverie and memories through the collected works). Whether the Viewer. who temporarily stands in this exulted position. will manage to tap into these resonances. remains to be seen. (Alexander Kennedy)
SCULPTURE INSTALLATION CHRISTINE BORLAND
The Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, Sat 2 Dec—Sun 28 Jan 2007
A mid-career retrospective of Christine Borland’s work has been awaited on home turf for sometime - mainland Europe having seen retrospectives in the late 905. So, a review, in the capital, arrives with great anticipation - most notably for her newly commissioned work. Although Borland’s practice has varied in focus over the years, common themes of the human condition and its relationship to science and medicine have remained constants. The development of these themes and their relationship to this new work provide an appropriate punctuation in a career, which, to date, has arguably been one of the most successful of her generation.
The stimulus for one of these new works is the tree that Hippocrates, the father of medicine is said to have taught under, or rather the structure that has been built to support its fragile limbs. The structure will be reconstructed within the gallery, a man-made skeleton built to support the symbol of life that the tree has come to represent. Cuttings and seeds from the tree
SCUI PTURAL INSTAl LATION
OFF THE WALL - GROUP SHOW Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Sat 9 Dec 2006-Mon 28 May 2007
The guiding curatorial principle of this show is to demonstrate how contemporary artists have removed their art from the gallery walls and plinths and relocated it on the floor or ceiling or. indeed. in other more ‘democratic' situations. wrth artists on show including Jim Lambie. Nathan Coley. Mona Hatoum and Davrd Mach.
Martin Creed (who won the Turner prize in 2001) believes that art audiences shOuId experience a fuller physical ll]\.’()l\.’(3lll(}ltt with his work. His 'Work No. 370: Balls consists (as its ambiguous title suggests) of numerous balls of varying Sl/OS and colours which are allowed to move freely on the gallery floor while Viewers walk in and around the artwork. It's the welcome opposite of the ‘Don't Touch' mentality. which denies full sensory particrpation in many works of art.
Christine Borland (also showrng at The Fruitmarket Gallery) WI” also be exhibited. givrng the Viewer a welcome chance to see her ‘Spirit Collection: Hippocrates. 1999'. Borland has suspended 100 glass vessels from the ceiling. each of which contain a bleached and preserved leaf from a specific tree. The tree in question is to be found at Yorkhill Hospital in Glasgow and is allegedly grown from seeds of the original plane tree in Greece under which Hippocrates taught in the fifth century BC.
Although most of this work has been shown before (some of it at the same time) this should make a thought provoking and Visually exciting ensemble. (Giles Sutherland)
Preserve
have spawned many derivatives, including one at the University of Glasgow’s Department of Medical Genetics (noted by Borland on a previous project). Another new work concerning the tree Newton discovered gravity under, will also be exhibited, demonstrating a clear shift in Borland’s focus from practice to practitioner.
In earlier works, Borland’s concerns have too referenced science and medicine, reassessing it, she acts as archivist to the ethics of science and medical procedure. Her seminal work, ‘Second Class Male/Second Class Female’, 1996, two forensic facial reconstructions from skulls bought mail order, will also be included in the exhibition. This work exemplifies Borland’s interest in the notion of self and the de- personalisation of the medically archived subject, which, along with other earlier works, acts as artefact to the morals and ethics of his stimuli. These issues are no stranger to Hippocrates, who, in the 3005 BC, had a heightened set of moral and religious codes to manage. This collection will act as archive to a significant and tightly woven body of work, which charts the frailty of the human condition.
(Steven Cairns)
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