UNDONE
Exploring a new mood in contemporary sculpture
29th September 2010 - 2nd January 2011
Contemporary artists engaging with the materiality and process of making sculpture.
Undone is concerned with sculpture that lies somewhere on the threshold between the made and unmade. This fascinating exhibition brings together a large body of recent work by international contemporary artists and in doing so identifies a shared aesthetic that characterises the work of this otherwise disparate group of artists. These ‘homespun’ sculptures, made from readily-available materials by artists from Europe, the US and Brazil seem to reflect a new age of austerity.
Focusing on objects and structures which are ‘handmade’, using traditional and more ad-hoc craft techniques, the works featured are often created using a simple, repetitive action, from crochet, plaiting, weaving and winding to stringing, shredding, binding and crumpling. Drawing on a wide range of materials, colours, scales and textures, the structures are as much bound together as they are poised to disintegrate. The selection includes work by Tonico Lemos Auad, Claire Barclay, Alexandra Bircken, Nayland Blake, Ruth Claxton, Krysten Cunningham, Michael Dean, Angus Fairhurst, Leo Fitzmaurice, Tom Friedman, Franziska Furter, Neil Gall, Jim Lambie, Tim Machin, Sally Osborn, Simon Periton, Mary Redmond, Eva Rothschild and Armando Andrade Tudela.
Whilst contemporary sculptors such as Damien Hirst and Mark Quinn experimented with the use of diamonds and gold at the height of economic boom, the ‘make do and mend’ approach illustrated by Undone seems more appropriate to newly constrained times.
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