Press Release
| Terminalia | |
| Curated by Reece Jones | |
| Matthew Cowan, Reece Jones, CJ Mahony | |
| PRIVATE VIEW | Thursday September 4 th 6:30-8:30pm |
| EXHIBITION DATES | Friday September 5 th – Saturday October 4 th 2014 |
| GALLERY HOURS | Wednesday-Saturday 11am-6pm or by appointment |
| Artists exist within and alongside pre-determined, pre-existent boundaries, co-ordinates and pathways long since established. They are variously aware of the proximity of these territories, their histories, their previous inhabitants, their provocative neighbours and dearest defenders. Making more art re-asserts these invisible lines, naturally challenges them or deliberately disregards them - enabling the layout of entirely new spaces in which to dwell. Before modern systems of mapping, tradition insisted that members of tribes, townships or cities would physically trace the borders of their parish, being made aware of its variables, correcting its anomalies and assuring a new generation would carry the knowledge on. This knowledge was often forcefully imprinted on the psyche of young villagers by beating upon them at key junctions or even bouncing them forcefully on marker stones or fence posts. The tradition became known as ‘Beating the Bounds’ and is still practiced on occasion to this day. The artists in Terminalia all seek to draw attention to or deliberately subvert particular marker points. Either exploring latent lore and tradition, marking new terrain by counteracting existent architectures or allowing unstable signs and signifiers to create navigational anomalies and mis-steps. ~ Reece Jones | |
| EDITOR’S NOTES | |
| Matthew Cowan is a New Zealand artist working in the realm of traditional European customs and folklore. His works are photographs, videos, installations and performances that play with the inherent strangeness of the continued popularity of long established folk customs in a modern world. Many of his works can be viewed as staged folk performances in themselves, acting on the elements of rituals which link people to the past. In investigating the celebration and intent of such traditions, a primary theme is the presence of humour and subversion of the accepted social order. Cowan has recently exhibited in, London, Sapporo, New York and Auckland. A newly commissioned 16mm performance film, The Terminalia of Funny-land is showing at Te Tuhi Centre for the Arts in Auckland, New Zealand from August 2014. Recent solo exhibitions include Agency Gallery in London and NURTURE Art, New York. For 2009, Matthew Cowan was the artist in residence at Cecil Sharp House, the headquarters of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. | |
| Reece Jones predominantly makes invented images on paper using particular processes to enforce or define pictures whose initial subject territories may be whimsical, improbable, impossible or theoretically muddled. Cross references, samples and complete fabrications are often layered and juxtaposed until an image is made manifest whose origins are potentially difficult to define. In his recent work Jones uses ‘evidence’ of mythological or supernatural beasts as a point of reference, working with and evolving these core signifiers until they become apparently more authoritative. Ultimately the viewer is invited to assess the legacy of surface, process, documentary, translation, actuality and illusion. An ongoing game of Chinese Whispers wherein a mischievous player throws occasional curve balls. Jones graduated from the Royal Academy Schools in 2002 and was one of the founding members of Rockwell project space in Hackney. His work has shown internationally. Solo shows include All Visual Arts, Andrew Mummery Gallery and Triumph Gallery Moscow. Group shows include: Lion & Lamb, London; Newlyn Gallery; Stephane Simoens, Belgium; Voorkamer, Belgium; Torrance Art Museum, LA; Drawing Room. London; Fruesorge, Berlin; Tokyo Wonder site and Transition, London. | |
| CJ Mahony’s practice explores stability, impermanence, and space via the distinction between sculptural object and immersive environment. Using structures that allude to corridors, paper folds, geometry, fragments, support structures, the subterranean and backstage spaces, her work ranges from large scale, site responsive constructions to fragile, speculative models. Her work sets up complex contrasts between the dimensions of architecture, the scale of the human body, and the idea of the object, often manipulating light and darkness to create a heightened state of awareness and uncertainty, requiring the audience to negotiate physically and emotionally in order to traverse the work. Mahony graduated from Camberwell’s MA Fine Art course in 2012. She has featured in the Art Angel Open 100 and The Catlin Guide and was a finalist for the Royal Society of British Sculptors Sculpture Shock (Subterranean) commission. Over the past 8 years she has undertaken a large number of public commissions. Group shows include: Block 336, London; Aid & Abet, Cambridge; Matt Roberts, London; Momentarily Lost, Leeds; Aurora International, Norwich; Borrowed Site commissioned by Situ Projects Cornwall; The Fishmarket Gallery, Northampton; and Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge. Forthcoming projects include; The Hand That Takes, Cambridge Junction, and Machines to Crystallise Time, Smiths Row Gallery. | |
Text | Reece Jones | 2014
| Terminalia | |
| Curated by Reece Jones | |
| Matthew Cowan, Reece Jones, CJ Malony | |
| PRIVATE VIEW | Thursday September 4th 6:30-8:30pm |
| EXHIBITION DATES | Friday September 5th – Saturday October 4th 2014 |
| GALLERY HOURS | Wednesday-Saturday 11am-6pm or by appointment |
| They can be quite insistent, considering the potential for variables. They are frightened I suppose that interpretations might somehow deviate from theirs - that the truths they have established and curated are vulnerable to evolution or misinterpretation. Their landmarks and milestones are wreathed in floral offerings, the fences and riverbanks are daubed with soil encrusted paint. I may have failed to honor a particular boundary marker sufficiently and now the larger of the congregation have me hoisted above it, inverted, blood rushing to my face as it is squashed into the mossy flint. Local flint. | |
| On the other side of the ditch another boy. My age I suppose. He prods at a dormant mole hill with his ceremonial staff. He jingles. They have bells on that side of the ditch. No such humiliation here. My smock is silent but for the wet slap of the muddy hem on my ever reddening face. He looks up at me and I squint at him. He nods in solemn recognition as I am dropped arse first to the ground. | |
| My attention is directed to a line of black painted bricks running up the side of the old house by the pond. We hitch up our skirts and climb through the pantry window. The clatter of pots and the smashing of vases a justifiable, ceremonial admonishment for the insult of maintaining a dwelling within and beyond the parish border. The boy continues to prod at the turf until the loud crack of a whip echoes out and he is startled back to his group. | |
| Reece Jones, 2014 | |