Review of Eva Stenram: Positions at the Siobhan Davies School of Dance

22/02/15

Eva Stenram: Positions

Siobhan Davies School of Dance

16 January – 22 March 2015

Just as languages are made up of signs, carefully arranged according to rules of syntax, so dances are made up of positions, choreographed to present a certain imagery. In her various series of photographic works, currently on show at the Siobhan Davies School of Dance in Southwark, Eva Stenram collates these different postures – actually digitally isolated from 1950s and 60s pin-ups, not dance-related at all – into a dictionary of gesture and posture, full of possibility of meaning.

All around the building – in reception, in the meeting room, in the stairwell, in the toilet – she has hung works from her on-going series, Parts (2013-14). Stockinged limbs, some with fishnets, most with stilettos, on leather sofas and carpets with thick pile, the feet arch as a moment of intimacy or rapture is interrupted. Carelessly discarded, these legs appear sinister – the images could perhaps be crime scene shots. This uncanny element resonates still more with the chosen real world surroundings when, upstairs, outside the practice rooms, a row of empty shoes stand in line, beneath a photograph of a castaway limb.

To read the rest of this review, please go to: http://www.photomonitor.co.uk/2015/02/positions-2/