Interview: Marcus Harvey

26/03/15
Interview with Marcus Harvey

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of State magazine

Editorial: News of the Art World

25/03/16
Editorial: News of the Art World

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of State magazine

Eurostate: Basel and Stefan von Bartha profile

25/03/16
Eurostate: Basel and Stefan von Bartha profile

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of State magazine

Visible - Four Artists to Watch

25/03/16
Visible - Four Artists to Watch

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of State magazine

#notacrime

25/03/16
#notacrime

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of State magazine

Watt's Gallery - Artists' Village

25/03/16
Watt's Gallery - Artists' Village 

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of State magazine

Don't Miss items

25/03/16

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of State magazine

Gallery Profile: Parafin

25/03/16
Gallery Profile: Parafin

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of State magazine

Aleksandra Karpowicz: Let's Talk About Sex

23/03/16
Aleksandra Karpowicz: Let's Talk About Sex

Published in issue 20 (March/April 2016) of F22 magazine

Feature: Paul Huxley

23/03/16
Feature: Paul Huxley

See the full feature with images in the March 2016 issue of Modern Painters

Portfolio: Sidsel Meineche Hansen

23/03/16
Portfolio: Sidsel Meineche Hansen

Sidsel Meineche Hansen: SECOND SEX WAR

Gasworks, London

17 March – 29 May 2016

“I would like to either abolish gender or multiply it beyond the binary, which would equate to the same thing,” says Danish-born, London-based artist Sidsel Meineche Hansen, whose current exhibition, SECOND SEX WAR, explores how this concept might be (re)produced in virtual adult entertainment.

Among other things, a new animated video, presented on Oculus Rift virtual reality headsets, considers the question of what post-human sex and sexuality might be like. Visitors take on the role of the avatar EVA v3.0 to experience this firsthand. Meineche Hansen is, in part, motivated by the feminist “sex wars” of the late 70s/early 80s, which politicised the concept and representation of female sexuality and led to a split of the feminist movement into anti-pornography and anti-censorship camps. Her own attitude towards pornography is unresolved, but her work debatably falls into the category of 3D porn. But is pornography art? “Sure, if you say it’s art, it’s art,” Meineche Hansen replies nonchalantly.

Alongside the video, Meineche Hansen is displaying a series of polymer clay sculptures and reliefs. Her practice is research-led and a series of seminars, planned for during SECOND SEX WAR, will look at the overlap between pornography and body horror. Although entrenched in academic discourse, they will be open to all. As for the exhibition, however, parental discretion is advised!

Published in the April print issue of DIVA magazine

Interview with Alison Watt

23/03/16

Between Your Eye and Your Mind

Interview with Alison Watt

in the catalogue to accompany 

Alison Watt: The Sun Never Knew How Wonderful It Was

Parafin

17 March - 7 May 2016

Extract:

As someone depicting fabric with paint, how important is the materiality of the paint itself to you? Do you work with layers? Do you feel there is any analogy between the paint and the drapery itself? In their trompe l’oeil nature, are your paintings seeking not just to represent but to recreate or become?

I have an obsession with surface in my own work. I’m really interested in how we read the surface of a painting and in how paint is employed. Rubens created very different effects on the surface of his canvas. If you look at the edge of the cloth that’s wrapped around Cupid’s shoulders, for example, where it merges with and dissolves into the darkness, it almost vibrates. There’s a kind of fizz, a kind of thrum on the surface of the canvas. But that is in contrast with other areas of the painting, which are rounded and bathed in light. The contrast of these two elements creates an incredible pictorial drama. A tension and dynamism in relation to the weight and form. That contrast had an effect on the way I used light and dark in my own paintings. At the same time, however, there are passages of paint where the shifts in tone are incredibly subtle. I wanted to make paintings that have an almost marmoreal quality but, at the same time, possess a softness.

Buy the book here

Interview with Mark Wallinger

18/03/16
Interview: Mark Wallinger

Mark Wallinger: ID
Hauser & Wirth
26 February - 7 May 2016

The walls of Hauser & Wirth’s North Gallery are hung with huge canvases, dominated by looming black shapes, smeared on, with vast hand gestures, mirroring themselves and each other, demanding interpretation in the same way as a Rorschach test. The paintings – Vitruvian in measure, at twice a man’s height tall and an arm-span wide – are from a series of id Paintings by the Turner Prize-winning artist, Mark Wallinger (b1959). They form part of his new exhibition, ID, his debut solo show at the gallery, focusing on Freud’s interrogation of the psyche, the self and the subject. Easy to miss, beside these towering inky smears, is a much smaller work, Ego (2016), comprising two iPhone photographs of Wallinger’s hands, posing as a playful recreation of Michelangelo’s The Creation of Adam.

Next door, in the South Gallery, Wallinger has installed a life-size, mirrored, revolving replica of the New Scotland Yard sign, here signifying the superego, with its all-seeing, controlling eye – a nod to some of his more political works of the past. The back rooms house the smaller video pieces: Orrery (2016), Shadow Walker (2011) and Ever Since (2012), each one taking the viewer on a journey, much as they did Wallinger during the creative process.

After giving a guided tour of the exhibition, Wallinger spoke to Studio International about his own journey and the – sometimes subconscious – messages and significations implied.

Read this interview here

Review of Through a Queer Lens: Portraits of LGBTQ Jews at the Jewish Museum London

Through a Queer Lens: Portraits of LGBTQ Jews

Jewish Museum London

11 February – 17 April 2016

LGBT History Month might be over, but there's still time to visit the Jewish Museum in Camden to see a vibrant celebration of LGBTQ Jewish life in the UK.

Through a Queer Lens is a photographic project co-ordinated by trans activist Surat-Shaan Knan and shot by black queer artist Ajamu on his camera, which he affectionately calls Bessie, after the bisexual African-American jazz and blues singer, Bessie Smith. Hanging in the entrance hall, on bright red walls, the 20 striking large format black and white portraits greet everyone, for free, as they queue to buy their tickets.

The individuals featured all identify, in one way or another, as Jewish and LGBTQ. There are activists, artists, rabbis and journalists. Lisa Gornick is there, the writer and director of three feature films, including ‘Do I Love You?’, ‘Tick Tock Lullaby’ and the forthcoming ‘The Book of Gabrielle’; Benjamin Cohen, chief executive of PinkNews and co-founder of the cross-party Out4Marriage campaign group is too; so is Rabbi Elli Tikvah Sarah, a longstanding campaigner for equal marriage.

Alongside each portrait is a brief statement about who the person is and, in some instances, how they identify and what being LGBTQ and Jewish means to them. Performer Rachel Mars, for example, describes having Judaism “written on her face” without her consent: “I have Jewish face #4 – you might know it. Your cousin/sister/aunt/old school friend is probably rocking it right now too”. She chooses to celebrate her grandmother for her acceptance and support – in her 90s – when she would even help Rachel with partner decisions. “[She] was about fairness, joy, kindness and a bit of muscle when necessary.” Sharing this and so many other anecdotes will hopefully make visitors question their own reactions and responses to family members and friends, when their sexuality perhaps doesn’t fall within the accepted mainstream.

As an accompaniment to the main exhibition, an iPad contains many further photographs (not by Ajamu) and stories from LGBTQ individuals of all different faiths. “If we all had the opportunity to live how we want to live, be who we want to be, have the freedom to express ourselves and follow religion or faith as we are meant to without delving into the negative aspects,” writes Khakan Qureshi, “what would we do? We would LOVE.” It sounds simple – and, really, it is. This exhibition includes just a small cross-section of LGBTQ Jews, but, even so, it is apparent how each individual is just that: an individual. No two subjects identify in the same way. But by accepting this, and loving one another anyway, we can celebrate this diversity and be proud of it. As the voices on these walls cry out: “We're here, we’re queer – and we’re visible!”

 www.jewishmuseum.org.uk

Image:

Lisa Gornick by Ajamu

Also publish at DIVA online