Night Cleaning at Elevator Gallery
Posted by Tom Estes on Thursday, June 7, 2012 Under: Night Cleaning
Night Cleaning at 'Vanishing Point' at Elevator Gallery
from Friday the 29th of October until the 14th of November 2010.
For most artists, presence of an identifiable artwork be it object or sound, is of utmost importance, but for Vanishing Point the curators have invited artists to make work that is either hidden, discreet, or at the cusp of vanishing. The white walled space of the gallery appears at first glance to be just itself; an empty white space, but it houses the work of 50 contemporary artists. This is not intended to be a mere exercise in minimalism, but an intentional reverse of the exhibition or gallery space as a “show” for art, consumable, ‘authorised’ objects. For a few of the artists, sensibility, the ephemeral, the quiet, is within the language that they usually work but for many they have had to rethink their ideas within a tight, compromising and challenging expression of their usual practice. Authorship of creative ideas is most certainly still present but it is hushed.
Traditionally the gallery has always been the space in which artists seek to display their creative endeavours. For this exhibition the tables have been turned and the desire to present has been muted to a whimper, a sound, a smell, a taste, an extension of what already exists. Working within these strict guidelines we have tried to coax the essence of the creative practice out of the artists on show. An exercise in showing, without showing off. Normally the white muted space, a perfect backdrop for art work, transcends from this; the space being at the forefront, the art not fighting for attention, the art becoming part of the space without compromising the space itself.
WIN PRIZES
As part of Vanishing Point Elevator Gallery will be running two competitions, one at the Private View and one throughout the exhibition. We invite gallery visitors to attempt to find as many works as possible. A prize ceremony will happen for the 3 most successful “art seekers” at the PV. All artists , art, and their location will be revealed on the last day of the exhibition. A prize will be awarded to whoever came the closest at accurately finding all the work during the exhibition.
Vanishing Point
Curated by Snoozie Hexagon and Simon Reuben White
Private View: Last Thursday, 28th of October, 2010.
The clandestine performance 'Night Cleaning' was first staged by Tom Estes on tuesday, the 21st of September, 2010 as part of 'Crit Group' at Elevator Gallery. Facilitated by Natalie Sanders, 'Crit Group' is an informal gathering at Elevator Gallery with the aim of providing a supportive arena for artists to show work, test ideas and get some critical feedback. Housed in a former chocolate factory, Elevator Gallery is run by Snoozie Hexagon and Simon Reuben White.
The Elevator Gallery is a contemporary art space in Hackney Wick, an industrial area, adjacent to the main site of the 9 billion pound Olympic Project for London 2012.
It is to be hoped that Hackney Wick’s proximity to the Olympic Park will stimulate much-needed jobs and environmental improvements in this vicinity. A third of homes in Hackney Wick are rented from a social landlord and another quarter from the council. Five per cent of households have neither central heating nor sole use of a bath or toilet – the highest proportion in London.
The expected cost of the 2012 London Olympics has tripled to more than £9bn and a raid on National Lottery money has now become necessary. Peter Hewitt, chief executive of Arts Council England, said it would affect smaller arts organisations, local projects and individual artists. The raid on funding in order to deliver the Olympics will see millions diverted in the coming years away from beneficiaries of the Big Lottery Fund, the arts, heritage, and grassroots sport - causes which the architects of the 2012 project claimed would be boosted by a London Olympics. David Barrie, director of the Art Fund charity said the raid "makes the Prime Minister's celebration of a 'golden age' for the arts ring very hollow".
The clandestine performance 'Night Cleaning' was staged by Tom Estes on tuesday, the 21st of September, 2010 as part of 'Crit Group' at Elevator Gallery. Facilitated by Natalie Sanders, 'Crit Group' is an informal gathering at Elevator Gallery with the aim of providing a supportive arena for artists to show work, test ideas and get some critical feedback. Housed in a former chocolate factory, Elevator Gallery is run by Snoozie Hexagon and Simon Reuben White.
clan·des·tine /klænˈdɛstɪn/ [klan-des-tin] –adjective
characterized by, done in, or executed with secrecy or concealment, esp. for purposes of subversion or deception; private or surreptitious.
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http://www.london2012.com/
In : Night Cleaning
Tags: vanishing point elevator gallery snoozie hexagon simon reuben white
As an artist I have always leaned toward making Live Art performance work that is participatory or immersive in some way. In my Live Art performance I stage an 'action' and then ask members of the audience to take pictures on a communal camera. In this way, the audience becomes part of the performance, and the pictures are then posted on on-line social networking sites and web sites for another, wider on-line audience.
For me, fantasy and illusion are not contradictions of reality, but instead an integral part of our everyday lives. There is a real Peter Pan Syndrome at play in my work and I suppose I would consider myself to be a carnival sideshow conceptualist, combining a bare-bones formal conceptualism with an eternally adolescent, prank DIY comic-approach.
At the core of this work is an attention to the flickering, fading definition of our lives as dictated by the computer monitor and the rapid reply of instant messaging. I strive, not to break down these introverted, often self-imposed boundaries, but to look at how dataflow from the virtual realm impacts on the significance and symbolism of real-world human senses. But in doing so, I have begun to generate unexpected questions about how art might be able to inscribe itself on the surface of reality- not to represent itself on the surface of reality –not to represent reality, nor to duplicate it, but to replace it.
