STILL/LIFE brings together a body of work that formed whilst working in Soho over the lockdown this year and takes influence from that time and location. The exhibition is accompanied by a text written in response to the work by Alice Bauer, an American writer and critic based in Berlin.
Rough crevices pulse with an existence, bleating in reality unheard. Coarse edges complete a fragmented vision. But within the unfinished awaits an energy yet to be pursued, pacing anxiously– impatience a force of destruction harnessed. An unbridled flow of optimism flows through the void – the listless façade is only superficially unreflective of a dream. Employing traditionally utilitarian materials, the use of concrete and cardboard reflect a space of unknowing possibility.
The interplay of ephemerality in cardboard and strength and semi-permanence in concrete questions perceptions of evanescence and highlights the power of transition and causal relationships. Details of one material take on a new life when crystalized within the details of another. The expansion of the work into a large-scale piece is an invitation to be encompassed into a world neither real nor false, but simply captured in a state of revision or flux.
A deep swirl of activity is captured within the strict concrete frame. The lines of action quake nearly imperceptibly, yet the hum of the vibrations seep into our consciousness. An underlying disquiet creeps up to the precipice as the folds of paper fossilize under a slate veneer. The vision encompasses a world complex and partial. The assemblage of the physical, mental, emotional and spiritual imprint upon the environment. Both blossoming and moribund, the dichotomy gives rise to a materiality and burgeoning existence beyond what meets the eye. The nothing contains everything; it is only a question of time, energy, and matter. The most unsuspecting catalyst gives rise to the Casimir effect.
An impressionable yet untamable presentation of symbiosis, the works offer life and energy in otherwise exanimate spaces – a reminder of the constant push and pull at work within all of life’s spheres despite discernibility.
The gaps fill with theories based upon callow perceptions, but in this cold, unyielding space, we identify the cracks and the fissures, which produce action. The vacuum whirs, aching for a spark. It is the empty space. It is what is ‘not yet’ which builds the foundation of change. It is more than the sum of its parts. The space between the cracks. Solidarity built out of the ephemerality. The reality of importance is not beholden to time or power – but through vision and energy.
Text by Alice Bauer