When in London, I visited one of my favourite gallery spaces, who always exhibition non-conventional and exciting contemporary artists. This exhibit was particularly interesting, combining performance art with sculpture and painting.
It was really useful to get a feel of how a gallery space could be utilised interactively to gage a viewers response, something that my practice has to include itself. I have highlighted the parts of her description I find to be particularly interesting and conceptual.
DONNA HUANCA: SCAR CYMBALS
About
Daily performances from painted models activating a series of new site-responsive architectural and sculptural installations in the 19th century former Methodist chapel.
Huanca’s work draws attention to the body and in particular the skin, which is simultaneously the surface on which our personhood is inscribed and the surface through which we experience the world around us. Huanca examines conventions of behaviour in our interaction with bodies in space and the invisible histories that are accumulated through those gestures. By exposing the naked body and concealing it under layers of paint, cosmetics and latex, Huanca’s performers confront our instinctive reactions to flesh, which becomes both a familiar, decorative object and an abstract, inaccessible subject.
Like penetrating through layers of skin, Huanca invites viewers to become increasingly immersed in the exhibition as it progresses from highly structured architectural tableaux vivants to interactive works. Sculptural installations draw upon the shapes and patterns of natural minerals and rock formations, recalling the sources of the pigments that cover the performers. Embedded within these sculptures and as a standalone totem-like sculpture will be a series of sound works that variously respond to the control of the models and the movement and proximity of visitors’ bodies. This installation builds upon Huanca’s earlier sound art projects made under the name Rua Minx and will feature new recordings of often overlooked, misrepresented or invisible groups. Glass is a recurrent material throughout as the artist examines ideas of surface and body and the ways in which an outer casing becomes the meaning and identity of the whole.
This was a another exhibition by US artist Donna Huance, who makes interesting video art which combines all senses to create an immersive experience. Her combination of sounds and physical scultpure to enhance the experience really contributes to the dramatic quailities felt on the viewer. Her combination of image and type is something that really interests me and emphasises certain parts of the noises and voices which were being pplayed on the video itself. Getting a message across in this way is an interesting approach and has strong graphic design qualities despite being in a formal fine art space.
