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New Monuments Forget the Future

Featuring works by: Luis Jacob, Eva Kolcze, Howard Lonn, James Nizam, Richard Storms and Renée Van Halm

Curated by Rebecca Travis

“Instead of causing us to remember the past like the old monuments, the new monuments seem to cause us to forget the future…” -Robert Smithson (Entropy and the New Monuments, 1966)

In the wake of rapid urban developments populated by functional structures seemingly designed neither to offend nor impress, architecture – at one time synonymous with permanence – appears to be becoming increasingly shortsighted and transient, a response to the present as opposed to a statement for the future.

Drawing on this sense of impermanence, New Monuments Forget the Future brings together artworks that reference architecture in varying degrees of flux. Rather than having solid foundation, the structures throughout the exhibition are caught in transitional states between the built and deconstructed, actual and imaginary, the abstract and representational.A process of reduction and rebuilding is evident in Luis Jacob’s minimal sculptures The BILTS (1997), which distil the dominant skyscrapers of downtown Toronto to geometric shapes lifted from their foundation footprints. Countering our usual perception of these high-rises, Jacob’s architectural models stretch horizontally and are rendered not in reflective, seductive glass, but in lacquered milled maple.

Richard Storms’ paintings based upon glassy condo exteriors and curtain walls also slip between abstraction and representation, while Renée Van Halm’s compressed facades negate a sense of overall scale and context, proving unclear as to whether the overlapping beams and planes represent an intentional ‘inside-out’ architectural style, or supportive scaffolding, thanks to their claustrophobic, cropped compositions.

A progressive journey toward painterly deconstruction can be seen in the works of Howard Lonn. Borromini’s Window (2012)contains tangible architectural elements that, interrupted by brushwork and dislocated from a structure as a whole, appear as fragmented ruins. Lonn’s new work Untitled (2015) takes this dislocation further. The ‘structure’ is provided more by the physical presence and application of the paint itself than any particular subject. Sweeping, girder-like elements transect the canvas but remain ambiguous, suggesting aerial views, shadows and surfaces without fully disclosing a specific form.

James Nizam’s early photographic series Dwellings (2006) captures buildings on the brink of demolition that are temporarily re-energized through his experimental lens. The opposite is true of the Brutalist university buildings in Eva Kolcze’s film All That Is Solid (2014), which begin as steadfast structures but soon bleed into painterly abstraction thanks to her chemical interference with the negative film  - a process that draws parallels between the material degradation of both celluloid and cement. 

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Minerals: new series following on from recent work with Icelandic mineral pools. Mixed media drawings of minerals onto delicate sample paper. 

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Minerals: new series following on from recent work with Icelandic mineral pools. Mixed media drawings of minerals onto delicate sample paper. 

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Minerals: new series following on from recent work with Icelandic mineral pools. Mixed media drawings of minerals onto delicate sample paper. 

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Minerals: new series following on from recent work with Icelandic mineral pools. Mixed media drawings of minerals onto delicate sample paper. 

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Unchartered Waters 2012 - melted ice drawings, ink, salt on sample paper

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Developing new projection work hinterland using photographs taken on the 'Blesi' mineral pools in Iceland.

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Looking at the Blue Lagoon on Google Maps... 

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I'll be showing work, including a new projection piece, in the exhibition another landscape at The Shed in Haltwhistle. 

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Experiments with photos and layering in a 'venn diagram' style - trying to get an essence of place through architecture and natural environment.

Top to Bottom: Iceland, Istanbul, Paris (Versailles), Vilnius

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The Heavens - Constellation Map of 88 pin prick drawings, installation at Studio Moro, Soncino, Italy.

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JAMBON Art Sale - 23rd - 26th Jan, 12-6 NewBridge Project, Newcastle > GO BUY ART.

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I'll be exhibiting at Ouseburn Open Studios this coming weekend with Katy Cole at Cobalt Studios (just down the road from Ernest). Find more info at the link above or at the Facebook Page HERE.

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Stargazing // Stefanik Observatory, Prague

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Tomorrowland install shots, VII Biennale Soncino a Marco - with Katy Cole.

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Katy Cole, Galaxias (2013) (Tomorrowland Installation: VII Biennale Soncino a Marco)