marigeoinbucatarie interior: YHBHS interview

Showing posts with label YHBHS interview. Show all posts

a conversation with LEADAPRON

I think at root they (my careers) are all attempts to express myself through a discipline and to understand something about what it means to be a sentient human being. - Jonathan Brown "You see, unfortunately I am an E X P L O R E R." - Lucio Fontana <a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7014/6724004413_36d4814165_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7014/6724004413_36d4814165_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 701px; height: 727px;" /></a> <div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7009/6724180977_f542eae41f_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7009/6724180977_f542eae41f_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 703px; height: 469px;" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"> (all photos by <a href="http://www.marcoannunziata.com/">Marco Annunziata </a>and David John) </div> <a href="http://www.leadapron.net/">LEADAPRON</a> is a capsule on Melrose Place that sells rare, signed, out-of-print art and photography books. Select titles, including books on Andree Putman, Pierre Chaveau, Basquiat, Ed Ruscha, Donald Judd, and Lucio Fontana line the shelves. Jonathan Brown, owner, is a collector, and it takes only a moment to realize that this is not your ordinary book store. It's a place that merges design, interiors, and art effortlessly. Plexiglass boxes containing postcards, books, organized in a manner that speaks of space, time, and history are scattered puroposely throughout the open and vaulted rooms. Skylights cast quiet shadows and dance upon the whiteness of the walls and floors. In one collection is rare Ed Ruscha books, while printed works on Lucio Fontana's punctured canvases dominate another tall bookshelf. I am not interested in the kind of space you are talking about mine is a different dimension. The hole is this dimension. I say dimension because I cannot think what other word to use. - Lucio Fontana <a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7008/6727611639_52d20cdbbc_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7008/6727611639_52d20cdbbc_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 704px; height: 820px;" /></a> What is <a href="http://leadapron.net/">LEADAPRON</a>, and how long has it been around? Jonathan: LEADAPRON began as Leadapron Productions 15 years ago. I was directing theatre in Manhattan. I came up with the name during my production of the Maids by Jean Genet. A Leadapron is what you wear when you get an xray. In short, its a protective shield. What was in this space before Leadapron? Did you have to do any renovations when you moved in? Rose Tarlow Melrose House. I built a few walls, a front reception booth and shelves to showcase books and artworks, painted it many times, and added track lighting, etc....I changed some small details like switches and the locks, etc, and added a few fixtures throughout. At the time it felt like quite a bit, but I essentially just tried to make the space a blank white canvas so it would disappear and the objects that I placed inside would pop. I still walk around making minor renovations all the time...just refining the space endlessly. <a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7021/6724001671_3ed8577753_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7021/6724001671_3ed8577753_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 700px; height: 901px;" /></a><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7015/6724180505_3959b002b5_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7015/6724180505_3959b002b5_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 701px; height: 467px;" /></a> I've seen some amazing shows, such as the recent James Lee Byars show in your gallery space. But, you also show collections of books, such as Donald Judd, Fontana. Are the works from your personal collection? Thank you for the compliment. The artists you mentioned are personal favorites. I show what I like. I spent 2 years assembling the Byars works. I suppose you could say that everything in the gallery is my personal collection, but it is for sale as well so I am just a temporary guardian. I keep a few works, but then sell them later only to replace them with something else. What sort of work did you did before LEADAPRON? In brief it went like this: Philosophy, architecture, draftsman, boxer, theatre director, writer, behavioral neuroscience, dealer. Ok, tell me more about all these prior careers. Is there something that links all of these occupations together you think? Very good question. I think at root they are all attempts to express myself through a discipline and to understand something about what it means to be a sentient human being. Some are more murky waters to navigate and others might have been too direct or too clear. Some are too mental, others too physical or abstract. A dealer has to embody and encompass all of these disciplines should he be effective. He or she needs to have a perspective, an aesthetic, a sense of design and space, a daring, be able to direct and stage events and most importantly have a sense of what his/her clients want or need and furthermore, they should be able, though charm or ingenuity or force of personality to convey to their clients their ability to both understand and provide. Where are you from? How long have you been in LA? I was born in Korea, and then we moved around from Boston to San Francisco to settle in New York. I spent a year living in France as a child, which was wonderful. I mainly grew up in Bronxville, NY, which is a suburb 30 minutes from Manhattan. An idyllic little town with lots of tudor homes and cobblestone streets. Nothing bad ever happened there outside of perhaps the town drunk or a few divorces. If I didn’t grow up there it wouldn’t be a bad place to raise my kids. At 18 I moved to NYC for 15 years. I’ve been in Los Angeles for the last 10 years. Why do you think you are interested in objects? what do they mean to you? what is the obsession? We learn about the world by manipulating objects as a child and I think this extends into adulthood. I enjoy the visual dialogue with objects. They probably give some sense of order or permanence to our lives and add to one’s narrative about their life. I practice letting them go, which is also a healthy disciple. Perhaps they punctuate space and make me aware that I exist, am existing and won’t exist someday....just like art, music and even friends. In your office, there is an amazing collection of objects and art on your desk. Can you tell me about any of these works? What sort of works do you collect? What were you doing in my office??? Just kidding. I've been collecting chairs. What sort of chairs have you been collecting? Gio Ponti, Donald Judd, Mario Botta, Gae Aulenti, etc... I just like placing them around the gallery and in my house. They make me happy. There is something about chairs that are more than sculptures (aside from their functionality). They seem half alive, which is just enough to make them endearing. Any upcoming artists you collect or are very interested in? Christopher Astley. He works in concrete. I am planning a show of 5 of his sculptures. He's a cross between John Chamberlain, Philip Guston, Chaim Soutine, Francis Bacon and Claes Oldenburg. What is the attraction to James Lee Byars' work? It's simplicity, freshness, evanescence, fragility, beauty, intelligence and ethereal-ness. Byars had a great sense of humor and play, he confronted his audience with boldness and courage and developed his own vocabulary while keeping it universal. He is totemic, mystical and truly mysterious. I do believe that Byars was one of the most important artist of the late 20th Century. <a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7145/6724000037_f09e34bf2e_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7145/6724000037_f09e34bf2e_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 704px; height: 804px;" /></a><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7170/6724003305_8d798abb10_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7170/6724003305_8d798abb10_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 700px; height: 829px;" /></a> Is it difficult to run a book store in the age of the internet? Not really. The internet helps with sales. Any favorite galleries/stores in Los Angeles? I like Earth Bar, Yves Saint Laurent, Prism & OH WOW. Mind and Body all covered. What can we expect from Leadapron in 2012? I would say more, but smaller shows. Instead of trying to be bigger and better I would like to get back to basics and create thoughtful, almost salon style shows...and of course we will continue to provide our selection of rare, unique, out of print, signed art, photography, fashion and design books. <a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7010/6724010655_feeb70b8f8_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7010/6724010655_feeb70b8f8_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 702px; height: 526px;" /></a> <a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7023/6724007319_fd07844344_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7023/6724007319_fd07844344_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 700px; height: 893px;" /></a> LEADAPRON 8445 Melrose Place, Los Angeles CA 90069 ----------------------

a conversation with LEADAPRON

I think at root they (my careers) are all attempts to express myself through a discipline and to understand something about what it means ...

11:53 PM

YHBHS interview with MARI ANDREWS

.... "I often make up words for titles, sometimes even in fake Latin. I love all those syllables and how they roll off the tongue. I like to misspell words so the title becomes understood phonetically. Other times I use verbs, or descriptive passages, or lines of poetry. Titles come about in many ways." - Mari Andrews <div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6013/5949618032_617299fdcf_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6013/5949618032_617299fdcf_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 687px; height: 1030px;" /></a> the studio of Mari Andrews.... <div style="text-align: left;"><a href="http://www.mariandrews.com/">Mari Andrews</a> has been working for over twenty years with materials that some might walk past, not even stopping to think twice about what they are actually seeing. The first time I discovered Mari's work, I connected to a sense of quiet purpose in her work, a sense of doodling with forms and abandoned materials, creating subtle arrangements in space. Her twisted thorns, lichens, and dangling rocks recall the art of ikebana, a quest for balance and beauty. But her formations of silicone coated wires make me think of mindless afternoons sketching, or the curves of the road that lead to Big Sur, also known as the Pacific Coast Highway. It's as if she has created maps with the objects she has discovered upon her own walks and trips, and drew them on the wall for us to use. If these works are maps to an unknown land, you'll see me on the other-side, looking for bubbling fountains and endless mountain views. Thank you Mari...... Mari Andrews' work is part of a summer group exhibition at <a href="http://www.jkgallery.net/innerindex.php?link=current" style="font-style: italic;">JK Gallery in Los Angles</a>. </div> </div><a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6131/5949039969_b9fbd0ee5d_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6131/5949039969_b9fbd0ee5d_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 711px; height: 609px;" /></a> <div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6139/5949623208_bb8af40f7f_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6139/5949623208_bb8af40f7f_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 708px; height: 707px;" /></a> 2 untitled works from 2000 </div> Can you talk about your choice of materials you work with for your sculptures? And how they came about? I work primarily with annealed steel wire which is black. It feels like a pencil line to me. (Almost everything I make I consider to be a continuation of my drawing practice.) Sometimes I add black silicone to the wire, and then it becomes a charcoal line. I combine various man-made and found materials with the wire, to make "hybrids". I have collected found objects for decades and it was very satisfying to bring these objects into the work - a synthesizing Eureka moment actually. Sometimes the collected material will spark an idea for a sculpture. Other times I have a fairly solid concept or drawn-up plans and look about my raw materials to select the right combination of things to carry out that idea. I have also sought out things to make or complete a piece. This is true of the lichen in "Lichen Square" in my upcoming JK Gallery show. I needed a batch of lichen and headed to the Northern California coastal range to collect it. Where do you collect the materials for your works? I collect all the time, although I have had to become more discerning for lack of space. I take walks in the city and pick up human detritus from the street. There is rusted metal wire and odd bits on construction and destruction sites, also along railroad tracks. I collect seeds, leaves, pods and branches while hiking, stones while walking river beds, other stuff washes up on coastal shores. I sometimes use kitchen compost like squash or melon seeds, and garden trimmings, too. Once in a great while people will bring me their findings. I take donations . If you were not a sculptor, you might be.....? A biologist, botanist, geologist, and maybe a sociologist. <a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6131/5949073431_9daa442172_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6131/5949073431_9daa442172_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 620px; height: 724px;" /></a> <div style="text-align: center; color: rgb(102, 102, 102);"> Accoil, 2009, wire and acorns </div> What does "Acocoil" mean? or "Alphanet"? How do your titles comes about, and what are they referencing? "Acocoil" is a hybrid of the words Acorn and Coil, I made it up. It is a very basic description of form and materials used in the sculpture. The sculpture "Alphanet" contains 26 manzanita leaves attached to the ends of a wire mesh. Each leaf has an alphabet pasta glued to the face of the leaf. Twenty-five different letters were used with one repeated, so not every letter of the alphabet is represented, one is missing. It couldn't be perfect in my mind, so I made a "purposeful error", like in a Navajo rug. So "Alphanet" is also, a hybrid of a couple of words. I often make up words for titles, sometimes even in fake Latin. I love all those syllables and how they roll off the tongue. I like to misspell words so the title becomes understood phonetically. Other times I use verbs, or descriptive passages, or lines of poetry. Titles come about in many ways. "For the most part these three-dimensional drawings are presented on the wall. They are made as singular pieces and often come together in larger wall installations. The individual works relate to and play off of each other like words forming sentences or sentences telling a story. " What are you communicating with your works, what is one of the many stories you are telling? The quote about "telling a story" is a really a metaphor for the way the sculptures interact with one another. They are like family members, related but different. They can stand alone or be read as a group of "related" elements. When they are presented together I feel that there is a richer, more complete vocabulary of form. I'd like viewers to walk away from my work with a deeper curiosity/observation of one's surroundings. This includes our urban environments as well as the natural ones. Perhaps if we slow down and take in what is around us we will be more inclined to appreciate and protect what we have left of our natural environment. So there is an underlying environmental message. You mentioned, the objects often times reflect our "human sensitivities and vulnerabilities." Will you talk about this? I believe that the delicacy and tenderness of some of the materials I use have similar qualities to human emotion, human condition. The objects can be physically fragile; they age, crack, break, fade. Some are sturdy but flexible like the willow. Some are thorny and defensive like cactus spikes. Some look thorny but are soft and pliable - as in silicone. The combination of materials sometimes yield humorous effects - - another very important human quality, I believe. The hundreds of "paperless drawings" I have made are representative of the diversity found in our society; the multitude of people, cultural backgrounds, points of view. Who or what captivates your attention? Bees, human psychology, long vistas, my garden, the western state deserts, high altitude streams, liberal politics, petroglyphs, abandoned mines, sense memory, obsolete tools, the oldest living things, spiders, poetry.... Among artists? Ann Hamilton, Anish Kapoor, Martin Puryear, Gego, Herman de Vries, Terry Winters, Eva Hesse, Kiki Smith..... Does your work ever frustrate you? Oh yeah! I'm not technically as proficient as I'd like to be to carry out some ideas. I also find that some ideas are difficult to translate into any materials. <div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6126/5982023906_9f48e85e27_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6126/5982023906_9f48e85e27_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 705px; height: 695px;" /></a> circuit 2006, wire and silicone </div> <a href="http://www.mariandrews.com/" style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">please take a look at Mari Andrews' site.</a> Mari Andrews July 16, 2011 — August 20, 2011 <a href="http://www.jkgallery.net/innerindex.php?link=current">JK Gallery, Los Angeles</a> 2632 S. La Cienega Blvd. Los Angeles, CA 90034 ----------------------

YHBHS interview with MARI ANDREWS

.... "I often make up words for titles, sometimes even in fake Latin. I love all those syllables and how they roll off the tongue. I ...

9:55 AM

YHBHS interview with James Clarkson

<a href="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5150/5873499349_6d6d69188b_z.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"> </a>" I think there are these chains of design history where an initial idea is made by one designer, and where he leaves it, another picks it up, and the process continues till you end up with this kind of inbred mutant object which has a very very rich in history. But its position, what you might call cultural value, is actually very low because its overly mass produced." "What I want to do is try and address that by looking at the past and understanding why the graphics on my phone and the furniture on the high street look like elements of modernist abstract painting or a piece of Bruno Mathsson Furniture and highlight that." <a href="http://james-clarkson.co.uk/"> </a> <a href="http://james-clarkson.co.uk/">-James Clarkson</a> <a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6046/5902017736_7cbd1dd2e8_b.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6046/5902017736_7cbd1dd2e8_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 651px; height: 883px;" /></a><a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6014/5901973482_f7dbcccbbd_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6014/5901973482_f7dbcccbbd_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 650px; height: 498px;" /></a><div style="text-align: center; color: rgb(102, 102, 102);"> top image:"Ordering of Colour and Form", Mixed Media, 2010 bottom image "A silver tear from a stone soul" 2010<a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6014/5901973482_f7dbcccbbd_b.jpg"> </a></div> <a href="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5239/5902006054_ff68bde50d_b.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"> </a> <a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6033/5901978428_08f6b5ca15_b.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"> </a> "James Clarkson’s practice addresses a HEDONISTIC IDEALSIM surrounding modernist art, design and interior living. He creates sculptures and paintings, which act as references or cultural signifiers, exploring historical contradictions between high art & design and low-end mass production. He is interested in the relationship between form, functionalism and meaning as modes of value and experience. His work looks to the past as a means of understanding the way we live now, whilst retaining an ambiguity for past, present and future" YHBHS: "Hedonistic Idealism" Do you idealize the past? There is a strong emergence of young artists and designers being energized by the works of furniture designers and sculptors that range from Sottsass, Brancussi, Superstudio, to name a tiny few. Will you talk about this in relation to your work? JC: I think when I used the term "hedonistic idealism," I was trying to talk about what you are describing as, ‘the strong emergence of young artists and designers.’ What I want to do is try and address that by looking at the past and understanding why the graphics on my phone and the furniture on the high street look like elements of modernist abstract painting or a piece of Bruno Mathsson Furniture and highlight that. I think there are these chains of design history where an initial idea is made by one designer and where he leaves it anther picks it up and the process continues till you end up with this kind of inbred mutant object which has very very rich in history, but its position, what you might call cultural value, is actually very low because its overly mass produced. A good example of this is the West Germany Pottery Group. I am really interested in those systems of value and how they can be broken down into objects. I try and use elements of these objects, formally, in my sculptures. A lot of the time these objects will have some form of visual manifesto that makes them distinguishable, whether that be a certain wavy line or some form of patternation. You are right though there is an incredibly large amount of artists practicing like this at the moment it can be quite overwhelming really. Some of my favourites though are Mathew Dearbyshire, Martin Boyce, Eva Berendes, George Henry Longley, Karin Ruggaber and Giles Round. I also worked as an artist assistant to Haroon Mirza, whose practice works slightly differently to the others above, but this was hugely key to the way I have developed as an artist. I started work form him more or less straight after university, the process became like a second education, which I was very grateful for. You mentioned that your father collected antiques. What sort of antiques did he collect? Any specific items, were there any as a kid that captivated your imagination? He still collects antiques now, so whenever I go home I find it an incredibly exciting time, things that I really like will have been moved on and in their place something new. It was much like this when I was a child. There would always be new things moving through the house, a lot of ceramics and sometimes furniture. My dad once had a Bruno Mathsson chair, which is something I remember quite vividly, as well as a really large collection of Franz Hagenauer Bronzes. Both have gone now and one of the only things that lives on from when I was younger is his collection of rare Poole Plane Ware. As a child I was really fixated by everything we had and how it was so different to a lot of other things I would see on a daily basis. Now I am really interested by the idea that the legacy of modernism is something we have to live with on a daily basis. My father collecting these things made that a really smooth transition and when I first started to make artwork my concerns were always with this in mind, one way or another. A lot of the things I saw around me just seemed so lodged in the modes of thinking behind modernism or were forming a very rigid language around it, I saw something really positive in that, but never really put much thought into it until now. How important is "tension" in your work? I guess tension is something that is physically present in a lot of sculpture historically. It’s not something that I put a lot of thought into when making work. I am more concerned with formal arrangements of line and the balance between objects, sometimes this might create a physical tension, but it could be totally incidental and I really like that kind of thing happening. I do think of tension in a more conceptual way though. The tension between sculpture and abstract painting is particularly important in the way I go about making my work. In particular the teachings of Josef Itten, at the Bauhaus school of art and design during the year of 1931. Itten made his students dismantle an object placed in front of them into a painting its basic formal Shapes and colours. The painting would then be used as an instruction for the creation of furniture or sculpture. Recently I have been using this process with a lot of the works I am making for an upcoming exhibition. Working like this allows the process of making to implement an environment where potentially there isn't much difference between the object and its surrounding material, or where that interaction is entirely alluded to through nuance, abstractions and conceptual activity. <div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6045/5905559330_4f18de79f5_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6045/5905559330_4f18de79f5_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 603px; height: 1044px;" /></a> images of Frey House II (top), Gio Ponti’s Residential Building Via Dezza (bottom) </div> YHBHS: What are you ideas of what a "home" or "interior space" should be? I read in an interview that you are fascinated with the <a href="http://www.google.com/search?q=frey+house+II&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&hl=en&tab=wi&biw=1268&bih=595">Frey House II</a>. Can you talk about your interest in that home? JC: What I find particularly interesting about the Frey House II is its harmony within the environment it sits. The way the clean, straight edges seamlessly balance the giant rock that intersects the window; it makes the whole thing quite sculptural. Especially when you transfer that into a photograph, it looks very strange, almost not real, I like that. So perhaps the Fr<span onmouseover="ButtonHoverOn(this);" onmouseout="ButtonHoverOff(this);" onmouseup="" onmousedown="CheckFormatting(event);FormatbarButton('richeditorframe', this, 8);ButtonMouseDown(this);" class=" down" style="display: block;" id="formatbar_CreateLink" title="Link"><img alt="Link" border="0" class="gl_link" src="http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif" />ey house is not really somewhere I would like to live, perhaps just visit a couple of times. My idea of what an ‘interior space’ should be in regards to the ‘home’ is probably something more like Gio Ponti’s Residential Building Via Dezza. I think its quite liveable space, its not huge, but realistic in regards to functioning properly for a human being. The only thing it misses is a garden, I think outdoor living space is as important as the interior. I really like<a href="http://mondo-blogo.blogspot.com/2010/10/who-knew-le-corbusier-was-surrealist.html"> Le Courbusier’s Surrealist Garden for the Charles de Beistegui Apartment</a> and all the outdoor spaces Caesar Manrique built. Again I think I like these space more because of their focus around sculpture, they are both really private spaces too, which I think adds to their charm. Perhaps this is really what interests me about the Frey House II also. The line is really blurred between interior and exterior space, in fact the two become totally combined. <div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5239/5902006054_ff68bde50d_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5239/5902006054_ff68bde50d_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 642px; height: 855px;" /></a> Mategot Composite 2011, collage </div> "Mategot Composite", 2011, and your other collages. Where did the ideas originate, and how are they different from your sculptures? I like to think of the works you are referring to as paintings, done in the same light as those of Itten’s students at the Bauhaus. The markings act as an abstraction of the ‘Masters’ work and form an instruction for a set of sculptural works. In my upcoming exhibition, at Supercollider, I have taken an image of a Calder work and used this process of abstraction to create of body of sculptural works that in their presentation reference this. Its kind of an attempt to make the creating process a bit more transparent and also about trying to work with these images as found objects. What’s important about these images of the ‘Masters’ work is that they all come from sale or private collection catalogues. I think this really changes what the art work or design object depicted stands for, making them really empty and hollow, kind of like a blank canvas in some respects. Yet there is also something incredibly spiritual about the way the objects are prented in the photogrpahs, lit and placed in endless white artificially lit environments. The images are so different to how you would perceive the work in reality, yet they really retain a real sense of their sculptural form. YHBHS: I completely agree with you. On YHBHS, I have often considered whether I am studying "the object as a photo" or "the object as a historical object." My head spins in circle some mornings as I sort what I am looking at & thinking about. It's the context I continually attempt to understand. When paging through the glossy & gorgeous auction catalogs, and then making it to the actual viewing, there is sometimes a sense of a let down, or perhaps a reality check. The objects come alive in person, sometimes for the better, and sometimes for the worse. But there is also the joy, in coming to terms with these objects, and their history as objects. Hopefully, they have been used, and enjoyed, as a design object should be. The fading of the metal, the reflection, the dust on their surfaces tells a story. I find it interesting in your practice of sculpture and photo-based collages, that you are working with these ideas. Ok, back to the questions! If you had to choose, only one, Form or Function? I think it would be form every time. I have this really old Ikea sofa at home, which I think is really stylish. When it was available initially I think it was pretty low cost, its not very functional either. My partner is always on at me to throw it out and get a new one but I value it formally far too much. Although if I had more money I would just buy a more expensive better looking one! Can you talk about the art/design scene in Sheffield/Manchester? Any favorite art galleries we should know about in Sheffield? I have lived in Sheffield for about four years now and have seen the art scene shift around quite a bit. The art galleries are a bit bigger than they used to be and there seems to be a real drive forwards in terms of Sheffield’s reputation as a place for exciting new work by international artists. The art scene in Manchester seems to be much the same, although the focus is perhaps on a different type of art practice, which I think is a positive thing, its not always good to be singing from the same hymn sheet. The north of England has been a bit pushed out by the south in terms of the arts in the past, but it feels like that’s about to change slightly with new galleries like; The <a href="http://www.hepworthwakefield.org/" style="font-weight: bold;">Hepworth Wakefield</a> and the recently re-opened <a href="http://www.s1artspace.org/">S1 Artspace</a> driving that force with some of the deep rooted spaces like<a href="http://www.sitegallery.org/"> Site Gallery</a> and <a href="http://www.henry-moore.org/">The Henry Moore Foundation</a> driving the force. <a href="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5075/5901419173_acdafe1e1a_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5075/5901419173_acdafe1e1a_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 651px; height: 917px;" /></a> <a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6023/5901976302_944891234a_z.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6023/5901976302_944891234a_z.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 648px; height: 485px;" /></a><a href="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6033/5901978428_08f6b5ca15_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6033/5901978428_08f6b5ca15_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 650px; height: 862px;" /></a> <div style="text-align: center;"> images of James Clarkson's studio </div> James Clarkson, shows.... <a href="http://www.supercolliderhq.org.uk/" style="color: rgb(255, 102, 102);">Supercollider UK</a>, July 10 - July 31. "Surface Open",<a href="http://www.surfacegallery.org/" style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"> Surface Gallery, Nottingham,</a> July 12 - 30 "How to be a Magician in Your Spare Time",<a href="http://kunstprojects.com/"> Kunst Projects</a>, Berlin, Summer 201 <a href="http://james-clarkson.co.uk/" style="font-weight: bold;">James Clarkson portfolio here...</a> (thank you James for this conversation......) <a href="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5150/5873499349_6d6d69188b_z.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5150/5873499349_6d6d69188b_z.jpg" style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 640px; height: 18px;" /></a> ---------------------------------

YHBHS interview with James Clarkson

" I think there are these chains of design history where an initial idea is made by one designer, and where he leaves it, another p...

10:36 AM

marigeoinbucatarie interior

a conversation with LEADAPRON

YHBHS interview with MARI ANDREWS

YHBHS interview with James Clarkson

Popular Posts

Blog Archive