Laboratory

We had an informal crit last night with me, Sarah, Mia, Jock and Steven discussing how we feel the show is progressing so far. A couple of things came up that really stood out…

The first one centred on one of the central themes of ‘Laboratory’: providing the artists with a space to work in for one month. All of the artists seem to be reacting to this in a different way. Jock normally works from home, so he hasn’t transferred his studio to Jerwood – this is his studio. Interestingly, he isn’t just making bigger work for the sake of it, but still weighing up how he is going to use the large wall spaces that are now at his disposal (will he display a number of smaller works or maybe create one large piece?). One way that he is taking advantage of the extra space is in the display of his drying rack (a thirteen foot plank of wood that is continually dripping paint being a little tricky to accommodate in your average home…)

Mia is producing a number of pieces that engage with the architecture of her space within Jerwood: creating works on canvas that wrap around the pillars; hanging work behind the pillars (something that is immediately dismissed as being the wrong way to do things in most Jerwood hangs); placing tissue paper over the windowpanes so that coloured light filters into the space. The space has definitely become Mia’s studio, but it is obviously different from Mia’s usual studio as well. In fact, last night Mia was questioning the point of keeping her old studio – far more preferable would be to have a new space to work in (and interact with) for each show. Any proposals from galleries out there gratefully considered… somewhere abroad would be nice…

Steven’s practice seems to have been affected the least by moving his studio into Jerwood; as he pointed out last night, working in a digital medium means that he is used to his studio being wherever he has his laptop.

The other main point of discussion was the works that the artists had started but then decided to abandon. For me, this is another key theme that makes ‘Laboratory’ stand out – it gives a insight into the aesthetics and working practices of a group of artists by showing the ideas that they don’t like as well as ones that they do. Last night Jock blogged about a new set of drawings that he truly hated with a passion and I thought it would be good to show some of the works that the artists had begun but then abandoned. They have (rather gamely I think) agreed to put them on the blog.

Here are two of Jock’s drawings (one is the tree displayed on the wall, the other is the crumpled mound in the foreground) that he initially threw away, but is now showing in his space:

After our discussion last night, he has decided to show them, because, as he wrote in his blog, ‘Laboratory’ is about showing your failures as well as your successes.

Mia originally intended to repaint and reinterpret this circle on the wall every day, but she now prefers the other projects she is working on, so she is painting over it:

And here is a double projection idea that Steven was working on, but has now abandoned: