Title
In Open Spaces
Year
2021
Location
As part of 'Through the Locking Glass', Rheged art space, Rheged Centre, Penrith, Cumberland &Westmorland Herald, Cumbria Life
Description
During the pandemic, we were continuously advised to meet in outdoor spaces to reduce the spread of the virus. I began to consider this new delineation of space, and the qualities of each type - shared or private, creative, zoom and in-person space.
The installation I created as a result, included a film, garment and wall-hanging, all sites for considering what it means to carry out an exchange with another person or thing (fictional or real). The film, a silent magnification of the small and detached interactions of zoom, reminds us of the disquieting qualities of online communication. The wall-hanging and garment, created with hand-dyed donated clothing remnants acts, as a reminder of older notions that making and expression could be instrumental in facilitating a profound and useful intersubjectivity. Read more
The installation I created as a result, included a film, garment and wall-hanging, all sites for considering what it means to carry out an exchange with another person or thing (fictional or real). The film, a silent magnification of the small and detached interactions of zoom, reminds us of the disquieting qualities of online communication. The wall-hanging and garment, created with hand-dyed donated clothing remnants acts, as a reminder of older notions that making and expression could be instrumental in facilitating a profound and useful intersubjectivity. Read more
Reviews
By Alison Critchlow (Artist), March 2021
This piece feels like a work out for the brain. Think John Paul Satre with flashing rectangles from the world of zoom. Burbush might do well to offer her audience a couple of Panadol and an analysts couch to rest on.
First we have the objects –The dress - A delightful conglomeration of textures and remnants, the Tudor inspired shape, with it’s PVC collar and rolled up shirt sleeve are wonderful and the button, which reads immediately like an eye, gives an early clue...Surveillance from the heart?
The wall hanging- seems to set the scene, appearing like the landscape backdrop of an 18thcentury portrait, separated from it’s sitter. I took it to have its origins in collage but ‘the wall hanging’s ‘boundaries are due to paint’ we are told, ‘it was she who conducted the shapes and colours across space’. The fairy-tale world which these objects set up, in their imagery and execution is as dynamic as it is fragmentary. This piece feels at times like loose threads, held together with ideas, some more persuasively than others. I love the use of the word ‘thread’, with its nod to the Twittersphere. Following a thread, however, can be a tricky business.
The film- A narration of the artists own psyche and creative practice...using the now familiar format of zoom to open and close windows onto her own thoughts. This piece cleverly combines the script writing technique of turning ‘things’ into ‘characters’ with the format of a video call; the cast are ‘Fabric’, ‘Paint’, ‘Self’ and ‘Writing’.
When the film begins it bombards you - trying to read the text box on the right, while the flashing rectangles ‘speak up’ is tricky and very reminiscent of zoom meetings. This is an inventive on line conversation with self, tongue in cheek, with a prod at the art world. It is funny and thought provoking. It is an interesting reflection on how screen conversations and relationships are impacting our sense of self. Who are we really amongst this strange overload? It is also an imaginative way of externalising creative process.
The flat grey rectangles are left blank except for their perimeter colour flashing when a ‘character’ speaks; identity pared down to a flash of colour, which seems to emphasise the dullness of a life lived via screens. They lack all sensory stimuli. I was desperate to see a visual link with the red jagged lines or frayed edges of fabric or the mimetic beauty of ‘self’. The stark contrast in sensory experience is clearly a deliberate act, but the separation is total. Visually there is nothing at all to connect the objects and the film. I wanted a digital running stitch or an animated wolf or an echo of the dynamic shapes and colours in the wall hanging. The connection is through the words and concepts alone, which beg the question, are the objects required at all? What do they add to this dialogue?
I found it very distracting to have the flashing coloured rectangles beside the text and difficult to focus on the writing, waiting for snippets of information which came at odd intervals added to the frustration. An accurate depiction, in fact, of zoom communication, and a very sharp observation of our current relationship with our online selves. The artists internal processing is on display here, being picked over. All the ‘characters’ are polite to each other but all the usual exasperations are present. At times they are reminiscent of awkward siblings. Is ‘paint’ the one that none of the others want to invite round for dinner? The one that just might be embarrassing or not cool enough, or worse, inappropriately honest?
Which brings us to the fairy-tale setting. Well known as succinct moral fables and for warning children of perils, fairy tales also reveal a great deal about the culture which creates them and in this sense the analysis is not just a digital self-portrait, it is a chewing over of our collective psychological toolbox.
Enter stage left, the big bad wolf...what does he represent?
Well, we can only wonder! I give you some clues;
‘Words are like spells’ points to a superstitious world, fearful, flighty; ‘self is convinced that paint is one of her organs’ (which one I wonder?). Let’s not forget that these thoughts being shared are all the time observed by the button eye - being watched by the heart; ‘we’ll all take turns to start the conversation’ - democracy always starts that way...
The wolf, traditional cunning predator, intruder, threat, seems to be nothing more than a character plucked from foundational myths. He is seen idly trotting through a background scene, providing context, or is he acting as a messenger- on a mission?
‘Self is struggling to connect’ – what a brilliant line!
Faced with seeing ourselves looking back from the screen, we are all more aware than ever before of the ‘self’ other’s see, and of our on line persona. The fragmentary self-analysis in this work doubles as potent collective psychology. There is also an appealing openness and very personal elements of artistic self-critique here, a searching for the correct medium and mode of expression.
‘There is a riddle that we shall ponder’...I like the way Antoni Tapies and a group of trees are invited in as mentors and then it is for us to imagine ‘all their very many replies’. With a nod to pantomime is this the ‘he’s behind you!’ moment? Well, we have been given a reference and it is left like a trail of bread crumbs to be followed... the social role of art and artists that interested Tapies is certainly in evidence in this piece. Pintura Materia is also a clear influence, what is less so is Tapies interest in John Paul Satre and his thoughts about an ‘authentic way of being’.
To quote Satre, ‘When an external object is perceived, consciousness is also conscious of itself’. This quote is from La Transcendance de l’ego written by him in 1934. A criticism of theories of the ‘I’. An analysis of the differences between consciousness and things to show that ego is an object for consciousness...’ Perhaps the characters in this piece would like to discuss?
This is a difficult artwork, it takes time to piece the fragments together, and does have something in common with a riddle, which is I think the whole point. I would like to see the rhythmic quality and pace of the wall hanging replicated in the rhythm of the dialogue. The use of nursery rhymes and fables is interesting but could be pushed further. We need paint to take up her screen and join in this conversation. There is a sense /hope that she will bring it full circle. I have enjoyed these disparate elements conversing, but there is not yet enough cohesion for me. This feels like a gathering of ideas, they are joining together but have not yet found the perfect vehicle. A work for our times certainly, still with a couple of pieces missing for me.
This piece feels like a work out for the brain. Think John Paul Satre with flashing rectangles from the world of zoom. Burbush might do well to offer her audience a couple of Panadol and an analysts couch to rest on.
First we have the objects –The dress - A delightful conglomeration of textures and remnants, the Tudor inspired shape, with it’s PVC collar and rolled up shirt sleeve are wonderful and the button, which reads immediately like an eye, gives an early clue...Surveillance from the heart?
The wall hanging- seems to set the scene, appearing like the landscape backdrop of an 18thcentury portrait, separated from it’s sitter. I took it to have its origins in collage but ‘the wall hanging’s ‘boundaries are due to paint’ we are told, ‘it was she who conducted the shapes and colours across space’. The fairy-tale world which these objects set up, in their imagery and execution is as dynamic as it is fragmentary. This piece feels at times like loose threads, held together with ideas, some more persuasively than others. I love the use of the word ‘thread’, with its nod to the Twittersphere. Following a thread, however, can be a tricky business.
The film- A narration of the artists own psyche and creative practice...using the now familiar format of zoom to open and close windows onto her own thoughts. This piece cleverly combines the script writing technique of turning ‘things’ into ‘characters’ with the format of a video call; the cast are ‘Fabric’, ‘Paint’, ‘Self’ and ‘Writing’.
When the film begins it bombards you - trying to read the text box on the right, while the flashing rectangles ‘speak up’ is tricky and very reminiscent of zoom meetings. This is an inventive on line conversation with self, tongue in cheek, with a prod at the art world. It is funny and thought provoking. It is an interesting reflection on how screen conversations and relationships are impacting our sense of self. Who are we really amongst this strange overload? It is also an imaginative way of externalising creative process.
The flat grey rectangles are left blank except for their perimeter colour flashing when a ‘character’ speaks; identity pared down to a flash of colour, which seems to emphasise the dullness of a life lived via screens. They lack all sensory stimuli. I was desperate to see a visual link with the red jagged lines or frayed edges of fabric or the mimetic beauty of ‘self’. The stark contrast in sensory experience is clearly a deliberate act, but the separation is total. Visually there is nothing at all to connect the objects and the film. I wanted a digital running stitch or an animated wolf or an echo of the dynamic shapes and colours in the wall hanging. The connection is through the words and concepts alone, which beg the question, are the objects required at all? What do they add to this dialogue?
I found it very distracting to have the flashing coloured rectangles beside the text and difficult to focus on the writing, waiting for snippets of information which came at odd intervals added to the frustration. An accurate depiction, in fact, of zoom communication, and a very sharp observation of our current relationship with our online selves. The artists internal processing is on display here, being picked over. All the ‘characters’ are polite to each other but all the usual exasperations are present. At times they are reminiscent of awkward siblings. Is ‘paint’ the one that none of the others want to invite round for dinner? The one that just might be embarrassing or not cool enough, or worse, inappropriately honest?
Which brings us to the fairy-tale setting. Well known as succinct moral fables and for warning children of perils, fairy tales also reveal a great deal about the culture which creates them and in this sense the analysis is not just a digital self-portrait, it is a chewing over of our collective psychological toolbox.
Enter stage left, the big bad wolf...what does he represent?
Well, we can only wonder! I give you some clues;
‘Words are like spells’ points to a superstitious world, fearful, flighty; ‘self is convinced that paint is one of her organs’ (which one I wonder?). Let’s not forget that these thoughts being shared are all the time observed by the button eye - being watched by the heart; ‘we’ll all take turns to start the conversation’ - democracy always starts that way...
The wolf, traditional cunning predator, intruder, threat, seems to be nothing more than a character plucked from foundational myths. He is seen idly trotting through a background scene, providing context, or is he acting as a messenger- on a mission?
‘Self is struggling to connect’ – what a brilliant line!
Faced with seeing ourselves looking back from the screen, we are all more aware than ever before of the ‘self’ other’s see, and of our on line persona. The fragmentary self-analysis in this work doubles as potent collective psychology. There is also an appealing openness and very personal elements of artistic self-critique here, a searching for the correct medium and mode of expression.
‘There is a riddle that we shall ponder’...I like the way Antoni Tapies and a group of trees are invited in as mentors and then it is for us to imagine ‘all their very many replies’. With a nod to pantomime is this the ‘he’s behind you!’ moment? Well, we have been given a reference and it is left like a trail of bread crumbs to be followed... the social role of art and artists that interested Tapies is certainly in evidence in this piece. Pintura Materia is also a clear influence, what is less so is Tapies interest in John Paul Satre and his thoughts about an ‘authentic way of being’.
To quote Satre, ‘When an external object is perceived, consciousness is also conscious of itself’. This quote is from La Transcendance de l’ego written by him in 1934. A criticism of theories of the ‘I’. An analysis of the differences between consciousness and things to show that ego is an object for consciousness...’ Perhaps the characters in this piece would like to discuss?
This is a difficult artwork, it takes time to piece the fragments together, and does have something in common with a riddle, which is I think the whole point. I would like to see the rhythmic quality and pace of the wall hanging replicated in the rhythm of the dialogue. The use of nursery rhymes and fables is interesting but could be pushed further. We need paint to take up her screen and join in this conversation. There is a sense /hope that she will bring it full circle. I have enjoyed these disparate elements conversing, but there is not yet enough cohesion for me. This feels like a gathering of ideas, they are joining together but have not yet found the perfect vehicle. A work for our times certainly, still with a couple of pieces missing for me.