Title
Light Trails
Year
2021
Location
In 'Unsettled', Baltic 39, Baltic's satelite space, Northumbria University
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Description
Remote disused mining sites have become a regular point on my journey into researching industrial ruins, sites where time and geology fold back on themselves. We're not clear in what time we stand. Hodge Close quarry near Coniston, Cumbria, contains remnants of a history of a precarious labour. Now a sanctuary for wildlife, and destination for adventurers, its sculpted glistening shapes provide a hypnotising terrain, an uncanny site to contemplate.
The wall-sized painting was commenced at the quarry itself, developed in the studio, and finally finished once installed in the gallery space. I was quietly retracing the performative steps of JMW Turner, who completed most of his work in the gallery space, after segments of time spent en plein air.
The work is both a response to, but also wishes to recreate for the viewer, the sensorial experience of being in the quarry. It borders between sculpture and painting, each slat tilting with fragility, a reminder that the platelets of the slate structure are never stable, and can break away and fall at any minute.
This project essentially looks at the bridge between objective research, digging into the social archive and topography of a site as well as the subjective experience, how a site is perceived through the interior (one's feelings, memories, and ideas etc). It is argued that JMW Turner, leaving his marks deliberately visible in the work, was also foregrounding this aspect to painting.
Read more...
The work was installed in and fully documented by, Baltic 39, Newcastle, UK in May/June 2021, as part of the Northumbria University MFA interim show.
The wall-sized painting was commenced at the quarry itself, developed in the studio, and finally finished once installed in the gallery space. I was quietly retracing the performative steps of JMW Turner, who completed most of his work in the gallery space, after segments of time spent en plein air.
The work is both a response to, but also wishes to recreate for the viewer, the sensorial experience of being in the quarry. It borders between sculpture and painting, each slat tilting with fragility, a reminder that the platelets of the slate structure are never stable, and can break away and fall at any minute.
This project essentially looks at the bridge between objective research, digging into the social archive and topography of a site as well as the subjective experience, how a site is perceived through the interior (one's feelings, memories, and ideas etc). It is argued that JMW Turner, leaving his marks deliberately visible in the work, was also foregrounding this aspect to painting.
Read more...
The work was installed in and fully documented by, Baltic 39, Newcastle, UK in May/June 2021, as part of the Northumbria University MFA interim show.