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I Wanna Destroy (Sacred Objects From Suburban Homes) – A forthcoming performance by EMA

Musician and multimedia artist Erika M. Anderson (EMA) ensnares us into her own world of music, spoken word and virtual reality at the Barbican.

Image via © Barbican 

Musician and multimedia artist Erika M. Anderson (EMA) ensnares us into her own world of music, spoken word and virtual reality at the Barbican.

Portland-based artist EMA can be described as a bit of an avant-gardist. Her most recent album, The Future’s Void, is about the Internet and the ever-encroaching virtualisation of society. She’s an artist that isn’t afraid of commenting on the digital world. And her upcoming performance, I Wanna Destroy, accomplishes that and more.

You’re taken into her immersive virtual-reality word. A nifty device known as an Oculus rift further glorifies the full experience. It’s a virtual-reality headgear that, when accompanied by the music, can fully channel the solemn and poignant environment that EMA creates.

Excerpt from EMA’s I Wanna Destroy performance in Queens, New York.  

I Wanna Destroy is a part of Doug Aitken’s 1 month long exhibition, Station to Station: A 30 Day Happening. A project of his that brings ‘together a fusion of leading international and UK-based’ contemporary artists in all fields, including EMA. Her collaboration with developer Zach Krausnick and the software company, Chroma are what allow this unique cybernetic world to exist.

This performance has already proved to be a success in the states, and it’s now travelling across the pond. It’s come for those select few who wish to turn on the virtual-world, tune in to her sound, and drop out at the Barbican.

Tickets available here

7th July at 19:30, Art Gallery. Barbican Centre, Silk Street EC2Y 8DS

 

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52 Words a Year

On Tuesday 7th April the Nancy Victor Gallery in Fitzrovia will display the culmination of a year’s intense work from three London based artists. 

 

On Tuesday 7th April the Nancy Victor Gallery in Fitzrovia will display the culmination of a year’s intense work from three London based artists. 

 52 Words a Year is an online project that had Mayumi Mori, Leni Kauffman and Oliver O’Keeffe each draw an illustration a week, every week for a year. 

The three sets of works that will fill the Nancy Victor were inspired by 52 words, chosen by the artists and taken off in different directions and styles. 

These include a New Year’s Restart, prompting a germinating bulb in watercolour from Oliver, Evolution and a clean, tree-filled landscape from Leni and style; a sumptuous patchwork of colours from Mayumi. 

The progression of artistic flair and competence that can be tracked across the course of the year is similar to several other projects. Californian artists Alberto Calleros spent 2008 creating daily work for his Blogspot, Drawing Every Day for a Year, exhibiting an immense creative capacity and commitment.  

The real uniqueness of 52 Words a Year therefore lies in the tweaking of a tried and tested idea. To view an artist’s year of toil is engaging, but to walk along the diverse branches of inspiration spread by 3 individuals, all emerging from the same point, is to receive a real glimpse into the artistic process. 

52 Words a Year runs from Tuesday 7 to Saturday 18 April 2015, Tuesday to Friday 10am–6pm, Saturday 12–6pm. 

Nancyvictor or for a taster of the exhibition, Wordsayear

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Leon Golub Retrospective – Bite your Tongue review

The oppressively large, looming portrayals of war and suffering that adorn the walls of The Serpentine gallery create a cinematic panorama of disaster, which both entices and repels the viewer

The oppressively large, looming portrayals of war and suffering that adorn the walls of The Serpentine gallery create a cinematic panorama of disaster, which both entices and repels the viewer.

Born in Chicago in 1922, Leon Golub had an early interest in the visual arts, stating once that seeing Picasso’s famous anti-war painting Guernica at age eleven, was the most profound art experience of his life.

Golub first studied art history, before joining the U.S. Army as a cartographer, and it was during this time that he developed his hatred of war. After he left the army he returned to art school to complete a Masters Degree in Fine Art, during which he met fellow artist and his future wife Nancy Spero. 

Golub’s larger-than-life characters commit atrocities that we are unable to look away from, as the floor-to-ceiling paintings fill the entirety of the space and tower over all that enter. The characters stand on almost-blank backgrounds, asserting that they are the only things we should be focusing on, and giving our eyes no avenue of escape.

In one particular painting, an unidentifiable assailant is putting someone in the boot of his car, as he looks straight out of the painting at the viewer. This sinister eye contact and the way the perspective makes the victim below eye-level, forces us to be accessories to the crime. 

Golub describes his work as crude and vulgar, something that is necessary to accurately depict the horrific things his work is commenting on. The works honest depiction of violence is a salient factor in Golub’s long-standing anti-war discourse, and something that he never shied away from. 

In this retrospective spanning over fifty years, many different eras and conflicts are represented, from Vietnam, Latin America, and beyond. This resonates with the way in which Golub would collect and combine different source materials from which to paint, often combining into one painting images from many different conflicts and settings. These fragmented characters in his paintings are depicted as of one era, but are timeless, and because of this convey a broader and more encompassing critique of the ‘Misuse Of Power’ as a whole. 

Golub’s work forces its message upon the viewer in both its size and subject matter. This harsh exposition of violence compels us to accept responsibility for our complicit violence through inaction. Golub is pointing out our moral responsibilities through his portrayal of the most horrific and difficult to look at subject matter. 

With the current climate of war and terror, his is even more of a poignant message today. His indulgence in his subject matter has created a harsh and undiluted statement of intent; by keeping silent we are allowing this to happen, and we must never bite our tongues.

I for one, long for a world where the work of Leon Golub is no longer necessary or relevant, and I’m sure Leon would feel the same.

*Images via Serpentine Gallery

Showing at The Serpentine Gallery London

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Undeniably Urban: Cartography Meets Street Art at the Somerset House

This month, London’s Somerset House explores new territories with its highly anticipated show, Mapping the City. 

This month, London’s Somerset House explores new territories with its highly anticipated show, Mapping the City.  Forgoing the traditional representations of exhibitions past and opting instead for a more modern focus, this exhibition features the work of over 50 street and graffiti artists – some emerging and some already on the map, like Cept, Shepard Fairey, Swoon and Aryz – and offers a diverse and contemporary look at the antiquated art of cartography. 

Executed in collaboration with dynamic arts organisation A(by)P, the locations conveyed in Mapping the City span myriad cities, countries, and continents.  Though varied in nature, the selected cities have not been arbitrarily chosen; the artists were asked to render their own interpretations of the cities they call home.  Additionally, due to the unique style of each artist, each map differs in artistic approach and aesthetic preference.  Spanning myriad media – predominantly painted works on paper and digital pieces – and ranging from realistic depictions to the abstract, the maps presented in Mapping the City offer a unique – and highly artistic – trip around the world.

Mapping the City embarks at the Somerset House on 22 Jan 2015 and is on view until 15 Feb 2015.  Bon voyage!

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