Tagged with: exhibitions
Posts (134)
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Lothar G枚tz: Wait Until Dark
Polly March
Those with an interest in architecture and its connection with art should check out a new exhibition soon to open at Chapter in Cardiff, by Lothar G枚tz. Wait Until Dark, which opens at the arts centre on Friday 3 February, G枚tz has created a series of new pieces that refer to and comment on t...
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New season at Oriel Plas Glyn y Weddw
Polly March
A riot of colourful local scenes will dominate in a new exhibition at the Oriel Plas Glyn y Weddw in Llanbedrog, Pwllheli. For its first display of 2012, the gallery is showcasing regular Anne Aspinall alongside the work of Caernarfon-based artist Stephen John Owen, plus new offerings by five arts students from across Wales. Manchester-born Aspinall has proved popular for the gallery in the past with her striking collection of local vistas. She uses mixed media to bring well-loved scenes to life and this exhibition will give her a chance to test out her latest collection, with some new paintings from further afield such as Porthgain and Abereiddy. Anne Aspinall, Abereiddy - Three Cottages. Image courtesy of the artist She says: "I was inspired by the ghosts of their industrial past and the tenacity of the people who lived and worked in such a harsh environment on the very edge of the land. I am drawn to places like this. "They have a gravitas and a melancholy but I see real optimism in the way they adapt and continue. "Porthgain has a new life as a fishing village - the tiny boat dwarfed by the vastness of the old industrial harbour and the old cottages at Abereiddy are still there having witnessed the rise and fall of the quarry, now swallowed by the sea. "I'm inspired by the spiritual feel of old places where people have lived and worked hard for hundreds of years especially those on the edge of the sea - hence my love for harbours." Stephen J Owen is best-known for his vibrant scenes of Gwynedd and Anglesey. His contributions for this exhibition have been influenced by his own recent house move to Groeslon. He says: "It is strange how light and colour can change so dramatically from one place to the other, even if it's only within a couple of miles." Stephen J Owen, Clothes Drying. Image courtesy of the artist As well as paintings, his display includes a collection of three-dimensional clay pieces which have been inspired by people in the local area. "Originally made as a gift for my wife, these figures are only intended as a bit of fun. They capture images and moments that I see on my regular walks about the area." To accompany the other two artists, there will be a group exhibition by art graduates from last year on the first floor of the gallery, funded by the Arts Council for Wales and Gwynedd Council. They are: Rhian Haf MA from Swansea University, Laura Hunt MA - Aberystwyth University, Dave Byrne BA - Bangor University, Lara Usherwood Art Foundation - Coleg Menai, Ffion Evans BA - Cardiff, Samantha Ellis BA- Glyn D诺r University and work by blogging site 'Animation Newport' from Newport University. Ffion Evans, Dead Bird. Image courtesy of the artist
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Daniel Blaufuks - Works On Memory
Polly March
A new installation by Portuguese artist Daniel Blaufuks will explore the complexities of the processes of memory and the role photography plays in freezing and retrieving memories. The exhibition is due to open at the Ffotogallery in Penarth on 14 January with a talk by Blaufuks on the subject taking place from 11am- 2pm. It is the first solo UK show for the artist, who uses the media of photography, video, sound and installation to express his fascination for how memory is formed through an accumulation of notions and details throughout life. Fifteen Minutes 1 from The Business of Living, c-print, 2010 漏 Daniel Blaufuks Blaufuks believes memory cannot be separated from our notions of time, space and place. In his own contemporary photography, for which he has built up a strong reputation in Portugal, he uses each object he snaps as a springboard for something else, be it conscious or unconscious. Untitled from The Memory of Others, c-print, 2010 漏 Daniel Blaufuks The works contained in the exhibition will explore how these cues for romantic relationships, emotional resonance or recollections just outside the realms of consciousness have significance yet can often remain beyond our reach. As he says: "The hand-written note, postcard, concert ticket, passport stamp, shopping receipt; as individual images they appear to have little significance and meaning, but presented in a series they encourage us to look for patterns and relationships, to build a coherent narrative from the shards and fragments of personal or collective memory." Another point of interest for Blaufuks is how individuals archive the important information in their lives and how that affects their ability to remember and the way they access those memories. Images of film canisters, cassette tapes, celluloid film strips and negatives included in the installation cast a glance at technological developments in photography over time and muse on how, even as we find ever more newfangled ways to store and retrieve data, something true can also be lost in the process. In using photography as his medium, Blaufuks investigates how it in itself becomes part of the process of memory and is more than just a trigger for past reminiscences or snapshots. "From the act of photographing something new, or incorporating a found image in a work, new memories and associations are formed." Untitled, from Terez铆n, c-print, 2007 漏 Daniel Blaufuks Works On Memory is co-curated by Filipa Oliveira and Ffotogallery Director David Drake and runs until 25 February. A new Ffotogallery publication, Works On Memory, will accompany the exhibition. Exhibition preview: Friday 13 January 2012, 6.30-8.30pm. Artist talk: Saturday 14 January, 11am-2pm.
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Fieldnotes - an exhibition by Iwan Bala and Menna Elfyn
Polly March
Award-winning poet and playwright Menna Elfyn and artist and writer Iwan Bala have teamed up for a thought-provoking new exhibition at the Oriel Myrddin Gallery in Carmarthen. Image courtesy of Iwan Bala. Photograph by Toril Brancher This creative dialogue is the product of conversations and ideas the two have shared during their time as colleagues at Trinity College, Carmarthen, where Menna is director of the master's programme in creative writing and Iwan is a senior lecturer in creative arts and humanities. Fieldnotes uses a collaboration of Iwan's paintings and Menna's poems to explore notions of memory, interpretation and errors in translation and also links this to Welsh cultural heritage and the shared knowledge of communities. It draws on the concept of notes made by any researcher as they investigate a topic. It is something Bala feels is intrinsically linked to his own artwork, which has always been about his lived experience and ideas drawn from his reading - in effect a product of his own field notes. His fascination with combining words and images, such as in maps and diagrams, acts as a springboard for much of the thinking behind the exhibition. "The meanings they contain are in constant flux," he says. "Despite their implied certainty - there is often a subtext, an error in translation, gaps, omissions, terra incognita, which is open to interpretation." For Elfyn, this gap, especially between the two languages of Wales, is fascinating because it allows people to interpret and read the same thing so differently. She says: "If you look at a diamond, it will gleam in so many different ways and it's the same with language - so much can be lost in translation." Image courtesy of Iwan Bala. Photograph by Toril Brancher The artists both relate this to Wales where many of the names of places - towns, villages, farms and houses - have been translated or lost by renaming. Elfyn says it is more than a place name that is lost, but the common shared knowledge of a people. "In the exhibition Iwan has a photograph with different names of farms and it's a very plain-looking list but opposite I have printed a list of nicknames given to miners that I heard growing up in Pontardawe. "They are nicknames that come from a local understanding and the brotherhood that exists in a rural place, but may not be carried on through the generations. "Much of our work in this exhibition is about mapping and remembering and an aura of place. "If you take the word snowdrop for example, in Welsh there are five different names for it, all of which are linked to images - one literally means 'brooch in snow' and another 'child's bell'. "I think it's up to each artist to rediscover these old names and give them prominence so they are not lost forever. It's important to get them down on paper." This merging of the historic and current is something Menna is very conscious of in her own work, with her modern Welsh poetry often supplemented by older words, which she hopes to "wash anew" in a new light for her readers. Both artists were determined the exhibition would evolve organically rather than with Menna writing in response to Iwan's art and vice versa, although it does include one picture of his of a map of Wales and Menna's poem about a map of Wales as well as a work Iwan has created in response to her poem Size of Wales, about a piece of ice the size of the country, breaking off. Image courtesy of Iwan Bala. Photograph by Toril Brancher Menna adds: "Writing is all about field-work and the act of digging deep to unearth mysteries. We know too well that we are only passing through as we sub-consciously make our personal field-notes. "Two artists seeing 'something down there to smile at in the dust' share the fascination of lifting and sifting through the cae hir (long field)." Fieldnotes will be opened by Professor M Wynn Thomas, Emyr Humphreys Chair of Welsh Writing in English, Swansea University on Friday 6 January at 6pm. Just before the official opening Iwan Bala and Menna Elfyn will be in conversation with visitors to the exhibition. The show runs from 7 January to 18 February. For more details visit www.orielmyrddingallery.co.uk.
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Cyn ac Wedyn - Before and After
Polly March
A surrealist exhibition which explores artist Wanda Zyborska's experience of breast cancer will open at the Rhyl Library Arts Centre in January. Cyn ac Wedyn - Before and After chronicles her battle with the disease from diagnosis, through surgery, reconstruction and recovery. Detail of on...
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Exhibition explores concept of light
Polly March
A group of professional artists based in and around Barry is staging an exhibition on the theme of light. The Vale of Glamorgan Artists' Association (Voga) consists of around 20 artists who regularly collaborate to put on events and workshops in all kinds of venues, ranging from formal galler...
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Cardiff Print Workshop opens new work space
Laura Chamberlain
The Cardiff Print Workshop will open an additional work space this weekend, and will mark the occasion with a new exhibition and demonstration of the art form. Cardiff Print Workshop's new work space The Cardiff Print Workshop is a not-for-profit organisation which has been running for o...
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Transhumance exhibition at National Wool Museum
Laura Chamberlain
A new exhibition, Transhumance by Romanian photographer Dragos Lumpan, opens this week at the National Wool Museum in Llandysul, Carmarthenshire. Transhumance is a traditional farming method of moving livestock animals to different gazing areas depending on the different seasons - such as mov...
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December exhibitions at Mostyn, Llandudno
Laura Chamberlain
Mostyn in Llandudno will open three new exhibitions on Saturday, in addition to the two current exhibitions already running at the gallery. The work of Anselm Kiefer, one of Germany's most significant post-war artists, will go on show at Mostyn from Saturday 3 December. The exhibition is part ...
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winter#2 pops up in Cardiff's Castle Arcade
Laura Chamberlain
The latest pop-up exhibition from Cardiff-based contemporary arts gallery project/ten will make one of the capital city's celebrated Victorian arcades its home from next week. The latest temporary exhibition entitled winter#2 will open, like an advent calendar door, on Thursday 1 December. It will occupy 16 Castle Arcade, currently an empty retail unit in the shopping arcade, for three weeks. Debbie Smyth, No Place Like Home, nail and thread 2011 There will be a selection of work on show by new artists in the gallery's collective including painter Menna Angharad, designer Jess Jones and ceramic artist Natalia Dias. Menna's 'pillow' series is quiet and contemplative, Jess' designs are innovative and functional, while Natalia's award-winning ceramic work is suitably nonconforming, pushing the boundaries of the craft - as you can see in the image below. Natalia Dias, Autumn Hearts, porcelain 2010. Photo: Jon Pountney The exhibition will sprawl over two floors of the retail unit, with a range of media on offer including paintings, prints, sculpture, furniture, textiles and ceramic pieces. winter #2 runs at 16 Castle Arcade in Cardiff from Thursday 1 December to Friday 23 December. See www.project-ten.co.uk for more details, including exhibition times, and to browse more images of work by the artists on show.
