We’ve been away to Milan (hence the radio silence) but did managed to find many an art along the way! First on the list was visiting PAC to see a retrospective of works by Santiago Sierra, someone we’ve been highly intrigued by for some time. He causes massive amounts of upset and anger which is usually something which is less interesting for us; anyone can be heard if they shout but it takes intelligence to disperse ideas by whispering. It’s difficult to argue that Sierra isn’t shouting in his work – he is obviously exploring issues around contemporary socio-political conditions and a criticism of them.
Nevertheless, there is a strong visual language and true complexity to his work which allows for an openness as opposed to a biased, ‘I’m right you’re wrong’, position. Also, the fact that they are plunged into the reality of people give them a rare emotional impact, which appears to break through even the tough skin built up by years of desensitisation via films and video games. (For lack of a better word) unfortunately, there were no live works in the museum, only photographic and video documentation. We don’t say ‘unfortunately’ due to us having slightly sadistic tendencies, but instead we have never been confronted with the moral dilemma which many criticised his work for. A lot of the people involved in the work aren’t having a great time, whether they’re having to face a wall, having a line tattooed across their back or sitting in a cardboard box. However, there are also people, perhaps even in the same room, having an equally unpleasant time. For example, just down the hallway from the work there might security guard that have to stand up all day as opposed to just 4 hours facing the wall. Tricky territory that could be discussed for many more words…
There was also a big museum show containing 110 works by Keith Haring. This fell into the category of an exhibition we wanted to see because he’s huge name in art history but the work isn’t our favourite. He played a key roll in the popularisation/commoditisation of art which are both highly interesting ideas and we appreciate him from a slightly more historical (if you can use ‘historical’ to talk about the last 30 years) perspective. However, the curation of the show made it far more enjoyable than we ever thought it would be and we have Gianni Mercurio to thank for that. Due to it being at the Palazzo Reale (one of the biggest museums in Milan) they were able to attain and consequently juxtapose works with those of authors from different periods who inspired or influenced Haring in his artistic evolution. These references were never something we had noticed before and being presented with it all in one place was very excited.
There were elements ranging from the classical tradition, tribal and ethnographic art, Gothic to cartoonist art, contemporary languages and excursions into the future with the use of computer graphics in some of his latest experiments. Amongst these are those created by twentieth century artists such as Jackson Pollock, Jean Dubuffet and Paul Klee but also casts of the Trajan’s Column, masks from Pacific cultures, paintings from the Italian Renaissance and so much more we can’t remember. Another aspect of this we found very entertaining is that in order to have all these references, Haring would have had to read a multitude of books as opposed to sourcing all his knowledge from one source (the internet). We’re not in any way saying either is more worthy or deserving but the references have undeniably been worked for.
Since we’re usually big fans of shows we’ve seen at Lisson Gallery in both London and New York we ventured over to their venue in Milan to complete the trilogy as it were. Spencer Finch had a solo show of various photography works, including one where he painted one of the white walls of the gallery with light-sensitive Cyanotype emulsion paint transforming the space into both camera and dark room. Since Finch is mostly known for his manipulation of light, photography seems to be a very appropriate medium, the whole thing is about how light works in conjunction with technology!
Something else we made sure we saw was the 36-foot marble sculpture is placed outside the stock exchange in Italy’s financial capital. It’s a work titled ‘L.O.V.E’ by Maurizio Cattelan and is giant marble middle finger, greeting Piazza Affari and its grandest building, the 1932 Palazzo Mezzanotte, the stock exchange headquarters, which is a hallmark of Fascist architecture. It was actually donated to the city and has become a permanent installation for the next 40 years. It appears to be a fairly anti-fascist statement. He transformed Italy’s Fascist hand salute from the 1930s by cutting off the fingers and mutilating the hand. Also, the way that it’s placed, it points away from the stock exchange, and not at it. Not quite as angry as it first may seem.
So that’s everything we saw in Milan but heading towards Morguefest we’ve ticked a couple more things off the list; we’ve got the script all done, an actor booked in, a scalextric set complete with two cars and tiny flowers. Just need to out make a little platform for the flowers to sit on the cars and have a practice and we’ll be sorted! Still not sure if we’re going to be able to get other people to control the cars or if we’ll have to do it ourselves – need to see how difficult it is to make them go slowly.
It has also now been confirmed that we will be participating in Aidan Strudwick’s degree show work. We’ll be enacting our piece ‘Marking time, Treading Water’ but along side Aidan’s work where he’ll be dressed like Santa, so it’ll be similar to those grottos you see in giant shopping malls and stuff like that.
Finally, Bob Bicknell-Knight’s Dollspace show has finally been set! It’s the 1st of June so do come along if you feel so inclined! Click >>>here<<< to check out more information.
