Aesthetica Issue 85 by Aesthetica Magazine

Aesthetica

THE ART & CULTURE MAGAZINE

www.aestheticamagazine.com

Issue 85 October / November 2018

NETWORKS OF THE WORLD

INCLUSIVE COLLECTIONS

CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY

Olafur Eliasson is celebrated for dismantling physical boundaries

Conceptual photographers navigate censorship in the Chinese art market

Fashion newcomers set an example with clean lines and social activism

Images from the 21st century provide a glimpse into the everyday experience

UK £5.95 Europe €11.95 USA $15.49

SHIFTING PERCEPTIONS

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Welcome Editor’s Note

On the Cover German artist Laura Zalenga utilises the power of photography to tell stories, communicating raw emotions and tapping into the almost therapeutic quality of imagemaking in today’s world. Introspection takes the focus within a self-portrait; surreal figures confront the idea of individuality within an empty field. (p. 118) www.laurazalenga.com. Cover Image: Self Portrait. Courtesy of Laura Zalenga.

Curiosity is the fuel for innovation and creativity is the ignition for invention. It’s this notion that when faced with a challenge or barrier, you can think of a solution. There is always an answer and sometimes it’s just an idea away. That is a liberating concept and one that I embody throughout my work and my personal life. You see, it’s important to see the glass as half full and many times that’s half the battle. This issue is a celebration of ideas. We start with a feature on the fifth edition of PHOTOFAIRS Shanghai and we look at how contemporary Chinese photographers are responding to censorship in the wider art market. This article traces the trajectory of photojournalism and fine art photography whilst acknowledging the surge in super collectors. Moving forward, Civilization is a new title that takes global expansion as its starting point and uses photography as a medium to understand the world. For example, think of all the shopping centres, retail parks and new housing estates – many of them have the same type of landscaping, such as trees that are small and sculpted. It looks very clinical and on a philosophical level, it’s eye opening how humankind’s relationship with the natural world has shifted so much that even nature is something that is constructed. We also highlight the work of Olafur Eliasson – one of the most prolific artists today, who has now turned his hand to architecture, cementing the intersection between art and design, whilst dismantling physical and cultural barriers. Bright, bold installations follow. In the photography features, Alessio Albi, Alexis Christodoulou, Kris Provoost, Sing-Sing, Louis MacLean and Glashier perfectly combine to depict the vast scope of contemporary images, from minimal landscapes and surreal concepts to dramatic portraits and colourful architecture. Laura Zalenga’s thought-provoking cover calls into question the need for self-reflection in a world riveted by images, profiles and social media. The self-portrait questions the multitude of layers in the individual. Finally, Aesthetica Art Prize alumnus Gabriela Torres Ruiz takes the Last Words. Enjoy! Cherie Federico

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contents

Art 16 Regular Sections The October / November issue provides coverage of Photaumnales, Artes Mundi 8, Bruce Nauman at MoMA, FotoFocus Biennial and The Hepworth.

24 Networks of the World The fifth PHOTOFAIRS Shanghai highlights the work of contemporary Chinese artists looking beyond state censorship through metaphors.

30 Spatial Landmarks Kris Provoost documents a range of buildings in order to better understand the metropolitan world; his urban photographs replicate this wider interest.

42 Playful Messages Collaborative duo Sing-Sing produces a bank of on-screen characters surrounded by comedic props that connect with audiences from today.

54 Cultural Anthropology Reconsidering humanity’s place within a mediasaturated, highly complex and ever-expanding planet through a diverse selection of images.

60 Dramatic Portraiture To incorporate a filmic sense of drama, Alessio Albi uses wildlife to embed anonymous figures within a highly textured and detailed landscape.

72 Inclusive Collections Californian fashion label LAND of Distraction redresses the notion of femininity through clean workwear staples and steps into social activism.

78 Minimal Construction With an appreciation for detail, Louis MacLean reinjects a sense of dynamism into the city with angular viewpoints and bright, pop colours.

90 Reviving Analogue Glashier captures the raw energy of youth with a soft and intriguing palette; each picture utilises organic topographies as a space for reflection.

102 Shifting Perceptions Iconic artist Olafur Eliasson leaps from design to architecture and back again, breaking down the boundaries between space, light and experience.

108 Digital Possibilities Inspired by the endless dimensions of graphic art, Alexis Christodoulou extends realities through rendering new spaces with a seamless aesthetic.

118 Capturing the Elements Laura Zalenga uses the power of photography to tell stories, tapping into the almost therapeutic quality of image-making in the 21st century.

Exhibitions

Film

Music

130 Gallery Reviews Included in this issue: Bruce Silverstein Gallery, ICP New York, Brooklyn Museum, Museo Reina Sofía, Getty Center and George Eastman Museum.

134 Beyond the Horizon This year’s BFI London Film Festival takes charge within an exciting programme and marks itself as a significant platform for women in the industry.

136 A Sense of Belonging After emerging in 2010, Derbyshire Dales trio Haiku Salut return with a dreamy folktronica sound that has garnered them critical acclaim.

Books

Artists’ Directory

Last Words

138 New Structural Languages Rick Joy’s latest publication celebrates the 25th anniversary of the architectural firm, considering the power of construction to inspire humanity.

153 Inside This Issue Our selection of both emerging and established practitioners makes use of multiple materials and new media to communicate the concept of space.

162 Gabriela Torres Ruiz With pieces from the Silence photography series, Aesthetica Art Prize shortlistee Torres Ruiz exhibits landscape motifs at Galerie im Tempelhof, Berlin.

Aesthetica Magazine is trade marked worldwide. © Aesthetica Magazine Ltd 2018.

The Aesthetica Team: Editor: Cherie Federico Assistant Editor: Kate Simpson Digital Assistant: Eleanor Sutherland Staff Writer: David Martin

Advertisement Enquiries: Jeremy Appleyard (0044) (0)844 568 2001 advertising@aestheticamagazine.com

Advertising Coordinator: Jeremy Appleyard Marketing Coordinator: Hannah Skidmore Artists’ Directory Coordinator: Katherine Smira

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Published by Cherie Federico and Dale Donley. Aesthetica Magazine PO Box 371, York, YO23 1WL, UK (0044) (0)844 568 2001 Newstrade Distribution: Warners Group Publications plc. Gallery & Specialist Distribution: Central Books. Printed by Warners Midlands plc.

Production Director: Dale Donley Operations Manager: Cassandra Weston Designer: Laura Tordoff Marketing & Administration Assistant: Sophie Lake Festival Coordinator / Technical Advisor: Andy Guy Events Assistant: Roisin Mullins Editorial Intern: Chelsea Wilson Marketing & Administration Intern: Madelaine Formica Events Intern: Lily Scott

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Contributors: Laura May Todd, Tom Seymour, Stephanie Strasnick, Beth Webb, Charlotte R-A, Gunseli Yalcinkaya.

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Reviewers: Kyle Bryony, Paul Risker, James Mottram, Grace Caffyn, Tony Earnshaw, Verity Seward, Sarah Jilani, Melissa Karlin, Louis Soulard, Rubén Cervantes Garrido, Olivia Hampton, Matt Swain.

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Alfred Seiland, Toltec, Arizona, USA, 1989. C-Print, The Albertina Museum, Vienna. © Alfred Seiland.

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Documenting the Land ALFRED SEILAND Fighting the corner of analogue photography in a digital advertising campaign for Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine age, Alfred Seiland’s (b. 1952) fascinations have ranged Zeitung daily newspaper from 1995 to 2001. The campaign from the cultural landscapes of contemporary America to revived the newspaper’s founding slogan “Hinter dieser Zeithe remnants of long-vanished empires. Born in Austria, Sei- tung steckt Immer ein kluger Kopf” (“Behind this newspaper land was self-taught, drawn to American culture, following is always a clever head”), and featured famous figures from in the iconic footsteps of Joel Meyerowitz, Stephen Shore politics, the arts and sport pictured with their faces hidden and William Eggleston, by working exclusively in colour, behind the pages in various locations. A more recent long-term project, Imperium Romanum, inrapidly developing a signature aesthetic and process, where dense, atmospheric scenes are kept under control through cluded visitation of former key sites in the Roman Empire, meticulous and detailed composition. The unstaged images travelling through Europe, the Mediterranean countries are filled with depth and striking shifts of perspective. Using and the near east, seeking out cities, ruins, landscapes and the same analogue camera, Seiland revisits each location nu- museums, the physical records of ancient cultural connections across this vast area of territory – one where, in the premerous times to find the perfect angle and situation. Vienna’s Albertina Museum presents around 80 works in this sent day, the recent refugee crisis has seen links re-emerge retrospective that has taken the photographer to Syria, Iran through the mass movements of people. Many of the feaand Egypt, as well as turning the lens on the artist’s home tured locations are not on the tourist trail and are difficult country in the selection Österreich, which demonstrates a hu- to access, lost to the public eye despite the status they held. These juxtapositions between ancient and modern worlds morous view of the world around us. Seiland’s relationship with the USA is compiled in the early series East Coast – West Coast are revealed as the viewer is drawn to consider the issues (1986), a journey through sweeping vistas, vibrant streets and around protecting ancient remains and cultural assets from neon signs which creates an individual response to American uncontrolled economic development and the impacts of culture. The final selection of 48 pieces was compiled from tourism, as well as the consequences of recent war, conflict and mass displacement. The remnants of a vanished settlemany visits to the USA from 1979 onwards. Aside from documentary works, Seiland found a wide comments shed light on the power structures of the contempomercial audience whilst working on the famous international rary world, pulling history into an age of media saturation.

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“Vienna’s Albertina Museum presents around 80 works in this retrospective that has taken the photographer to Syria, Iran and Egypt, as well as turning the lens on the artist’s home country.”

The Albertina Museum, Vienna Until 7 October www.albertina.at

Rediscovering History PHOTAUMNALES

Photography as an artform is intrinsically concerned with Stèles, which highlights monuments from WWI, following on “A key example is time, memory and, through its ability to turn the lens upon from his previous series on the Berlin Wall and the remnants Ambroise Tézenas’ itself, questions about the relationship of images to truth. of the D-Day landings. These physical objects preserve both investigation of ‘dark Where Memory Remains is therefore a thought-provoking the memory of the dead and the trauma of contemporary tourism’ – the allure of visiting places theme for the 15th edition of Photaumnales, especially in to- conflicts in distinctly human and archival presentations. As well as solo exhibitions, the curators have created group which have been day’s world of fake news and media indiscrepancies. The exhibition involves Amiens, Beauvais, Clermont, Creil, Noyon and and joint shows. In one such juxtaposition, the threads of con- marked by tragedy, Douchy-les-Mines, as the Hauts-de-France region plays host nection between Emilie Vialet – whose subject is zoos around whether through to an international festival. A total of 27 photographers ex- Europe, and Christoph Sillem – who photographs the urban natural disasters plore how traces of history are recorded in the landscape and surroundings of Disneyland Paris, are revealed; both capture such as earthquakes, in collective cultural memory: how they can be rediscovered. a sense of absence in what seem optimistic, celebratory land- or through human error or intent.” A key example is Ambroise Tézenas’ investigation of “dark scapes, yet which are places of control and surveillance. Growing up in communist east Germany, Sibylle Bergetourism” – the allure of visiting places which have been marked by tragedy, whether through natural disasters such mann led a revival in photography before and after reunificaas earthquakes or tsunamis, or through human error or intent. tion. Known for employing absurdity and a sense of melanTézenas selected a dozen locations and registered with tour choly to reassert the individual in a controlling society, Das operators to be immersed in the same experience as any other Denkmal (The Monument) charts the construction of the Marxtourist, photographing only what an ordinary visitor would Engels Forum in the Mitte district of Berlin between 1975 and see. From the site of the Nazi massacre at Oradour-sur-Glane, 1986. At the centre of the construction are the bronze statues France, in 1944, where the ruins of the village still stand as a of the two political theorists whose work came to shape much memorial, to the remaining traces of the devastation of the of the 20th century. In Bergemann’s images, the sculptures Various venues, 2008 Sichuan earthquake in China, and from Cambodia to by Ludwig Engelhardt become the characters of the series as Hauts-de-France Rwanda, Ukraine and Lebanon, Tézenas turns his camera on they undergo the construction process, sometimes suspend- Until 31 December the 20th century’s most harrowing corners. The physical stig- ed in the air or packed for transportation, creating images that www.photaumnales.fr mata of history are also the subject of Patrick Tournebœuf’s are surreal, humorous, dreamlike and poetic.

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Christian Hoehn, Gornergrat, Wallis 2014 Lightbox. Courtesy of the artist.

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Alienating Topographies CHRISTIAN HÖHN The relatively recent phenomenon of the “megacity” – vast Megacities project, which now comprises more than 50 works “His large-format urban areas with more than 10 million inhabitants – has documenting the phenomenon around the world. images, often A related project, One Station, was inspired by the role of photographed from become part of everyday life for an exponentially growing number of people. There are 47 such locations in the world, the railway station in literature around the world – here, the a raised perspective and though the category includes New York, Moscow and human presence absent from Megacities is restored to the and devoid of people, London, the phenomenon is centred in the East, reflecting the foreground. The stage sets for sad farewells, happy reunions convey both the explosive transformation of Asian and Indonesian economies and coincidental meetings, and the start and end points for monumental scale over the last century. China alone has 15 megacities, and India some of the world’s most legendary journeys, these real-life of the structures, six. Tokyo, Shanghai and Jakarta are ranked as the world’s landmarks are enduring locations of transience, proving and an atmosphere irresistible to writers from a number of cultures. of anonymity and largest examples, all exceeding 30 million inhabitants. Höhn travelled within five continents to capture the unique alienation.” These monumental cityscapes have become a careerlong fascination for German artist Christian Höhn (b. 1968). magic of these locations including the Gare du Nord, Paris; His large-format images, often photographed from a Dresden Hauptbahnhof; the ultra-modern Kanazawa Station raised perspective and devoid of people, convey both the in Tokyo; Cape Town, Mumbai and the Australian outback; monumental scale of the structures, and an atmosphere and Gornergrat, Wallis (featured in the image above.) The of anonymity and alienation. Moving from continent to resulting series ranges through space and time, myths, art continent, Höhn reveals both the diversity and the uniformity and history, where hyper-realism shifts into the surreal. Another recent subject for Höhn is the extravagant at work in the international architectural vocabulary of urbanisation. And, though the human inhabitants are architecture of Dubai, which needs little introduction. For invisible – indeed, perhaps as a deliberate consequence of this, he captured moments of hesitation – a series of images their absence – the viewer is compelled to imagine and to document the financial crisis, when construction work was halted as the machinery associated with capitalism suffered Herforder Kunstverein empathise with those who live in this hyper-real landscape. Herforder Kunstverein’s show brings together work a systematic shock and a rare moment of stasis. Through this Until 4 November from two series, including large-scale acrylics and light monumental work, and the series showcased at Herdorfer, boxes. It features a range of major projects, such as the contemporary landscapes are thrown into question. www.herforder-kunstverein.de

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Championing Female Artists ING DISCERNING EYE 2018 of my own little world which I thought I knew well.” “Focusing on ING Discerning Eye creates opportunities within the indus- recognising talent try – with at least 25% of selections taken from the open- and reassessing the call. Focusing on recognising talent and reassessing the changing nature of changing nature of today’s financial and artistic landscape, today’s financial and the national exhibition has consistently sought to showcase artistic landscape, the those pushing the boundaries of contemporary media whilst national exhibition has addressing gender imbalance within exhibitions. Homma consistently sought to continues: “I think the restriction of scale and size is really in- showcase those pushing teresting, especially where male dominance is still prevalent the boundaries.” and larger or more ‘ambitious’ compositions can be seen to be stronger pieces. My works are literally produced in my kitchen, utilising the heat from a gas hob to burn the images on paper, and washing off the acidity in the bath.” Though created in the domestic environment, these compositions delve into the post-truth of today’s globalised politics. “I entered the competition to challenge my own practice, to see if an entry can be selected without contextual frameworks. The process of assessment gives practitioners the The 2018 ING Discerning chance to compete with those that are already recognised.” Eye exhibition runs Judges for the 2018 ING Discerning Eye exhibition include 15-25 November at Bridget McCrum, Artist; Frances Hedges, Associate Editor for Mall Galleries, London. Harper’s Bazaar; Cherie Federico, Editor of Aesthetica Magazine; Nick Ross, Radio and Television Presenter; John Benja- www.discerningeye.org min Hickey, Actor; and Sadie Clayton, Artist. www.kaorihomma.co.uk

01-2”, A problem of annihilation, 2005. Digital Print edition 1/50, 540mm x 780mm x 35mm. © Kaori Homma.

This November, the ING Discerning Eye exhibition returns to London’s Mall Galleries. Having invited six judges to select works from both nominations and submissions, the 2018 show includes a presentation of established and emerging practitioners, demonstrating innovation and diversity. Following on from previous editions of the prize, this year’s selections continue to support women in the arts. ING Discerning Eye has championed many female practitioners – early to mid-career – offering a number of varied prizes. Previous winners have included Dee Standford (Sculpture & 3D Work Prize, 2013), Oona Grimes, (London Regional Prize, 2014), Alison Lumb (St Cuthberts Mill Award, 2015) and Laura Critchlow (The Wright Purchase Prize, 2016). Alongside 2017’s winners – Jill Desborough, Camilla Dowse, Victoria Atkinson, Diana Evers, Jane Morgan, Sarah Jane Bellwood and Deborah Grice – Kaori Homma was awarded the Parker Harris Print Purchase Prize for Under the foreign sky IV, a fire-etching inspired by her 2005 film installation, A Problem of Annihilation. She notes: “The winning work stemmed out of a feeling of bewilderment. Earlier in 2017, I came across a news article about the sky over Tokyo and I discovered that a large part of the sky above my head where I grew up actually belonged to America. The realisation that invisible boundaries existed overhead – and the fact I was totally unaware of it – suddenly challenged my perceptions

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Blue Hole from Lone Stars, 2016. © Matt Henry / Courtesy Polka Galerie.

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Tales from America MATT HENRY Brighton-based photographer Matt Henry (b. 1978) spe- world of each narrative. Indeed, his cast had compelling “Henry specialises in cialises in photonarratives which resemble film stills that backstories in their own right, including a former police scripted series, with were never made, compelling viewers to imagine the links detective, NFL cheerleaders and a bodybuilding lawyer who an abiding fascination between dream-like images. His latest series, Southern Gothic lent his own 1967 Mustang and collection of firearms to the for American and Other Stories, pays homage to the fictions of authors shoot. The resulting works are sinister, dramatic and violent, culture, notably such as William Faulkner, Carson McCullers and Flannery though bright and polished. As Henry notes: “The small the counterculture O’Connor, who revived the conventions of the Gothic novel town has always been the perfect stage for the stories we tell of the 1960s and 1970s, influenced in the early 20th century, transplanting them to the American ourselves about what it really means to be human.” Lone Stars – including the image featured above, Blue by literature, south in order to examine the region’s post-Civil War character. It’s a genre where sinister situations and settings of Hole – channels the surreal atmospherics of David Lynch cinema and TV.” decaying social structures – notably rural communities and as disturbing events unfold in a mysterious Texan setting. plantations – give rise to stories steeped in folklore, which The TV series True Detective provided one of the inspirations emerge from a flux of poverty and racial and religious di- behind Born on the Bayou, shot in Louisiana, where Henry vision. Meanwhile, the use of absurdity and magic realism sets out in search of the kind of bar deep in the swamplands makes clear that this is a modernist reinvention rather than a in which the protagonist Rust Cohle could have retired. As in a film noir, the events that take place seem ambiguous. throwback to the tropes of European romanticism. Henry specialises in imaginative, scripted series, holding an Against a background of racial tension and violence, a drama abiding fascination for the USA, notably the counterculture unfolds before the viewer’s eyes and makes links to today. of the 1960s and 1970s, influenced by literature, cinema and Though set in the 1960s, this journey into hidden, neglected TV. For this show at Polka Galerie, Paris, he has created three communities that have long forgotten the “American Dream” innovative tales: The Curse of Nanny Goat Island, Lone Stars brings obvious resonances of the present political climate, Polka Galerie, Paris and Born on the Bayou, all set in small towns in the 1960s. He and the economic alienation and resurgent racism that fed Until 27 October works partly from a storyboard, partly from improvising with into the rise of Donald Trump to the presidency. The three his cast of unconventional, usually amateur local actors, to stories are also brought together in Henry’s new book Night www.polkagalerie.com create eccentric characters which exist in the self-contained of the Hunted, launched alongside the exhibition. www.matthenryphoto.com

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Deconstructing Illusion THE BEAUTY OF LINES Amongst the thematic sections is a study of what the straight “In its curation, line can do – whether it is controlled and strictly parallel, or The Beauty of Lines takes on a seemingly more spontaneous form, as demon- creates juxtapositions strated through work by Stéphane Couturier, Hiroshi Sugimo- between diverse works, to and Lewis Baltz, amongst others. Within this section, audi- which, though they ences are invited to consider the lines of force within images. may be far separated For example, in pieces by Couturier, the dynamic vertical and in time and geography, horizontal perspectives and strong lighting effects express reveal unexpected the opposing cycles of construction and demolition in the echoes and resonances modern urban landscapes, resulting in compositions that of form and structure suggest both a lack of control, and a state of precise harmony. between them.” Curves, meanwhile, are the essential element in representing and recognising the human form in all its complexity. Pictures by the likes of Robert Mapplethorpe, Edward Weston and Léon Levinstein emphasise how the curve defines both male and female bodies – along with a sense of intimacy and fluidity between the two. Finally, the exhibition leaves any idea of representation of the real world behind and moves into the sphere of pure abstraction through work by Minor White, Ray Metzker and Harry Callahan. For Aaron Siskind, straight photography crosses into the realm of abstrac- La Propriété Caillebotte, tion simply by focusing in tightly on details which, though Yerres, France originally taken from nature, architecture or the street, lose Until 2 December the context of the original subject in order to reveal a world which is composed of form, texture and, crucially, the line. www.elysee.ch

Cig Harvey (1973, United Kingdom), The Pale Yellow Cadillac, Sadie, Portland, Maine, 2010. © Cig Harvey.

Taken from the New York-based collection of Sondra Gilman and Celso Gonzalez-Falla, and curated by the Musée de l’Elysée, Paris, this investigation of the development of the photographic line through two centuries, which was previously seen in Lausanne, comes to La Propriété Caillebotte, once the home of Impressionist painter Gustave Caillebotte. The starting point is the illusion that forms the basis of experiencing photography, and of today’s screen-based image culture: the way in which even the most discerning viewer can easily forget that they are looking at a twodimensional surface. They are drawn into the seeming depth of a picture, to the details of the landscape, the subject of a portrait. The show aims to highlight the line as the basis of composition, which makes possible the mimetic illusion of three dimensions, and how artists have understood this within their practices. Henri Cartier-Bresson, for example, spoke of “the instantaneous lines made by movements of the subject” with which the artist must work, in unison with the subject, to capture the point when all elements come into equilibrium. In its curation, The Beauty of Lines creates juxtapositions between diverse works, which, though they may be far separated by time and geography, reveal unexpected echoes and resonances of form and structure. The featured visionaries include Cig Harvey, Berenice Abbott, Eugène Atget, Robert Adams, Walker Evans, Vik Muniz, Man Ray and Lee Friedlander.

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1. Ugo la Pietra, La casa telematica, 1983. Courtesy Archivio Ugo La Pietra, Milano. 2. Bruce Nauman. Human Nature/Life Death/Knows Doesn’t Know. 1983. Neon tubing with clear glass tubing suspension frames, 273.1 cm × 271.8 cm × 14.6 cm. Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Modern and Contemporary Art Council Fund. © 2018 Bruce Nauman/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo © Museum Associates/LACMA 3. Roman Vishniac, Interior of the Anhalter Bahnhof railway terminus near Potsdamer Platz, Berlin, 1929 - Early 1930s. © Mara Vishniac Kohn. Courtesy International Center of Photography.4. PIXEL by Hiroto Yoshizoe and Shunsuke Watanabe for B&B Italia Tokyo. 5. Architectural Workshops: ELEMENTAL, Villa Verde, Constitución, Chile, 2010. Photo: Elemental.

10 to See RECOMMENDED EXHIBITIONS THIS SEASON

Home Futures

Design Museum, London 7 November - 24 March

www.designmuseum.org Asking the question: “What happened to the future?” Home Futures explores social and technological aspirations in the home, through more than 150 objects and experiences. With works by Ettore Sottsass, Joe Colombo, Superstudio, Archigram, Alison and Peter Smithson, Hans Hollein, Jan Kaplicky, OMA and Dunne & Raby, it asks whether we are living in the way that pioneering architects and designers once predicted.

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www.moma.org Encompassing the artist’s entire career, Disappearing Acts occupies MoMa’s sixth floor and the whole of MoMA PS1. For nearly 50 years, Nauman (b.1941) has explored spatial and psychological tensions, and how they structure the wider human experience today. This joint presentation demonstrates a wide range of media, from drawing, photography and neon to performance, video, film, sculpture and architecturalscale environments.

www.thephotographers gallery.org.uk Fascinated from childhood by photography and science, Russian-born Roman Vishniac (1897-1990) is best known for creating a photographic record of Jewish life in eastern Europe in the inter-war years, a way of life about to vanish at the hands of the Nazis. Escaping to New York in 1941, Vishniac then began a new phase of his career as a pioneer of photomicroscopy, filming minute life forms.

www.designart.jp/en Returning for a second year, DESIGNART TOKYO turns the Japanese capital into a city-wide celebration of creative culture, spanning design, art, fashion, technology and more. Participating artists include architect Sou Fujimoto, design studio Yoy and furniture manufacturer Conde House. Bethan Laura Wood and Kazunori Matsumura collaborate on a colourful designed environment in a special commission.

Bruce Nauman

MoMA/MoMA PS1 21 October - 25 February

Roman Vishniac

The Photographers’ Gallery, London 26 October - 24 February

Designart Tokyo 2018

Various venues 19-28 October

Elemental

Louisiana, Humblebaek 11 October - 28 February

www.louisiana.dk The latest in the Louisiana’s series The Architect’s Studio focuses on Chilean studio ELEMENTAL, headed by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Alejandro Aravena. The company built its reputation on an innovative and pragmatic approach to social housing in the Chilean capital Santiago. It has gone on to design everything from museum buildings to private homes, with the UC Innovation Center at Santiago University a signature project.

6. FAIZA BOUGUESSA, for FAIZA BOUGUESSA (est. 2014, United Arab Emirates). Geometric Abaya dress with belt, 70˚ Collection, 2014. Polyester crepe, satin lining. Courtesy of Faiza Bouguessa. 7. Shirley Baker, Abandoned Car, 1961. Courtesy the artist estate 8. Trevor Paglen, Maximally Stable Extremal Regions; Good Features to Track, 2017. Pigment print, 72.39 cm x 101.60 cm. 9. Basir Mahmood, A Message to the Sea, 2012. Single-channel video, color, sound, 06:04. Courtesy of the artist. 10. Chris Engman, Landscape for Quentin, 2017. Digital pigment prints, 109.22 cm x 140.97 cm. Courtesy of the artist and Luis De Jesus Los Angeles.

Contemporary Muslim Fashions

De Young, San Francisco Until 6 January

www.deyoung.famsf.org From Nike’s first professional sports hijab, to a veil made up of stars and stripes as a symbol of political protest, the interaction of faith, culture, fashion and individual expression is examined in this world-first exhibition. It traverses interpretations of religious dress codes from high-end fashion, street wear and commissioned couture in order to consider how Muslims express themselves through dress.

Modern Nature

The Hepworth, Wakefield Until 22 April

www.hepworthwakefield.org From the collection of Claire and James Hyman, this new exhibition of photographs by leading British photographers such as Shirley Baker, Bill Brandt, Anna Fox, Chris Killip, Martin Parr and Tony Ray-Jones explores our evolving relationship with the organic world in an age dominated by urban living, and how this shapes individuals and communities. Modern Nature charts this journey from the end of WWII.

Artes Mundi 8

National Museum Cardiff 26 October - 24 February

www.artesmundi.org The shortlist for the eighth edition of the biennial art prize, worth £40,000, has been announced, selected from more than 450 nominations from 86 countries. The five artists in competition are Anna Boghiguian (Canada/Egypt), Bouchra Khalili (Morocco/France), Otobong Nkanga (Nigeria), Trevor Paglen (USA) and Apichatpong Weerasethakul (Thailand). The prize, last won by John Akomfrah, is awarded in January.

Basir Mahmood

Letitia Gallery, Beirut Until 3 November

www.letitiagallerybeirut.com Basir Mahmood (b. 1985) uses photography and video to reflect upon the social and historical dimensions of a closely-observed everyday life. The solo exhibition Eyes Recently Seen, features works from the past five years, including his meditation on the lives of fishermen (A Message to the Sea, 2012) and new pieces that investigate communal activity, consumption and the division of resources, such as 2018 works Milk and All Good Things.

FotoFocus Biennial

Various locations 4-7 October

www.fotofocusbiennial.org The largest lens-based biennial in America, and now in its fourth iteration, the 2018 edition of FotoFocus encompasses more than 90 projects at museums and galleries across Greater Cincinnati, Northern Kentucky, Dayton and Columbus. The unifying theme this year is Open Archive – emphasising the centrality of photography to modernity and examining the fundamental need to preserve images in the current landscape.

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Networks of the World Photofairs | Shanghai CONTEMPORARY CHINESE ARTISTS DEMONSTRATE A CONSIDERATION OF CENSORSHIP IN THE WIDER INDUSTRY, OFFERING FIGURATIVE AND DEEPLY METAPHORICAL MESSAGES.

On 9 November 2015, at a Christie’s auction in New York, This number is set to continue to expand dramatically, with an oil painting of a nude woman was sold for $170.4 mil- a 250% increase in the number of exhibitions in 2017 comlion. The sale would prove to be the second-highest price pared to 2014. As for the event, it reports visitor growth as ever paid for an artwork at auction. It was bought with an exceeding numbers by over half: 64% since 2014. The expansion of PHOTOFAIRS, coupled with the ostentaAmerican Express card. The painting was by Amedeo Modigliani, an early 20th century Italian Jewish painter and sculp- tious rise of super-collectors, serve to capture the Chinese tor who died at the age of 35. The buyer was a former taxi art market at a pivotal time of emergence. In the past decade, driver, Liu Yiqian, who had risen from a large working-class photography has moved forward as the nation’s most popufamily in Shanghai in the 1960s to become one of China’s lar medium for purchase. This has been powered by the somost famous multi-billionaires. After dropping out of middle called “fuerdai” (which translates literally as “second genschool, he began selling leather handbags, and then later eration rich”). Many of these collectors are millennials, who drove a taxi, before finding more successful ways to profit have come of age as China has globalised, with the spread from the liberalisation of Chinese markets in the early 1990s. of the internet allowing for an understanding of the wider Liu Yiqian is a controversial figure – he’s regarded by many, world like never before. These individuals comprise one of and indeed is happy to be called, a “tuhao,” a popular Chinese the key demographics for buyers this year. Yet what are they buying? In China, any photograph, or, for term for the nouveaux rich. Heads were turned when later he bought a tiny Ming dynasty porcelain cup for $36.3 million that matter, any creation of artwork or expression of journalat a Sotheby’s auction, and proceeded to be photographed ism is subject to approval from the Communist Party, the in the bar drinking tea from the 600-year-old cup. Yet these founding and ruling singular group. If a practitioner is cenpurchases also serve to highlight a remarkable meeting of Chi- sored by the state apparatus, there can be widespread implinese wealth and the western art market. They led a cohort of cations on their career and social freedom, including whethcollectors who, quite suddenly, began dominating the auction er they have the ability to leave and return to the country, how they are seen within artistic circles, and their acceptance houses in the years following the millennium. This September, PHOTOFAIRS, devised by the World Pho- in everyday civic life. All this provides photographers with a tography Organisation, launched its fifth Shanghai edition, complex set of issues – how do they express their concerns, allowing people from the city to buy artwork from across whilst also successfully navigating the authorities? How do the world – and from across China. Since the inaugural edi- they remain sanctioned, but create truthful artwork? It’s important to contextualise photography’s remarkable tion, four dedicated photography museums have opened, and more than 70 exhibitions have taken place in the city. rise in China. During the Cultural Revolution – an era largely

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Chen Wei, In the Waves #5, 2013. © CHEN Wei, courtesy of ShanghART Gallery (Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore).

“The expansion of Photofairs, coupled with the ostentatious rise of super-collectors, serve to capture the Chinese art market at a pivotal time. Photography has become the nation’s most popular medium.”

Previous Page: Chen Wei, Stairs, 2015. © CHEN Wei, courtesy of ShanghART Gallery (Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore). Left: Chen Wei, The Door, 2014. © CHEN Wei, courtesy of ShanghART Gallery (Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore).

recognised as between 1966 to 1976 – image-making was used, effectively and comprehensively, as a propagandist tool by the state. Practitioners were told what to document, and their negatives were held by authorities. Any privatelyheld pictures in the country were deemed to be illegal. As the 1970s wore on, an underground movement of defiantly unofficial photojournalists emerged, propelled by the ideals of confronting power with unvarnished, unmanipulated truth. This pioneering revolution was largely quashed, or at least kept securely underground, by censors keen to hide the inequities of the system. From this dialectic between state-backed photography and insurgent journalism came a virulent third strand – an experimental, highly conceptual and figurative style of fine art photography. In the midst of the photojournalism movement was Liu Heung Shing, a Pulitzer-Prize winning artist who left the country to become Time magazine’s foreign correspondent in Los Angeles, New Delhi, Seoul and Moscow. In the early 1980s, he returned home to create the seminal photobook China After Mao. Newsweek referred to the publication as “a uniquely informed transcultural perspective on the complexities of the post-Mao era,” and described Liu himself as “the Henri Cartier-Bresson of China.” In 2015, Liu Heung Shing opened the Shanghai Centre of Photography, one of the largest public-facing institutions of its kind. He notes: “When I was growing up, all the photographs in the newspapers were fake.” After the sweeping Cultural Revolution and the free market reforms of the 1980s, “the economy accelerated at a speed no-one expected, and we forgot that these ideological constraints are always there. Photography is accepted if it doesn’t threaten the order of the government.”

For Liu Heung Shing, the dearth of photojournalism since the 1970s heyday, and its replacement by a newer, more experimental strain of compositions, is troubling. “Through social media, exhibitions and travelling, photography has become hugely popular for the millennial generation,” he says. “This art is something that can keep people happy, so the scrutiny is relaxed. But [the government] is still behind it.” One of these new practitioners – and one of the most commercially successful artists in recent years – is 38-yearold Chen Wei. At PHOTOFAIRS, his works are hung alongside a mini retrospective. Viewers see ravens picking through trash in a tiny, claustrophobic space. Or a stained tablecloth spread over a long dining table vacant of food or life. They will see televisions standing side-by-side in tiny private cubicles, or a club-like gathering of ghost-like youngsters. In other photographs, we see a pair of glasses with the lenses blown out, as if the owner’s head has exploded. In another, a man stands on an obelisk-like podium, dogs prowling beneath, their eyes turned up towards him. Empty landscapes are often used – where doors lead to nowhere and bold, concrete structures allude to open spaces. They are dark and haunting pieces, ones that swim deep into the fathoms of your brain. Although lacking overt – or perceivably obvious – political commentary, they seem to suggest that we are at risk of losing our freedom, or that it has already been taken from us without our knowledge. Yet, on the surface level, they are photographs that constantly elude any ideological definition. Chen’s images have all passed the censorship test and will be on sale for thousands of pounds. If recent history is anything to go by, there’s little doubt he will prove widely popular with young buyers.

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Chen Wei, In the Waves #4, 2013. © CHEN Wei, courtesy of ShanghART Gallery (Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore).

Born in 1980, Chen was introduced to a China that was in conflict with the police, but much more difficult to flag still responding to the arrest of the notorious Gang of Four up an image of violently broken glasses, or of a chair splatin 1976 and adapting to the beginnings of Deng Xiaoping’s tered with the red of pelted tomatoes. Chen is carefully and free market reforms. His teenage years coincided with the skilfully making statements through the judicious use of country establishing itself as the world’s new superpower – metaphor, symbolism and multivalence, and the resulting a one-party state based on untold resources and the relent- images, though less direct, are all the more powerful for it. As James Donald states in Framing Impossible Futures: less embrace of commerce. At the Mayfair Gallery of Brown Fine Arts in 2014, he spoke of his work as being “a reaction Chen Wei’s Surreal Documentation and The Demise of Hyperto Chinese life.” But the pieces remain defiantly oblique, bole, “Chen is part of an emerging post-cultural revolution, one wholly unlike those of generations past. Chen’s age depicting troubled human environments absent of people. The most important picture he has ever taken, Chen noted, group has begun to concern itself with themes transcendis of a decrepit statue of a young boy. He is standing in ing the disarray spawned in the aftermath of Mao Zedong’s a fountain, and adorned with gold coins, which glitter in disastrous nationwide social experiment. He is part of a genthe water around the podium on which he stands. “These eration less focused on political history or obvious social fountains were everywhere in China during the 1980s and criticisms than wider personal and intellectual freedoms 1990s,” he said, explaining that the boy’s posture was one and the individual’s place in a now modern and developed of deference to communism. “Nowadays, all these monu- China. History for these populations has been obscured by ments are demolished. You can barely find one anywhere. economic reforms, and the speed and scale of development in the contemporary country which they have witnessed.” Now they are abstract. This is the government’s decision.” So how are practitioners like Chen finding a new kind In a further interview given to Ocula in 2017, Chen commented on what motivates him to make his photographs. of aestheticism in today’s market? How are they building The answer? “Because of tragedy. These are the forces that connections and breaking down barriers in today’s mediadrive my creation. They are more like a quality of spirit. Dif- saturated landscape? Perhaps censorship itself is an unexferent people have subtle understandings of them. For expected element that – whilst tricky to navigate – provides ample, in the New City series, I hope to highlight the gap some source of inspiration and motivation. As Professor between people’s imagination of urbanity and the reality. Jiang Jiehong, Director of the Centre for Chinese Visual Arts at Birmingham City University and editor of the Journal of The space lying inbetween is one of the tragic elements.” It’s possible Chen is merely acting out a purposeful strat- Contemporary Chinese Art concludes: “Avoiding censorship egy here – for he does not want to overtly critique the is a creative process. I see that method as a reinforcement of system in which he so successfully exists. It’s easy to censor the artist’s strategy … It’s too easy and too lazy to say ‘ok, I a photograph depicting, for example, a political protestor give up.’ Scaling that wall is part of the beauty.”

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Right: Chen Wei, Lost Hotel, 2016. © CHEN Wei, courtesy of ShanghART Gallery (Shanghai, Beijing, Singapore).

Words Tom Seymour

www.photofairs.org/shanghai

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art

Spatial Landmarks Kris Provoost

Kris Provoost (b. 1987) is a Belgian-born photographer, currently designing and documenting buildings in order to better understand the world. After graduating in 2010, he relocated to Beijing, working for Zaha Hadid and Buro Ole Scheeren, before moving over to Shanghai for GMP Architekten. Complementing a knowledge in architectural infrastructure, Provoost’s images merge the analytical with the creative – surveying glassy monuments with an eye for anatomic detail. The following pages provide a sea of manmade textures and lines, following the curvature of city icons and the angles of office blocks. Featured projects include the 632-metre-high Shanghai Tower and Heatherwick Studio’s UK Pavilion, which was themed around the future of cities and their relation to nature in busy spaces. Beautifying dissected forms, Provoost draws attention to the pavilion’s intriguing surface – where 250,000 seeds are implanted into acrylic hairs – merging the organic with the engineered. www.krisprovoost.com.

Kris Provoost, Shanghaitower, Shanghai. Designed by Gensler.

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Kris Provoost, Duo, Singapore. Designed by Buro Ole Scheeren.

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Kris Provoost, Spanish Pavilion, Shanghai World Expo 2010, Shanghai. Designed by EMBT.

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Kris Provoost, Shanghai 2010 Expo Main Boulevard, Shanghai. Designed by SBA.

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Kris Provoost, Unknown Building, Shanghai. Designed by Unknown.

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Kris Provoost, British Pavilion, Shanghai World Expo 2010 , Shanghai. Designed by Heatherwick Studio.

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art

Playful Messages Sing-Sing

Sing-Sing is the award-winning collaborative studio of set designer / photographer Adi Goodrich and animator / director Sean Pecknold. The duo work together on everything from design to film, creating projects for the likes of Sagmeister & Walsh, Fleet Foxes and, showcased here, Lyft, a taxi travel app providing over 1 million rides per day in the USA. For this, Sing-Sing produced a bank of on-screen characters for social, advertising and promotional usage. With environments built around comedic props and narrative prompts, viewers are encouraged to look further into the commercial side of imagery, considering the numerous layers of craftsmanship written into each photograph. Architecture, design and art coalesce in colourful worlds to create something truly multidisciplinary, whilst figurative scenarios reflect upon humanity today â&#x20AC;&#x201C; where busy workers pay no attention to each other and smartphones provide perfect mealtime company. www.sing-sing.co.

Photography & Set Design: Sing-Sing | Production: Connect the Dots, Meghan Gallagher | Lyft Creative Director: Jesse McMillin Lyft Art Director / Designer: Will Geddes Lyft Producer: Max Morse | Lighting: Gregory Brouillette, Chris Moore, Clay Rasmussen | Art Department: Dustin Ruegger, DD Rozas, Aaron Wiley, Cliff Collins, Sam Margherita | Wardrobe: Kat Rumford Hair: Chanel Croker | Makeup: Erin Walters.

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Photography & Set Design: Sing-Sing Production: Connect the Dots, Meghan Gallagher | Lyft Creative Director: Jesse McMillin Lyft Art Director / Designer: Will Geddes Lyft Producer: Max Morse | Lighting: Gregory Brouillette, Chris Moore, Clay Rasmussen | Art Department: Dustin Ruegger, DD Rozas, Aaron Wiley, Cliff Collins, Sam Margherita | Wardrobe: Kat Rumford | Hair: Chanel Croker Makeup: Erin Walters.

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Photography: Sing-Sing Art Direction / Set Design: Adi Goodrich Build: Dustin Ruegger Wardrobe: Katrina Rumford Production: Vacation Theory.

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Cultural Anthropology Civilization RECONSIDERING HUMANITY’S PLACE WITHIN A COMPLEX, MEDIA-SATURATED AND ACCELERATING WORLD THROUGH THE PRESENCE OF CONTEMPORARY IMAGE-MAKING.

It didn’t make headlines. For most of us, it passed unrecognised – just another day on Planet Earth. But a decade ago, in 2008, the human race underwent a profound cultural shift. For the first time in our history, a majority of us lived not in a small pocket of the world’s endless natural expanses, but all on top of each other – in cities. The scales swung the other way, and we became “an urban animal.” Scientists have widely named this phenomenon the Anthropocene – the age of man. And it is, as the title of William A Ewing and Holly Roussell’s Civilization attests: “The way we live now.” Published by Thames & Hudson, the book combines images from a wide range of contemporary series with a series of essays, exploring how, as co-editor Ewing writes: “Today we are mostly in awe of ourselves.” He touches upon a profound shift, not only in the ways in which we inhabit the planet, but a change in what we understand to be photography. The invention of the camera in the mid-19th century gave birth to a mass media tool, a way of reflecting and seeing our surroundings that, whilst fighting for recognition, also fundamentally altered the form and role of modern art. But in the 21st century, this came under threat, Thomas Struth acknowledges, with the irruption / disruption of the digital era. “Photography as we’ve known it is fast disappearing, overpowered by technological inventions,” he writes. Civilization considers such a thought, investigating how the still image has this knack for addressing the state of the world. Artists are at work everywhere, looking at everything. Although they’re participants in a new and still emerging medium, they are perhaps the documentarians best placed

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to capture what has become known as the “global village” – the experience of a newly urbanised species which is now also able to communicate with each other instantly, and without the inconveniences of distances of geography, or the imposition of linguistic and cultural boundaries. We may be more aware of our divisions and opinions than ever before, but we are in fact far closer together, more bound by mutual interest, than at any point in our shared history. Ewing is the former Director of the Musée de l’Elysée in Lausanne and has since established himself as a leading publisher of photobooks that look at the fast-moving intersection between photography and anthropology. “Something astonishing is happening, at rapid pace,” he says. “A planetary civilisation is emerging. Think of the recent World Cup; half the population watched some part of it – 3.2 billion of us. Think of the Olympics, which reaches down into every village on the Earth’s surface. Billions of people watch these events, and globally we spend trillions on them. “Think also of air travel. You or I can decide today to fly to Ulan Bator tonight, and be there tomorrow. Armed with a slim piece of plastic, with codes inscribed on it, which anyone can verify, we can drive to the airport, choose from a number of routes and airlines, and have ourselves picked up. Hours later, we could be placed down on the other side of the planet – fed, watered, entertained – and safer than if we’d stayed on the ground. We keep two million people in the air at all times, which is an airborne metropolis that is bigger than San Francisco and Vancouver combined. “Nike, Hubble, Airbus, Mercedes, CERN, antibiotics, heart

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Henrik Spohler, THE THIRD DAY. Reservoir for greenhouse irrigation, El Ejido, Andalusia.

“Maddow’s point of humans as genetically social also applies to photography. As Ewing points out, no man (with a camera) is an island. ‘We’ve been trained to think of artists as solitary workers. But, on examination, that falls apart.’”

Previous Page: White Road and Trees, Adams, MA, 1987. Ref. #: LS_2659_27. © Alex MacLean.

Left: Detail of Untitled (Train Crossing Great Salt Lake), Utah, 2016. Chromogenic print. © Victoria Sambunaris. Courtesy of the artist and Yancey Richardson Gallery.

transplants – all are evidence of us increasingly inhabit- athletes, but the rest of the organisation is more or less foring the same world. Is this a smooth process? Of course not. gotten. Similarly, Hollywood, the dream machine with an There is much friction. But terrorists are also using smart- international reach, leaves us dazzled by a handful of stars. phones, YouTube and Twitter. The fact of the matter is we But I am always reminded of the collective reality of filmmaking when the final movie credits roll and roll and roll.” both inhabit this same human-made skin of the planet.” Spanning more than 350 pages and including close to This idea is captured through the book’s impressively diverse collection of photography, spanning epic manu- 500 images – many previously unpublished – such a mamfactured landscapes, like Edward Burtynsky’s now famous moth enterprise has been broken down into different chapimage of a chicken processing plant in Dehui City, China, ters, each exploring the underpinnings of provocative titles: along with sweeping vistas of the built environment, like words like Control, Rupture, Escape, Persuasion and Hive. Most compelling of these is maybe the chapter titled InRobert Polidori’s stately shots of the slums of Mumbai, to portraits of individuals in enclosed domestic spaces, such as dividual Combined / AloneTogether. Intriguing because, as in Benny Lam’s Trapped, which documents the living condi- the chapter attests, people have an instinctive, atavistic tentions of migrant workers in Hong Kong, or Michael Wolf’s dency to seek each other out. Ben Maddow, from his 1977 geometric series Architecture of Density, depicting expansive text Faces – a historical overview of portraiture – is quoted: “We are not solitary mammals, like the fox and the tiger,” urban skylines, which adorns Civilization’s cover. But amidst these compositions – the kind you might expect Maddow writes. “We are genetically social, like the elephant, to find animating Ewing’s argument – are more subtle depic- the whale and the ape.” His point is drawn alongside Ahmad tions. A double page spread is given to a grid-like staging of Zamroni’s bird’s-eye view of Muslims bowing together in Roger Eberhard’s recent series Standard, showing the many prayer – countless backs are bent in a moment of heartdifferent hotel rooms he has visited throughout the world – stoppingly beautiful shared synchronicity and faith. Maddow’s point of humans as genetically social also apall of which look strikingly similar. Or there’s Mark Power’s queues of tourists waiting in similar orderly lines whilst sur- plies to photography. As Ewing points out, no man (with a rounded by some of humanity’s greatest creations, in the camera) is an island. “We’ve been trained to think of artists as series L’Italia E Gli Italiani. The curation of these diverse solitary workers. But, on examination, that falls apart. They compositions provides a visual impression of how big and need camera and lens makers, electronics experts, drivers, diverse the planet is, and yet how uniform our experience of pilots to transport them. They rely on labs, paper-makers, pigment and ink-makers, then agents, dealers, curators, cultural icons can be, from one person to the next. As Ewing says: “The collective reality of our lives is dis- funding institutions, editors, designers, publishers, promoguised by the cult of individuality. Those trillion-dollar tors. Each is immersed in a web of interdependency. But I Olympic Games end up worshipping a handful of superb think of the collective in another sense,” Ewing says.

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Henrik Spohler, THE THIRD DAY. Tree nursery, rows of clipped trees, northern Germany.

“Imagine a satellite view of the world, or any country or city. If you had good enough eyes, you’d see thousands of photographers busy beavering away. Some work for themselves, and some for others. Here’s Raimond Wouda focusing on schools, or Thomas Struth looking at museums, Dona Schwartz with family arrangements, or Edward Burtynsky on the oil industry. They are producing a portrait of our planet. Some work on landscapes, cities and machines, others on order, and the rest on conflict. There are hard-nosed realists, and those that employ fictive or metaphoric techniques. “In Civilization, we have simply taken the widest view of this that was possible. It’s a sampling, of course. Even a show of 100,000 works would be a mere sampling. There are billions of pictures which are being made annually, perhaps even daily. Who know, or cares, beyond a certain number. But most are mere flickers, ones that don’t come close to anything resembling permanence. But amongst them are those which do tell us something which we didn’t already know.” It’s a compelling idea. Also featured within the pages are Adam Ferguson’s portraits of soldiers returning from war in Iraq and Afghanistan. They’re simple, closely-cropped portraits of starkly-lit faces in a sea of black. They’re of people who carry with them the internal scars of the battlefield and are expressing this through their 1,000-yard stares. What does this have to do with the idea of being alone and together? And yet the inference is clear – soldiers survive such brutal wars by developing the kind of ties that transcend friendship. They entrust each other totally with their lives, in the proper functioning of a unit of interdependent people as a way of protecting an individual against an overwhelming existential threat. Another example might be Victoria Sam-

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bunaris’s open salt lakes complementing Henrik Spohler’s uniformed, plastic-looking landscapes. Both document an unprecedented type of living where artifice is the new normal. In these instances, viewers are tasked with questioning what is “real” or “natural,” and, indeed, whether the outcome of such a process of inquiry is important at all. Alex MacLean’s aerial images offer a similar view of the world – documenting the working of transportation and agriculture with an almost omniscient and, therefore, distanced view. Then there’s George Georgiou’s slightly haphazard representation of parades, which were taken across America’s deep south. The pictures, in monochrome, have little in the way of organising principles to them at first consideration. But the title, Company of Strangers, and Georgiou’s own accompanying words, are key to understanding this work – as an outsider trying to work out the practices of a strange and alien culture in a bid to find his own place within it. The artist notes: “In a lot of places, a community doesn’t see itself – then you have that day when you can see people you haven’t seen for ages. And an outsider can see that community and lose any prejudices of that neighbourhood.” Georgiou, in that sense, has found a way of discovering a unifying idea in photography that, at first glance, can appear crowded and chaotic. It’s an idea that appeals to Ewing: “Our book proposes ways of looking at works that support our central theme,” he says. “It’s a purposely ‘loose’ structure, and any viewer is free to say: ‘I would have put this work in that other chapter.’ But the reader will be thinking of doing so. This is what curators want. We’re in a sense holding up a mirror with this book, one in which I hope people will recognise themselves, or see a world they know.”

Right: Rice Fields, Davis, CA, 2003. Ref. #:LS_8320_28. © Alex MacLean.

Words Tom Seymour

Civilization: The Way We Live Now is published by Thames & Hudson on 16 October. www.thamesandhudson.com

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art

Dramatic Portraiture Alessio Albi

To incorporate a filmic sense of drama in his works, Alessio Albi (b. 1986) uses surrounding wildlife to create an improvised shadow, silhouette, or border – embedding anonymous figures within a highly textured and detailed landscape. Set amongst rugged topographies, each image has a carefully considered colour scheme – deep seas match with denim styling, rich copper desert tones blend into auburn hair and pale white bedding reaches a focal point with the light of the sky outside windows. Following on coherently from each other, the images are united by a light blue palette and an almost melancholy effect found within the models’ hair. Albi utilises the ability of each strand to swerve, curl and wrap around the characters’ faces like an organic frame, connecting the photographs to a wider feeling of fluidity and freedom, despite their staged theatricality. www.alessioalbiphotography.com.

Alessio Albi (Instagram: @alessioalbi). Model: Martina Esposito. Courtesy of the artist.

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Alessio Albi (Instagram: @alessioalbi). Model: Martina Vodanova. Courtesy of the artist.

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Alessio Albi (Instagram: @alessioalbi). Model: Ksenia Finenko. Stylist: Fluidadesign. Courtesy of the artist.

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Alessio Albi (Instagram: @alessioalbi). Model: Martina Esposito. Courtesy of the artist.

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Alessio Albi (Instagram: @alessioalbi). Model: Martina Vodanova. Courtesy of the artist.

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Alessio Albi (Instagram: @alessioalbi). Model: Ksenia Finenko. Stylist: Fluidadesign. Courtesy of the artist.

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Inclusive Collections Land of Distraction A NEW FASHION LABEL REDRESSES THE NOTION OF FEMININITY WITH CLEAN LINES AND WORKWEAR STAPLES AS WELL AS A WORLDVIEW THAT EXTENDS TO SOCIAL ACTIVISM.

LAND of Distraction (LoD) founder Danita Short knows workwear. The designer grew up on a sprawling farm just outside the rural Canadian town of Coronation, Alberta (population 940). It’s an isolated place, hours by car from the nearest city, where rickety wood-clad grain silos from decades past cause the only interference on a horizon that stretches well beyond comprehension. It’s a level-flat platter of butter yellow fields under a sky so big you can read the incoming weather like a book. “Being removed from the city, I was able to use my imagination a lot as a child,” Short says. It seems the tranquil, unchanging prairies of her upbringing are still working their magic, providing inspiration for a fledgling label long after moving south, having since traded the Albertan wheat fields for Laurel Canyon, an address steeped in glam-rock folklore. Originally trained as a nurse, Short relocated to Los Angeles several years ago – in what she describes as a “spontaneous move” – harbouring dreams of starting a new creative life in southern California. She met her now business partner, the Canadian investor Laurie Venning, during a planning session in the city and the rest, as the story goes, is history. “He inspired me to follow my passion and start the fashion brand,” she says. And just like that, LoD was born. The next step was finding someone with the technical know-how to realise the creative visions that had been swimming around Short’s head since childhood. She was introduced – in a manner described as a “business blind date” – to New York-based designer Christian Juul Nielsen. A fashion industry veteran, Juul Nielsen previously held

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senior positions at Christian Dior, Oscar de la Renta and as of September 2018, has added the notch of Creative Director at Herve Leger to an already distinguished belt. Now on its fourth collection, LoD has become synonymous with clean lines and boxy yet flattering cuts that provide fine canvases for rich, durable materials in an array of playfully muted shades. “The core tenet of our brand is easy-going clothing that is both functional and wearable, made with luxury quality.” The wide-ranging line includes full-length suede skirts that look as though they were purpose-built for kicking up the dust as well as slightly cropped nubby wool jumpers that channel a lived-in, thrift shop feel – in the best way possible. There’s of-the-moment wide wale corduroy in the form of 1970s-style suits, lots of denim, rubberised trench coats and bombers, plus heavy-duty cotton twill which is found on western-inspired shirts and sleek flared trousers: the types of textiles that wouldn’t rock the boat if they showed up for duty on the ranch. To contrast the harder elements, there are velvet mini-dresses in pale pink, dreamy floor length tulle sundresses and sportybut-feminine blouses in floral-printed silk, providing just enough feminine romance to swing the collection out of androgynous territory. Decoration is minimal, but it does remain loyal to a number of signature motifs which run through the collection: “topstitching, big pockets, textures and unique colour palettes” are emblematic of the brand. “We wanted to use soft fabrics that are still luxe,” says Juul Nielson, who decided early on to focus on easy movement and effortless comfort. “The clothing had to be something

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Courtesy Land of Distraction. Image: © Alessio Boni.

“To create a collection that is thoroughly durable and built to last through seasons one has to understand how the body moves, how garments will wear and fray over time, as well as how exactly to reinforce them.”

Previous Page: Courtesy Land of Distraction. Image: © Alessio Boni. Left: Courtesy Land of Distraction. Image: © Alessio Boni.

people could throw on and go, but still look very put of high and low dressing, but fast fashion has an expiration together, nothing too constricting. For Collection Two, we date of two-to-three wears. LoD is made of materials that removed the darts from many of the shirts and insisted on are meant to last longer than other collections. We view the adding pockets to the dresses,” he explains of the pared- brand as seasonless, so our customers can build a story.” It may have taken a village to launch the company and down design process underlying the brand’s evolving aesthetic. “I wanted to be comfortable and still fashionable,” recruiting a former design head from Dior certainly helps to stoke up the buzz around a new label, but when it comes adds Short, “which isn’t always the case for many brands.” As for the colour palette, earthy tones are a direct to inspiration, Short needn’t look far. Created in her own response to a recent trip home. Taking a pilgrimage to image, she’s the collection’s heart, soul and perennial muse, the motherland – Short’s family farm – Juul Nielson was seeking inspiration in cross-country road trips. Having able to glimpse firsthand the day-to-day uniforms which previously traversed the United States and the Czech are found on a working farm. Whilst there, he filled up on Republic, searching the globe for new creative sparks, she inspiration from the lived-in garb men were wearing in the looks as though she could have toppled headfirst out of a fields. “We fell in love with all of the vintage uniforms and motorcycle flick, flared jeans, tattoos and all. The collections the unintentional styling of the farmhands,” he says of inevitably mix the prairie-inflected influences of her rural their trip north, from which he took cues back to New York, and minimal upbringing with a rocker twist that’s based on “borrowing some of the elements of the finer elements from her current location and its colourful cultural associations, the landscape and translating them into cool and wearable “imagining what life was like in Los Angeles in the late 1970s, where groupies chased after rock stars – and borrowed their pieces with a feminine and contemporary update.” “I think that shoppers still want clothing that looks amaz- clothes – before getting all dressed up for the clubs at night.” However, LoD’s wares remain restrained amidst this launing, actually fits beautifully and is made of real fabrics,” explains Short of what she believes sets LoD apart in an dry list of influences. The utilitarian designs are also a welindustry that cycles through styles at a lightning fast rate. come break from the hyperbolic take on western dressing The key to the collection’s approach to quality includes an that has been permeating the fashion world as of late. Fall understanding of the rigour that goes into proper workwear. / Winter 2018 collections were rife with such references: To create a collection that is built to last through the sea- fellow Canadians, Dean and Dan Caten of DSquared2, trotsons – both in style and in durability – one has to under- ted cowboy-style shirts and bolero ties down the runways stand how the body moves, how garments will wear and of Milan, whilst Versace offered a leather-bound take on fray over time, as well as how to reinforce them, which re- the trend with their bondage-inspired rodeo garb. Maxquires the kind of thoughtfulness that much of the industry Mara and Isabel Marant’s interpretations involved copious is sorely lacking at the moment. Short says: “We are aware amounts of fringe: wide-shouldered blanket coats by the

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Courtesy Land of Distraction. Image: © Alessio Boni.

former, ponchos and roughly-hewn fur coats by the latter. Alongside this, it was Maria Grazia Chiuri at Dior that took the trend to its logical conclusion with a collection that was deeply inspired by the iconography of the American west, and which included flat brim hats (a nod to Georgia O’Keeffe), turquoise jewellery and patterns sourced from ancient rock art. The historic French fashion house went so far as to celebrate the collection by holding an over-thetop rodeo-themed runway show in the Santa Monica mountains, complete with models on horseback and hot air balloons. But these brilliant daydreams of an Italian couturier in Paris certainly exist on the opposite end of the spectrum from the real farms that inform LoD’s collections; they are ample evidence of a trend that shows no sign of slowing down or giving up, especially in a competitive industry. Indeed, a rural upbringing makes for a good story and plenty of imaginative fodder, but it also sets Short apart as an independent visionary drawing on inspiration from outside of metropolitan bubbles. She inhabits an unconventional place in the fashion industry, having eschewed the well-trodden design school-plus-internship route, choosing instead to jump headfirst into her own line. “I would definitely consider myself an outsider in fashion,” she says of her unusual path. Instead of this unorthodox beginning boxing her in, it seems that it has brought a fresh perspective to an industry which is often accused of having a narrow lens. “We’re making clothes that can be attainable to a broader audience.” And isn’t that what art should do? This inclusive attitude has now led Short to partner with the United States of Women (USOW), a US-based organisation that promotes gender equality and female empowerment through networking opportunities and a yearly

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summit. Short describes her motivation, in seeking out the innovative and remarkable work of USOW: “When launching the label it was important for me to find a way to give back and help others. We partnered with the organisation because they support women as leaders, as entrepreneurs, as people.” As the 2018 apparel partner of the organisation, the LoD team produced a capsule collection of slogan tees, the proceeds of which went to the 2018 event. An accompanying campaign saw the label teaming up with activists who are vocal in their respective fields, including disability rights campaigner Emily Ladau, publisher of Feminist Press; Jamia Wilson, founder of @equalityforHER; Blair Imani, organiser of the Women’s March; Sarah Sophie Flicker and adapted athlete Mia Ives Rublee. “I think that it’s important to acknowledge the issues, and then work to make this industry more inclusive,” says Short, “I want to make lines for all people. It’s something that we, collectively, are still working on, but definitely, it’s a core tenet of what I’m trying to do personally.” Looking towards the future, the brand’s image is going to remain steadfastly set in the real world as it aims to grow in an accessible way. “We are launching a campaign called This is my LAND,” she explains of the label’s next steps, “it showcases real people wearing our collection whilst highlighting their passion. We also want to continue to support emerging artists and performers and welcome them into our vision.” More than just a marketing stunt, LoD’s decision to align itself with such a diverse and inclusive world view hopefully signals a changing wind and the arrival of new voices in the notoriously homogenous fashion industry. “Our ‘land’ is diverse. It’s made up of highly creative individuals across a range of media.” One hopes the wider fashion business will follow suit.

Right: Courtesy Land of Distraction. Image: © Alessio Boni.

Words Laura May Todd

www.landofdistraction.com

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art

Minimal Construction Louis MacLean

Scottish photographer Louis MacLean (b. 1984) has a keen eye for detail, taking away the formal function of landscapes and reinjecting a sense of dynamism through a considered perspective. Having moved from Edinburgh to Spain, MacLean harbours a grid-like understanding of his new surroundings, where tennis courts, stairwells and garden benches attribute to a wider visual encyclopaedia. Sun-drenched courts match with pastel columns, whilst bold shadows cut through structures and provide a distance between viewer and location. The straight lines further perpetuate the idea of the photograph as a fixed object, one which is controlled by the individual vision of the artist. The graphic style almost alludes to the constructivist movement, in which all art is seen to be autonomous, translating vistas into a fixed experimentation of striking colour, concrete frameworks and multidimensional layers. www.instagram.com/louis.maclean.

Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

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Photo by Louis MacLean.

art

Reviving Analogue Glashier

A self-taught filmmaker and photographer, Glashier is based between Berlin and London, working exclusively on film, capturing narrative images and producing both documentaries and music videos for artists such as Juno Temple, Harry Shearer, Bonobo, Maximo Park and Ghostpoet. Having started out as the official photographer for the Mercury Music Prize, Glashier’s passion for analogue has accrued international acclaim, producing pieces for renowned brands such as American Apparel, and featuring on a week-long takeover on The Photographers’ Gallery’s Instagram. Each image is instilled with a deep sense of intimacy – from self-referential moments to the silent company of others in a car lay-by. The following series captures the raw energy of youth with a soft palette. Meanwhile, rocky waters, foggy streets and cloudy skies pervade the settings, offering spaces for self-reflection. http://glashier.co.

Josephine, 2017, Berlin. Shot on Film. Image: © Glashier. http://glashier.co. www.instagram.com/glashier.

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The Runaways, 2015, Dungeoness. Shot on Film. Image: ÂŠ Glashier. http://glashier.co. www.instagram.com/glashier.

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Emily Bador, 2014, Ride Exhibition. Shot on Film. Image: ÂŠ Glashier. http://glashier.co. www.instagram.com/glashier.

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Hotbox, 2014, Ride Exhibition. Shot on Film. Image: ÂŠ Glashier. http://glashier.co. www.instagram.com/glashier.

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Beth (LOYAL), 2016, Promotional Shot. Shot on Film. Image: ÂŠ Glashier. http://glashier.co. www.instagram.com/glashier

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Sedger, 2015, Brighton. Shot on Film. Image: ÂŠ Glashier. http://glashier.co. www.instagram.com/glashier

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art

Shifting Perceptions Experience OLAFUR ELIASSON CONNECTS ART, ARCHITECTURE, INSTALLATION AND DESIGN, DISMANTLING THE PRESENCE OF PHYSICAL AND CULTURAL BARRIERS IN THE PROCESS.

In Iceland, the nation’s parliament is referred to as the “Alth- how we react to our surroundings and how we understand ing,” the loose translation of which means a space for each the world,” comments Anna Engberg-Pedersen, Head of Reand every object, person and exchange – a meeting place search and Communications at Studio Olafur Eliasson. “What where people from all walks of life can come together to do we see? Why do we see it? Why do we understand the speak about differences and engage in wider productive world in the way we do? These are questions that have all dialogues. The French philosopher Bruno Latour (b. 1947) been central to his practice since the very beginning.” Born in Copenhagen, the artist has maintained a steadfast further unpacks the term: “A thing is, in one sense, an object out there and, in another sense, an issue very much in there.” interest in space and consciousness, and the myriad ways This notion that strife and conflict are inherent to matter is in which people interpret and navigate their surroundings, an idea that, for years, has resonated deeply with Latour’s throughout his creative life. As a teenager, Eliasson had a close friend, Danish-Icelandic artist and architect Olafur passion for break-dancing and from this developed the Eliasson (b. 1967), whose socially conscious creations have notion that personal space can be altered, distorted and long challenged viewers to confront real-world issues that otherwise disrupted using only the body. This fascination range from climate change to immigration and displacement with perception grew throughout his education at the Royal to sustainable agriculture. Just as no topic, regardless of its Danish Academy of Fine Arts and in the early years of his complexity or polarity, appears to be off limits, no medium eponymous studio, which he established in Berlin in 1995. His award-winning enterprise has expanded exponentially seems too challenging for him to tackle. The practitioner’s wide-ranging oeuvre encapsulates large-scale, immersive over 23 years – Eliasson’s work has been showcased in exhiinstallations, miniscule sculptures and portable electronics, bitions across the globe, including a solo show – The Speed of paintings, films, cookbooks and, more recently, architecture. Your Attention – currently on view at Tanya Bonakdar Gallery, Eliasson’s multifaceted, confrontation-generating output Los Angeles (until 22 December), and his team now comis the subject of a new and exciting tome by Phaidon, titled prises more than 100 technicians, architects, craftspeople, Experience. This weighty compendium of essays, interviews historians and programmers. In summer 2019, Tate Modern, and mind-bending colour images spans three decades of in- London, will launch a survey of the artist’s career. The exhibinovation and experimentation by the artist, and charts the tion follows his colossal 2003 installation The weather prodistinctive ways in which Eliasson’s custom-built, perception- ject – presented in the Turbine Hall and considered one of changing environments break down barriers, not only in rela- Eliasson’s most iconic creations – and the 2004 installation tion to the viewer and the space, but also with regard to other of the mesmeric Your double-lighthouse projection that envepeople, cultures and belief systems. “He’s very interested in lopes the viewer in a sea of monochromatic light.

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Your double-lighthouse projection, 2002. Installation view at Tate Modern, London, 2004. Picture credit: Tate photography, Andrew Dunkley & Marcus Leith.

“Olafur supports a friendly embrace of conflict – he likes some discord, but where you can respect each other, try to cultivate some mutual understanding, or, reach a territory where you can be together despite differences of opinion.”

Previous Page: Gravity stairs, 2014. Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul. Picture credit: Hyunsoo Kim / Courtesy of Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art. Left: I only see things when they move, 2004. Installation view at Moderna Museet, Stockholm, 2015. Picture credit: Dmitry Baranov.

As Michelle Kuo, the Marlene Hess Curator of Painting and Sculpture at MoMA, New York, and former Editor-in-Chief of Artforum, describes, in the introduction to the Phaidon publication, one of Eliasson’s most remarkable talents, which he has demonstrated relentlessly throughout his career, as the distinctive ability to arouse tension through installations and spaces. It’s through this force that he inspires understanding and empathy in countless international viewers. She writes: “[Eliasson] understood that our togetherness, our intertwinement with people and things and places, is never seamless or whole, never complete … His art makes a difference; it generates experiences that are discontinuous, always changing, shifting in relation to others and ourselves.” These consciousness-awakening experiences have been described by the artist as “frictional moments” and they’re nearly omnipresent in projects highlighted in this text. Amongst the most tension-generating creations is a 360degree walkway, Your rainbow panorama (2006-2011), for the ARos Aarhus Kunstmuseum in Denmark. The winning commission for the museum’s rooftop revamp, the piece casts rainbow hues over the surrounding landscape, dividing it into zones of colours. Viewed from within, the enclosure functions as an alternative lens from which to see the city, and from a distance, it serves as an orientation device – a new brand of north star – as each band of colour can only be viewed from a specific vantage point. Though an addition to a preexisting structure from Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects, this mindful construction is regarded as a local landmark, and a navigational beacon, in and of itself. A similar phenomenon transpired during the 2011 solo exhibition at SESC Pompeia, São Paulo, Brazil. The show’s

titular artwork, Seu corpo da obra (Your body of work), was a nod to the now-legendary Brazilian artist Hélio Oiticica, who is recognised today for a trailblazing exploration into the multidimensionality of colour, and comprised dozens of sheets of bright plastic. These massive cyan, magenta and yellow panels were suspended from the ceiling to form a multi-hued labyrinth which visitors could traverse. The movement and vantage point of each individual determined the colour they perceived and no two encounters were alike. Eliasson’s real gift for manipulating the viewer’s perspective, however, lies in his ability to alter not only how a person sees the world around them (as illustrated in the Aarhus and São Paulo example), but also how they see themselves. Many installations call upon museum-goers to play an active role – their image is often reflected directly into the work, elevating them from passive audience member to willing and active participant. His site-specific construction Gravity Stairs (2014), for instance, is a modern take on the mise en abyme. Created for the Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art in Seoul, this permanent installation features a mammoth, reflective model of the solar system arranged above stairs. As visitors climb the staircase, they are confronted with a kaleidoscopic view of planets, and, in the centre of it all, their own likeness. With a growing inventory of large-scale projects like Seu corpo da obra and structurally significant contributions such as Your rainbow panorama and Gravity stairs, it’s no surprise, then, that Eliasson has opted to add the title of architect to his ever-expanding list of credentials. In 2014, the artist formed the experimental firm Studio Other Spaces (SOS) with German architect Sebastian Behmann and earlier this summer the pair unveiled their first completed building,

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Seu corps da obra (Your body of work), 2011. Installation view at SESC Pompeia, Sao Paulo, Brazil, 2011 Picture credit: Olafur Eliasson.

Fjordenhus, in Vejle, Denmark. In its conception, the new Kirk collaborators such as model Naomi Campbell, acclaimed Right: rainbow panorama, 2006-11. Kapital headquarters challenged the limits of digital render- filmmaker Alejandro González Iñárritu or artist-activist Ai Weiwei. Your 360-degree walkway installed on top of the ARoS Aarhus Art Museum, ing and models. In its awe-inspiring execution, the brick, el- Eliasson teamed up with the latter for the 2013 web-based Denmark. Picture credit: Thilo Frank lipsoidal office space – which appears to rise from the waters venture Moon – a participatory drawing that took four years to / Studio Olafur Eliasson. of the Vejle Fjord like a sandcastle – is as much a life-sized create and features a rotating globe of messages and drawings sculpture as it is a functional and lived-in structure. “Fjorden- crafted by a community of online users. In the write-up for this hus is really quite different than other buildings because it’s piece, the project’s founders penned the lines: “Creativity defies a bit weird – you feel outdoors because you can see the har- boundaries. Ideas, wind and air no one can stop.” In 2017, the pioneering producer further evolved this bour and feel the wind, but you’re also contained,” remarks Engberg-Pedersen. “That’s something that came out of this concept of a collaborative art-making experience with the release of an original project on the virtual reality exhibition dialogue taking place between art and architecture.” In signature Eliasson style, the master maker has taken space Acute Art, which is billed as a museum without walls. space-creating impulses one step further, investigating new Titled Rainbow, Eliasson’s contribution to the platform invites mechanisms through which his constructions can transcend viewers to align digital water droplets, light waves and their the physical world and enable art lovers and design enthu- line of sight to create the titular weather phenomenon. siasts – regardless of their location – to experience his work Multiple users, regardless of their physical location, can digitally, through experiments in virtual reality, digital art engage with one another to produce a digital rainbow, and social media. As Engberg-Pedersen explains, pivotal further testing the limits of literal space and boundaries. to Eliasson’s practice is the idea that an encounter with art “VR promises, in a way, the opportunity for people to enter or architecture “does not only take place in a gallery. It can spaces that they’re not physically in,” explains EngbergPedersen. “And that’s an interesting thought for Olafur.” happen in the street, in a public space or online.” Through examining this publication, it becomes apparent The studio has more than 270,000 followers on its encyclopaedic Instagram page, and the account’s twice- that regardless of scale, material or medium, a consistent Words daily posts include a selection of images from inside the ethos is ever-present in Eliasson’s work. Both a child-like Stephanie Strasnick company’s day-to-day activities, including elegantly plated curiosity about the world around us and an unwavering meals from Studio Olafur Eliasson Kitchen (which is headed commitment to questioning the status quo in the service of up by the artist’s sister, chef Victoria Eliasdottir), interviews with humanity are always at the heart of his wide-ranging output. Olafur Eliasson: Experience In keeping with Latour’s earlier meditations, Engberg-Ped- is published by Phaidon the artist, video footage highlighting recent exhibitions and architectural projects, behind-the-scenes snapshots, and, of ersen states: “Olafur supports a friendly embrace of conflict on 15 October. course, the occasional selfie of a bearded Eliasson trekking – one in which you can reach a territory where you can be through Reykjavik or posing with friends, fellow creatives or together despite the wider differences of opinion.” www.phaidon.com

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art

Digital Possibilities Alexis Christodoulou

A self-taught 3D artist living in Cape Town, South Africa, Alexis Christodoulou (b. 1983) has spent the last four years building a collection of works that focuses on the creation of imaginary architecture. Based on a life-long interest in digital worlds and multidimensional graphics, Christodoulou extends realities through rendering new spaces. Offering a clean, seamless aesthetic, each composition â&#x20AC;&#x201C; which starts as a sketch â&#x20AC;&#x201C; is influenced by the boundless concepts and muted palettes of leading artists and designers such as David Chipperfield and Aldo Rossi. Shadows cut across endless landscapes, whilst ripples of light sit on the surface of undetermined pools. The images ask questions about the evolving methods of post-production and their place within the appreciation and realisation of contemporary art: how far does a viewer need to be convinced that something is real? Can our idea of beauty be replicated through a calculated algorithm? www.alexiscstudio.com.