Dialogues from within:
bodies, worldbuildin g and the politics of impermane nce
written by Ricardo Reverón Blanco
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Muslin descends into the gallery’s entrance imbued in colour using f oraged goods, remnants of a metropolis stretches over the space; blues, purples and maroons punctuate the room, in the backdrop a futuristic soundscape whispers within the gallery walls. Presence has never become more important in a world taken aback by isolation restrictions, epidemics, digital omnipresence and social disconnection. These issues are clearly reflected in the ways the selected artists for this year’s Platform Graduate Award at Aspex Portsmouth have engaged with the world around them through the themes, materiality and substance of their work.
Freya Watson
In Freya Watson’s ‘Screen Bodies’ we encounter an imagined queer utopia presented in a triptych of digital screens mounted on a metallic structure. This digital dimension enables the artist to propose safer queer spaces online, breaking through skin and inserting the transcendental soul into the digital realm. This reclamation of the corporeal body enables a sense of autonomy to liberate the physical self and open the doors to new possibilities of self-expression, identification and perception. This decentralised model for new networks of care are evolving, and communities are finding innovative ways to build supportive systems to steward collective histories and identities.1 Beside this digital city, lies Rabia Raja’s ‘The Maze of Sunken Liberty’ which forms the infrastructure of a forgotten city. Functioning as a memento mori, these ruins depict an urban detritus which confronts urban neglect and the flaws of modern construction.2 As Raja writes; “the installation appears hostile, abandoned, and devoid of human presence, traces of human activity subtly remain” in the form of footprints and the memories of those who once stepped on these structures. Featuring floor-based concrete and steel sculptures, the industrial materials become a symbol for structural and instrumental power, which this work undermines through its deconstruction.
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Rabia Raja
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“Concrete’s historical associations with federal governments embodies failed utopian promises, reflecting its rigidity and functionality that restricts lives. Tensions around destruction and societal collapse evokes parallels to current capitalist cultures and economic imbalances.” 3 Questioning the fallible malleability of urbanism, these works seek to provoke discussions around how one can create safer spaces for people.4 Personally, it stands in stark opposition to the current devastation of life through settler colonialism in the form of military occupations and raidings that are happening in Northern Cyprus, Western Sahara, Palestine, Syria, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia and Moldova. It is at the sight of these ruins and imagined future cities that I hope this exhibition will encourage audiences to think about the incessant and continuing traumatic effects of the destructive forces costing the homes and lives of civilians enduring such inhumane conditions.
Karl Bailey
This ruinous effect can also be systemic and Karl Bailey explores the effects of class onthose who are most affected by receiving the short end of the stick due to structural inequity. In ‘A Stone’s Throw’, Bailey explores the underbelly of Portsmouth’s economic struggles to depict a city that has been financially underserved showcasing the impact this has had over the years on working class people. The composition presents the backdrop of the city as a landscape, for locals recognisable, yet subtly hints at the degradation of buildings, people and public spaces due to the severe austerity imposed on a place. Class and most specifically, class in the UK is inescapable and as Nathalie Olah notes culture is at the heart of making and maintaining class oppression.5 Most recently, a July 2023 study, The Acme Artist Tenant Survey highlights the implications that the cost of living crisis coupled with increasing pressures on the UK’s cultural sector have wrought on UK’s working artists.6 Presenting this work in a gallery setting, is therefore an act of opposition to how culture is disseminated, talked about and presented to audiences. The project aims to catalyse discussions around the city’s economic struggles and places them in context and in situ to the city’s cultural doorstep at Aspex Portsmouth.
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Georgia Menear
Mia Blake
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In Mia Blake’s ‘Visibilis’ an eye inspects the room akin to a live CCTV camera, becoming a pseudo-panopticon which makes visitors aware of their presence in the gallery. 7 How one perceives themselves, others and how others perceive them becomes apparent in this artwork. To be gazed by Blake’s installation enables viewers to determine their position in the gallery to be gawked at. One may read into the controlling force of being aware that someone is watching, and such effects detail the controlling power governments have on civilians who believe they are constantly observed and monitored. The gaze and invasion of one’s privacy becomes the centre point in Georgia Menear’s installation that presents us with research that investigates autobiographical, intimate narratives that the artist places in full view. The research is displayed to be looked at and engaged with, but it is the visitor’s choice to decide how deeply they want to intrude in someone’s private space. The domestic aesthetic is further highlighted in Harrison Jones’ practice which is informed by his imagination and intuitive compositions, enabling experimentation as a tool for communication. He takes inspiration from domestic environments, archival imagery, artworks, nature, wallpapers and himself. Acting as a form of diary that oscillates between fantasy and reality, his paintings project the transience of his thoughts which can be gauged by the colour story and gradience that clearly depict the passing of time and emotions.
Harrison Jones
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Mia Bilbeisi
In ‘Memories in Music’ Luke Wateridge takes visitors on a journey through his travels around locations that have been memorialised through selected songs. A triptych depicts scenes which invite for slow contemplation and frames how memory works. An image surrounded by blank space that functions as a visual representation of how one might remember a detail from one instance but the whole image from that memory is misremembered or forgotten altogether. The work is situated next to a film depicting the locations Wateridge has travelled to and the songs associated with those memories, reigniting them sonically to become palpable moments imprinted in one’s mind. In a more corporeal form, Mia Bilbeisi conceptualises an internal artwork using recycled fabric such as bedding and dyed, creating a stained effect that becomes visceral in its composition. Mimicking internal organs the intestinal sculpture feels impure and collides when exposed to a purer space through its exhibition in a gallery setting. Displacing the internal into an external realm makes us see the fragility of life, hanging like the threads that descend from said fabrics.
Ren Woolridge
Similarly, Ren Wooldridge investigates bodily forms where ‘the body often seen as a vessel, finds its counterpart in the tactile nature of clay. Sculpting from within, I create hybrid forms that encapsulate a state of metamorphosis and challenge the boundaries of the self.”8 The human as a vessel has been researched and explored by many artists and art critics, though in this iteration, Wooldridge provokes us with a pristine object that presents itself akin to a heart due to its ventricular composition.
Leilani June
Also inclusive of organic vessels, Leilani June’s ‘Divine Fabrication’ becomes a participatory installation whereby audiences are encouraged to be part of the artwork by leaving traces of their conversations and remnants from vegan treats presented to be digested and used to stain the surrounding fabrics. Threaded around the space, this muslin structure engulfs the centrepoint of the gallery and develops itself once visitors engulf the foraged herbs and flora which denote the geographical location in which the artwork has been produced. In its socially engaged methodology, it aims to defy being a static artwork and breathes life through the rhythms and collaborations of those who want to be part of the work. Expanding over Aspex’s architectural features, the work embodies a sanctified haven for those who want to be hugged by its natural elements that condiment and supply offerings to its guests, and in doing so, welcomes visitors to find refuge within our gallery and provide safer spaces for those who need it most.
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A recent and clear example is the work done by The Queer Museum of Digital Art, a unique and vibrant space dedicated to preserving the rich culture and creativity of queer and trans artists. 1
As Anicka Yi writes in relation to worldbuilding; ‘Humans have a fear of impermanence. We go against nature to try to preserve and stabilize’ [accessed on 9.10.2023: https://art21.org/theme/world-building/] 2
Rabia Raja writes about her series and makes connections to other artworks using concrete structures as a method for institutional critiquing such as Teresa Margolles’s ‘Muro Ciudad Juarez’ or Ciro Duclos’ ‘Obedience’ as well as Mike Nelson’s ‘Extinction Beckons’. 3
Douglas Murphy’s book ‘The Architecture of Failure’ critically analyses architectural movements and terms in relation to failed structures, exploring their socio-political connotations. 4
Nathalie Olah particularly delves into the socio-political repercussions of art’s oppressing power throughout history and at present in ‘What Can Art Galleries Teach Us About Class Oppression?’. Similarly, in Culture is Bad For You, Mark Taylor, Dave O’Brien and Orian Brook also determine such systemic cultural inequity.
References
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Nearly 75% of responses indicated that they were struggling financially and only 12% indicated that they could support themselves financially through their practice. 6
For further readings on panopticism Michel Foucault’s ‘Discipline and Punish’ explores the impact on oppressive control methods, power and control imposed by the government. 7
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Ren Wooldridge, Body Clay, 2023.