Press Release - British artists participating in the Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale

PRESS RELEASE September 2015

MDINA CATHEDRAL CONTEMPORARY ART BIENNALE 2015

PARTICIPATING BRITISH ARTISTS

Left: Coven, 2013, fluorescent pigment, ink and oil on panel. 50x34cm © Adam Dix Right: The Madonna in the Blue, 2015, chalk dust on baize, wood. 74x138x7cm (not including lights) © Richard Shields

13 November 2015 – 7 January 2016 Mdina, Malta The Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale, with Main Sponsor APS Bank, will take place between 13 November 2015 and 7 January 2016 in the medieval walled city of Mdina, Malta. Establishing a stimulating modern environment presenting a host of artists from diverse cultural backgrounds under one theme, the 2015 edition makes a radically shift from its previous incarnations, evolving from the first such event in Mdina, ‘Contemporary Sacred Art in Malta’ of 1994, and the subsequent exhibitions entitled ‘Contemporary Christian Art’. The theme for 2015 is ‘Christianity, Spirituality and the Other’, ‘The Other’ standing for faith and non-faith, belief and non-belief, theist and atheist, agnostic and polytheist.

London-based curatorial organisation ARTNAKED are delighted to announce their association as Creative Sponsor, curating the work of several British and international artists as part of the Biennale under the Artistic Director Dr Giuseppe Schembri-Bonaci. ARTNAKED presents a careful selection of artists chosen for ability to respond intelligently and essentially to the theme, as well as deep knowledge of their long-standing artistic development: Adam Dix, Madeleine Fenwick, Andrew Hancock and Richard Shields (UK); Sergei Isakov (Russia); and Lena Lapschina (Austria).

“We are bringing a small but well selected group of artists to Mdina, and hope that alongside the other artists being exhibited we can allow a Maltese audience and more international art-lovers a deep, rich and exciting contemporary art viewing experience. Given the strong and inimitable expression of faith on the island, our selection of artists was completely singular to this occasion.” ARTNAKED Several artists from this selection have made, or will be making, new work especially for the Biennale, in a direct response to the spirituality and bodily materiality of the island, and specifically Mdina itself.

TBurnsArts | 18 Bishops Court, 54 Folgate Street, London E1 6UN | 0207 377 5665 | tani@tburnsarts.com

PRESS RELEASE September 2015

Richard Shields, a Manchester-based artist, presents for the first time The Madonna in the Blue, created following his first visit to Malta in early 2015. Taking inspiration from the Madonna’s presence throughout the Island, as both a symbol of reflection and communal celebration, he has developed a fitting continuation to an ongoing series including his acclaimed From the Cradle to the Grave with Empty Pockets (also to be shown at the Biennale), an installation comprised of two green baize pool tables – one depicting Madonna and Child (after Raphael), the second Christ on the Cross (after William Holman Hunt). The work is a paradigm of the artist’s conceptual exploration of historical relationships between art, finance and the Church, finding in the faded ‘D’ the outline of a halo, and in the green baize an inextricable link to the banking patronage of the art world since the Renaissance.

Inspired by a statue near the ‘Chapel of Rdum tal-Madonna’ in the North of Malta, the artist’s development of the theme was furthered through introduction to adorned, illuminated churches during festa celebrations and altars to the Madonna erected outdoors throughout Malta – juxtapositions to that calm reflection felt on the northern cliffs.

“We traveled to a few towns to experience the festas, and the churches had been framed in light. The buildings looked like they had been re-drawn in bulbs. The immersive décor of the churches was a huge contrast to the calm, personal, human moment felt on the cliffs and this to me, in context of the Biennale, was an important statement to make in my new piece The Madonna In The Blue.”

Richard Shields

Untitled I, II (pair), 2015, mixed media on board, each 76x76cm © Andrew Hancock

Andrew Hancock is creating a unique series of work on Malta itself. Often integrating into his paintings the very fabric of the island – its raw materials, limestone dust, chalk and found objects – he incorporates, along with the spirit, the inextricable bodily existence of the land.

Focusing upon abstract painting, he is conceptually realigning certain artistic and iconographic histories. Part of his focus for these works has been upon Maltese communities and the dichotomy that exists between outward expressions of faith and private religiosity. Symbolic and bold but with a profound material and theoretical subtlety, Hancock’s paintings have involved much meditation to properly evoke a unique psychological response to the religious landscape across the Maltese Islands.

“Malta to me has been a lifelong family home and spiritual retreat. Being privileged in the making of these new artworks for the Cathedral Biennale, I am symbolically acting out ritual observances that stem from profound Catholic traditions in addition to certain art historical and theological ideas and practices. I am painting as part of a real pilgrimage and in my own manner making art as a religious obedience.”

Andrew Hancock TBurnsArts | 18 Bishops Court, 54 Folgate Street, London E1 6UN | 0207 377 5665 | tani@tburnsarts.com

PRESS RELEASE September 2015

Austrian artist Lena Lapschina will make a series of ‘wall murals’, created singularly onsite for the Biennale. Wellversed in creating powerful, authoritative and yet sympathetic site-specific installations, both indoors and outdoors, Lapschina forms her work uniquely for the place and the time in which they exist. Entering into a conversation with history, present and future in a single instant, Lapschina’s murals are precise moments – open dialogues which may carry social, political or spiritual messages, but which ask just as many questions as they may venture to resolve.

Specifically for the occasion of the Mdina Cathedral Biennale, Lapschina will be working directly with the Artistic Director and ARTNAKED to conceive new work to be made manifest through the streets and architecture of the walled city – work which will exist only for the duration of the Biennale. Mdina, the “Silent City”, will become both the subject and the canvas, the inspiration and the foil for Lapschina’s work, juxtaposing her mountainous texts and imagery – the artwork standing as a reflected account of the spirit in the place itself. Communicating with the audience and binding the Biennale to the place that is its host, Lapschina’s work will be an interactive link on the Biennale trail through the city.

L-R: Untitled (California), 2013 © Lena Lapschina; Untitled (from the series “Siberia: Polar Night”), 2010, silver-gelatin print © Sergei Isakov; The Consecration of the Oyster, 2015, oil, resin and gold on mahogany panel, 24x26cm © Madeleine Fenwick

ARTNAKED is also thrilled to present work by London-based painter Adam Dix, whose impressive CV includes exhibitions at Haunch of Venison, Eleven Gallery, Charlie Smith Gallery, APT Gallery, the Mall Galleries and The Future Can Wait, in addition to shows in Paris, Athens, Dubai and Los Angeles.

Dix’s palette of muted colours, hazy imagery and subject anchor the work in a time of historical optimism. Referring to imagined futures of our predecessors his deployment of colour links the subject of contemporary technology to its 1950s origins. These are exaggerated by appropriating the ritualistic and ceremonial traits and imagery often found within science fiction, religion and national pageantry. Through combining these genres, Dix acknowledges the focused response of the subject’s relationship to the ‘Icon of infotainment’, conveying a sense of compliance or worship, creating a unique dialogue with the overarching theme.

“My paintings explore associations between communication technology and our desire to communicate.

This exploration into Society’s response and subsequent personification of these devices of modern communication describe how we relate to and comprehend technology on a humanistic level, whilst referring to other constructed ‘belief systems’ that foster a similar dual sense of connectivity and community. Aside from the incredible setting for the Mdina Cathedral Biennale, the thematic development of the work and the unique environment in which to show offers a perfect combination. I look forward to seeing how audiences respond.” Adam Dix For the Biennale, ARTNAKED is working with Dix to curate a unique installation comprising of the artist’s ‘prayer cushion’ entitled Follow facing the painting Coven (pictured above) along with selected ink studies and a reproduced print of the artist personal reference.

TBurnsArts | 18 Bishops Court, 54 Folgate Street, London E1 6UN | 0207 377 5665 | tani@tburnsarts.com

PRESS RELEASE September 2015

Madeleine Fenwick’s paintings, explorations of light – of how it affects the human mind and eye in a way that can be described as divine communion – will be underlined in a selection of works curated especially for the Biennale.

Light has long been understood to hold a divine quality in painting, from the soft emanations of Christian iconography to the depictions of the sublime by such artists as Caspar David Freidrich, John Martin and JMW Turner. The full spectrum of light is beyond our visual comprehension, and for the artist these invisible elements are a fascination.

This elegant selection of small paintings has been chosen as it embodies the constant transference of energy of light in Fenwick’s work – depicting that moment the light catches, ignites the creative thought and engages the divine, while simultaneously metaphorically recalling another shift, from the primordial to the technological era of Now. Finally, a careful selection of work by Russian fine art photographer Sergei Isakov is a unique highlight from a period of ten years of his photographic career, featuring several exquisite photographs from his highly acclaimed series “Siberia: The White Roads” and “Polar Night”. Each piece is a study in the juxtaposition of silence and tension, each uniquely encapsulating a deep story of the spiritual life, evoking the experience that envelops the Siberian people in its white landscape. The collection is a stark demonstration of the changes in life and environment of the generations of families who settled in Siberia on the wave of economic and social change – yet it remains, also, a crystalline reflection of his personal inner search for something profound: “I am looking for something, I guess, I am trying to find photographs that would delicately transmit the human emotional experience.” Sergei Isakov Following soon after the launch of the Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale, Malta will host the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting for a second time, having successfully done so in 2005. As an island state in the Mediterranean Sea, Malta has served throughout history as a bridge between North Africa and Europe.

Now, as the CHOGM host for 2015, Malta provides a platform for Commonwealth countries to come together to build bridges of cooperation, and the organisers of the Biennale are proud to be providing such a unique platform for artists worldwide during this exciting period.

“Malta, being so rich in its heritage and so inextricably steeped in its history, is rightfully becoming a keen place of interest – its burgeoning cultural landscape is incredibly exciting right now. The radical broadening of the creative spectrum of the Biennale this year comes at a perfect time. As Malta moves closer to 2018, when Valletta takes on the crown of European Capital of Culture, we have already seen, over the course of just the last few months, definite developments in the cultural infrastructure across the major cities of the island.”

Tani Burns, ARTNAKED

*ENDS*

TBurnsArts | 18 Bishops Court, 54 Folgate Street, London E1 6UN | 0207 377 5665 | tani@tburnsarts.com

PRESS RELEASE September 2015

MEDIA ENQUIRIES For further information, interviews or images please contact Tani Burns: T: 0207 377 5665 M: 07888 731 419 E: tani@tburnsarts.com W: www.tburnsarts.com

EDITORS NOTES ABOUT THE BIENNALE

The Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale, scheduled between 13 November 2015 and 7 January 2016, will establish a spiritual space celebrating creativity. It will create a stimulating modern environment, in which different works of art by artists from diverse cultural backgrounds are displayed together under one theme. The theme for 2015 is 'Christianity, Spirituality and the Other', 'The Other' standing for faith and non-faith, belief and non-belief, theist and atheist, agnostic and polytheist.

The Mdina Biennale traces its roots back to the previous Christian and Sacred Art Biennale of the 1990s, and the forthcoming 2015 event will radically widen its creative spectrum. The idea that all art is spiritual remains the central concept. This thematic approach is profoundly important for a complete appreciation and understanding of the event.

It plays a central role in the Artistic Director's concept and to establish the Mdina Cathedral Contemporary Art Biennale as a spiritual space of and for creativity.

Dates: 13 November 2015 – 7 January 2016 Venues: Throughout Mdina Website: www.mdinabiennale.org ABOUT THE BIENNALE’S ARTISTIC DIRECTOR Dr Giuseppe Schembri Bonaci graduated from the University of Malta, the State University of Kiev, and the State University of Moscow. He also did postgraduate research at the State University of Milano. He specialised in Law, Philosophy and the Arts. Dr Schembri Bonaci is currently senior lecturer in the Department of History of Art, University of Malta. Besides being the author of several academic research publications he is also an artist who has exhibited in various Maltese and international venues and galleries.

ABOUT ARTNAKED ARTNAKED is a London-based curatorial and cultural programming organisation, founded in 2013 by artist and gallerist Andrew Hancock and arts and PR consultant, Tani Burns. ARTNAKED has unique access to an extensive network of leading artists, creatives, tastemakers, academics and press worldwide and brings together the combined experience of two established art-world professionals.

Both in London and internationally, in the private and public spheres, ARTNAKED’s primary focus is not only in presenting then very best of the contemporary art scene, but also – importantly – in delivering intellectually led, stimulating content to an intelligent and engaged audience.

In addition to regular visual art exhibitions – including their Art Directorship at private members club ‘Library’ in London’s West End – in 2013 ARTNAKED began the production of a variety of plays, literary evenings, academic events and art performances.

This year has also seen the inaugural broadcast of their new radio podcast series of debates entitled “Naked In The Library” for Resonance FM, a culture-focused radio station in London.

Tani Burns is a London-based curator and consultant across arts, cultural, luxury and leisure and launched the company TBurnsArts in early 2012. Global brands, world-class venues, publishing houses and charitable organizations form much of her experience, alongside an international network of prestigious artists, galleries, auction houses and art fairs.

TBurnsArts | 18 Bishops Court, 54 Folgate Street, London E1 6UN | 0207 377 5665 | tani@tburnsarts.com

PRESS RELEASE September 2015

Andrew Hancock is a UK-based artist and curator. Andrew initially graduated with a B.A. in Art History at Manchester University, before concentrating on his own art practice. Later he has established a parallel approach in his development both as an artist and as a professional within the wider art economy. Andrew draws on this experience in his workings, enabling himself to create whilst engaging critically within the wider cultural sphere. www.artnaked.co.uk

TBurnsArts | 18 Bishops Court, 54 Folgate Street, London E1 6UN | 0207 377 5665 | tani@tburnsarts.com