Graham Rich: Anchored Under Red Rock

GRAHAM RICH

ANCHORED UNDER RED ROCK

The Fine Art Society in Edinburgh presents

GRAHAM RICH

ANCHORED UNDER RED ROCK 20 April - 12 May 2018

View the exhibition at www.fasedinburgh.com/exhibitions For sales and enquiries please contact Jamie Mackinnon: +44 (0)131 557 4050 jamie@fasedinburgh.com

Trying to Reach the Sea is a sculpture which uses an old rowing boat as its central component. The boat was found in a back eddy on the River Exe in Devon – a back eddy in which floating objects destined for the sea often become trapped. The boat developed as a sculpture over a number of years and has revealed its meaning slowly through the process of its making.

To begin with the boat was a dustbin for beach litter – fishing floats, bait coffins, broken oars, seign nets and rusting metal were all collected together in the boat. These objects were subsequently ordered positioned and placed as if subconsciously preparing for a long voyage.

Voyages require destinations and this sculpture in its advanced state of decomposition and excessive deterioration was clearly going nowhere. It was physically incapable of reaching any sea: yet it maintained its contingencies to do so, its routines, its disciplines and its hope for the future.

At the stern of the boat is a lens mechanism, an oblique reference to The Occulist’s Witnesses in Marcel Duchamp’s Large Glass. At the front of the boat is a two dimensional grid which contains images of the sea. The lens is focused on these images, acting like horse blinkers, and isolating the spectator from the surrounding reality. Only the destinations are seen, the immediate reality is obscured. One piece of the boat fabric cuts the lens but this is camouflaged.

Through the lens the boat becomes a metaphor for existence – for futility and for hope, of survival and of endeavor – a resistance against the way the world defeats us.

The text pinned to the grid is from Four Quartets – The Dry Salvages by T. S. Eliot We cannot think of a time that is oceanless Or of an ocean not littered with wastage Or of a future that is not liable Like the past to have no destination In this exhibition, the boat has arrived at anchor under Red Rock and is surrounded by material found on its various voyages. The found objects have become an archive of time spent on the water, and of the experience of the sea, and of the difficulty of navigation, and of reaching destinations, and of the struggle to reach physical and spiritual places.

- Graham Rich, 2018

1. DICK HOOK - UNDERWATER, 2018 found material and marine paint 35 x 29 cm

2. WHITE PAINTING RIVER EXE, 2006 found material and marine paint 50 x 38 cm

3. RIVER YEALM DIPTYCH, 2018 found material and marine paint 61 x 99 cm

4. THE NORTH WALL, 2008

found material and marine paint 120 x 210 cm

5. RETREAT BOATYARD BOOK, 2005 found material and marine paint 20 x 25 cm

6. CROSSING THE RUST SHELF, 1990 found material and marine paint 45 x 80 cm

7. A HANDFUL OF SAND, 2018 found material and marine paint 110 x 90 cm

8. ANCHORED UNDER RED ROCK, 2018 found material and marine paint 56 x 39 cm

9. FINDING A WAY THROUGH, 2017 found material and marine paint 95 x 66 cm

10. ISLA CORTEGADA DOOR, 2018

found material and marine paint 49 x 68 cm

11. ISLA CORTEGADA FLAG, 2018 found material and marine paint 40 x 67 cm

12. RIVER YEALM TRIPTYCH, 2018 found material and marine paint 60 x 150 cm

13. WINDOW, 2018

found material and marine paint 66 x 90 cm

14. VERTICAL INTERVALS 1-17, 2018

found material and marine paint 60 x 11 cm each

15. SAILING FREE FROM A DANGEROUS LEE SHORE, 2004

found material and marine paint framed 43 x 169 cm

16. LYME BAY AFTER RAIN, 2003 found material and marine paint framed 22 x 43 cm

17. TURF REACH RIVER EXE, 2012

found material and marine paint 40 cm diameter

18. CALLING THE PORT HAND LAY LINE FOR ANDREW found material and marine paint 26 x 25 cm

19. UNDER THE SHADOW OF BOLT TAIL, 2008 found material and marine paint 20 x 13 cm

20. CLOUD

found material and marine paint 32 x 30 cm

21. LOOKING FOR LORCA’S THIRD ARCH

found material and marine paint 12 x 22 cm

22. EARLY MORNING BOW CREEK RIVER DART found material and marine paint 21 x 22 cm

23. CROSSING THE BAR SALCOMBE

found material and marine paint 17 x 18 cm

24. GLITTERING SEA

found material and marine paint 33 x 38 cm

25. SAILING WITH MALEVICH FEB 23rd 2018

found material and marine paint 32 x 42 cm

26. TAKING THE INSIDE PASSAGE START POINT found material and marine paint 34 x 28 cm

27. AN ANGEL PASSING TO WINDWARD

found material and marine paint 13 x 33 cm

28. FLARE PATH OFF FERRARA BEACH found material and marine paint 18.5 x 36 cm

29. LITTLE CLOUD

found material and marine paint 16 x 22 cm

30. BOATS AND BIRDS

found material and marine paint 14 x 12 cm

31. SAILING INTO THE BIGHT

found material and marine paint 20 x 29 cm

32. LOOKING FOR THE FAIRWAY found material and marine paint 22 x 25 cm

33. ON STAND BETWEEN TIDES found material and marine paint 40 x 40 cm

34. NIGHT VOYAGE, 1988

found material and marine paint 13 x 227 cm

35. CROSSING DAY’S LEDGE

found material and marine paint 16 x 27 cm

36. TRIPTYCH FOR I H F

found material and marine paint 25 x 19 cm

37. RED ROCK REFLECTIONS

found material and marine paint 18 x 20 cm

38. START POINT, 1999-2018

found material and marine paint 21 x 21 cm

39. TRYING TO REACH THE SEA found material and marine paint 200 x 125 x 240 cm

40. SAILING PAST THE BLACK SQUARE

found material and marine paint 25 x 23 cm

41. EASTERLY SQUALL

found material and marine paint 7 x 8 cm

42. CROSSING THE LEDGE

found material and marine paint 16 x 29 cm

43. SUMMER SEA

found material and marine paint 21 x 30 cm

44. LUCKY BLUE SHIFT

found material and marine paint 13 x 23 cm

45. I WILL FOLLOW YOU HOME

found material and marine paint 16 x 28 cm

46. HOW I FEEL TODAY

found material and marine paint 28 x 20 cm

47. EXPLORING CAVES UNDER RED ROCK

found material and marine paint 19 x 11 cm

48. FIVE BOATS LEAVING THE BIGHT

found material and marine paint 17 x 57 cm

49. HIGH PRESSURE

found material and marine paint 14 x 39 cm

50. LEAVING FIRST PERCH TO PORT D.

found material and marine paint 25 cm diameter

51. REACHING HOME PAST DAWLISH WARREN

found material and marine paint 29 x 12 cm

52. SIVER TRIPTYCH

found material and marine paint 10 x 16 cm

53. MARKS MADE BY THE ACTION OF WATER found material and marine paint 24 x 14 cm

54. UNSTABLE AIR SAILING THERMAL SHIFTS

found material and marine paint 15 x 35 cm

55. GATEWAY

found material and marine paint 10 x 35 cm

56. WAITING FOR THE TIDE

found material and marine paint 5 x 22.5 cm

57. THINKING OF VIGILANT

found material and marine paint 10 x 23 cm

58. BART VAN DER LECK

found material and marine paint 7 x 19 cm

59. DEBEN FOUR TONNER JANE

found material and marine paint 9 x 26 cm

60. SAILING INTO THE LIGHT

found material and marine paint 5 x 32 cm

61. LEAVING BANTHAM

found material and marine paint 9 x 8.5 cm

62. UNDER THE FLOORS

found material and marine paint 12 x 26 cm

63. TWO BOATS

found material and marine paint 10 x 6 cm

64. YOU LEAD THE WAY

found material and marine paint 7 x 38 cm

65. THE CROSSING

found material and marine paint 14 x 22 cm

66. LIFTING CHRIS JONES OFF RED ROCK BEACH

found material and marine paint 16 x 73 cm

67. SAILING IN A NORTH WESTERLY GUST

found material and marine paint 11 x 20 cm

68. SHIPS THAT PASS

found material and marine paint 13 cm diameter

69. DEBEN

found material and marine paint

13 x 9 cm

70. BETWEEN TIDES

found material and marine paint 19.5 cm diameter

71. PATIENCE

found material and marine paint 14 x 20 cm

72. FERRARA BEACH

found material and marine paint 40 x 37 cm

73. TACKING INTO BOLT HEAD

found material and marine paint 8 x 14 cm

74. MEWSTONE PASSAGE

found material and marine paint 17 x 15 cm

75. THE DAY BEFORE YESTERDAY

found material and marine paint 20 x 16 cm

76. SAILING OVER THE CLOCK found material and marine paint 17 x 31 cm

77. LIME KILN - BOW CREEK

found material and marine paint 10 x 9 cm

78. NORTH DAY BEFORE DUSK

found material and marine paint 14 x 20 cm

79. WET AND DRY

found material and marine paint 17 x 14 cm

80. ROGER’S RULE

found material and marine paint 23 x 5 cm

18

The Fine Art Society in Edinburgh

6 Dundas Street, Edinburgh, EH3 6HZ +44 (0)131 557 4050 www.fasedinburgh.com art@fasedinburgh.com

Published by The Fine Art Society in Edinburgh for the exhibition

GRAHAM RICH ANCHORED UNDER RED ROCK held at 6 Dundas Street, Edinburgh, EH3 6HZ from 20 April to 12 May 2018 Catalogue © The Fine Art Society in Edinburgh Images © Graham Rich All rights reserved

Front cover: River Yealm Diptych, 2018 no.3 (detail) Inside front cover: River Yealm Triptych, 2018 no.12 Title page: Finding a Way Through, 2017 no.9 (detail) Left: A Handful of Sand, 2018 no.7 Back cover: Mewston Passage, no.74

The Fine Art Society in Edinburgh