FESP Bold Tendencies Exhibition Catalogue

FESP STUDIO ART EXHIBITION

2 nov 2015 bold tendencies part of Bold Tendencies Education and Community Programme

This exhibition fea works by seven stud Elective Semester Pr (fesp) at Centra it is situated within Peckham, which has an arts space by

atures site-specific dents from the Free rogramme- Studio Art al Saint Martins. a disused car park in been converted into y Bold Tendencies.

bold tendencies

fesp studio art exhibition

alysha tse Mindfulness Mixed Media Mindfulness is the awareness of oneself and of one’s environment. It is a form of self-meditation that is proven to reduce stress. The art pieces I created fit specifically within their chosen spaces. The ‘What do you see’ cards set the mood for awareness as audience members enter Bold Tendencies. The installations I created relate to mindfulness by subtly reminding people to invoke an awareness of the space around them and of the placement of the words and structures. The words ‘Balance’, ‘Fresh’, and the small sculpture are meant to be discovered during the journey through Bold Tendencies. I chose the word ‘Balance’ because the space truly gives the illusion of balance, with the wall sitting in between two gaps. The word ‘Fresh’ fits within its space because it is outdoors and in the garden. This piece is not telling you how to feel but is promoting mindfulness by encouraging you to be aware of your senses and the environment around you.

clara aristimu単o

Personality moulding clay Who are we? We are each a combination of characters with different thoughts, brought together to create a single individual.

This project is inspired by the idea of a society brought together by all these different individuals and the characters within. What we leave is even greater when each individual is different and unique.

Everest Shi To Kill a Mannequin Mixed Media ‘To Kill a Mannequin’ is a project about online exposure of personal information and word abuse. The project is inspired by my personal experience; after participating in a television show two years ago, I was stalked and my personal information was posted online. As a result, people started sending me negative emails which severely affected my life at the time.

But I am not alone. In this era of virtual data, everyone is a “public figure” to some extent and always bears the pressure of being watched. All the information one leaves on the internet -from one’s Facebook profile pictures to the Youtube videos one likesis tracked and constitutes another “self” in the virtual world. That virtual person constructed by data is simultaneously human and non-human, becoming the target of all the verbal judgements that take place online. But can the virtual person feel? Who is the actual person behind the screen? How will the person think of the presence of hundreds of mouse clicks? The piece raises those questions for its audience by replicating the tension between publicity and privacy.

Mariana Negreiros Rebuild flyer This project is a result of a long, arduous path. I still follow my Brazilian roots; artists like Lygia Clark and Caetano Veloso guided my eyes through this concrete building. Neoconcretism is geometry. In this large, cold, and empty environment the light guided me. Once I noticed it, I could not take my eyes off it. The ephemeral angles and triangles enchanted me, prompting me to portray this unexpected beauty.

My experience in Bold Tendencies gave me a deeper understanding of what the artistic process is. It is nothing more than a construction and deconstruction, flowing as light. In this immensity of concrete, this skeleton of a disabled car park, I searched for utility where it was once considered barren, angles that may have gone unnoticed. This work is based on a search, a search for the light; light which builds and destroys, like everything in art.

bold tendencies

fesp studio art exhibition

saloni kalkat Among the Crowd acrylic on canvas with audio The population of London is 8.6 million people.

That’s around 10 times the population of San Francisco, the city I grew up next to, and 287 times the size of my hometown in the Silicon Valley. Never in my life have I lived in such a largely populated, bustling, urban area. This piece aims to visually as well as sonically translate the physical and psychological experience of moving through the street crowds of London.

After exploring the Bold Tendencies site, I found that this space contains the most ambient noise within the parking lot. Here you can hear the screeching of a train, the cacophony of construction work, and the blare of an overhead airplane. This surrounding noise combined with the narrow, closed-in quality of the ramp - like a street or tube station exit that forces people to congregate together - provided the ideal space to evoke the “crowd” experience.

Being among a crowd of people can be simultaneously unifying and lonely; crowds can prompt both a sense of belonging and a strong singularity. As you move through a crowd, some faces remain distinct while others blur and blend together. Similarly, snippets of conversations overlap to create a nebulous buzz of words and phrases. ‘Among the Crowd’ represents these phenomena.

samantha butler revisionist histories thread, yarn, recycled trash ‘Revisionist Histories’ seeks to empower viewers to make unprecedented connections between this and that, here and there, when and why and how. Set in the raw, ambiguous space of the disused car park, the installation emphasizes the importance of alternative ways of navigating space. As the site of Bold Tendencies has proven: a car park is not just a car park, disused and left for destruction; there is beauty and purpose to be found and composed in raw spaces such as these, but these opportunities only reveal themselves to us when we seek them out with open minds.

Found throughout the passageway are bound selections of trash items reminiscent of hand-bound books. Though these are crafted from technically worthless materials, when they are connected and treated with time and thought, these items may become something of value.

It is my hope that these trash books inspire curiosity from the viewer, whether it is in response to their aesthetic or to the open-ended narratives that are created by the connection of seemingly unrelated items.

Grounded in the belief that art should be kept accessible and within reach, viewers are invited take a seat, touch anything in the exhibit, and take home any of the trash books that are found throughout the installation.

zhiwen yap paper rye 2050 paper installation The future of Bold Tendencies and Peckham Rye is in a state of flux.

For several years, the Southwark Council has proposed various plans to redevelop Peckham’s town centre and this car park. It now faces the possibility of demolition, to be replaced by residential or commercial buildings. There are also plans to build a tall building which would obstruct the iconic view over London that Peckham has become known for. In response, community groups like Peckham Vision have campaigned for the council to consider residents’ needs and wants in their plans, launching petitions like ‘Protect Peckham’s Rooftop Views’.

Shrouded in pages of formal, bureaucratic language, the future of this carpark and Peckham remains up in the air. Forming clouds out of pages of crumpled plans, this installation questions the efficacy of institutional bureaucracy in building a home which truly serves its residents’ needs. It also puts a spotlight on the liminal nature of this art space/carpark, inviting viewers to imagine what it will or could become in future. Viewers are encouraged to write or draw their ideas on the accompanying ‘Peckham 2050’ postcards found at the entrance of Bold Tendencies.

artists alysha tse / clara aristimu単o / everest shi / mariana negreiros / saloni kalkat / samantha butler / zhiwen yap

special thanks to bold tendencies claire nichols Louise Ashcroft Frances Scott Richard Wentworth charles abbott

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