ma fine art catalogue
DESCRIPTION
Work by graduating and interim students at Brighton UniversityTRANSCRIPT
Excess Baggage: MA anyone?
Some years ago an eminent colleague, who shall be nameless, remarked to me that the problem with MA students was that they came with ‘baggage!’ One presumes that this remark indicated a preference for blank slates but even he would acknowledge that this is impossible, that we all inevitably carry baggage regardless of who we are.
As a visitor wanders around this exhibition he/she will see many different approaches and highly varied works using a wide array of media. In places these are grouped together, as in our main gallery, in a supportive conversation and we must again this year thank our ex-colleague Barry Barker who returned from retirement to assist with its curation, acting as the chair of these ‘conversational exchanges.’ In the upstairs studios the works tend to be grouped per individual student where a ‘voice’ sustained over several pieces can be heard.
However in considering the opening remark of this introduction, it may also strike the visitor that what we are experiencing is a bit like the baggage carousel in the arrivals hall at Gatwick. Here is the emerging baggage, sometimes fresh and pristine, rather grand, highly polished, sometimes a little rough round the edges, a bit battered and covered in stickers! The bags suggest a journey or completed passage to the viewer but the start of its journey can only be implied from the visual evidence. What was it like when the baggage handler in the departure lounge chucked it down the chute, stacked it up hugger-mugger on trolleys, and loaded it onto the plane?
Yes, MA students do come with baggage in the form of earlier undergraduate work or a larger life experience, even a discontent with their lot, or at least a desire as they climb onto the plane to travel to another place for a little while, to take their baggage somewhere else, so that when it finally re-emerges it bears the stamp of the journey even if in the end it is the same old bag! Now it at least has a different sticker or a new sheen.
The MA experience is short whether the bags are fast tracked (twelve months) or take the slower queue (twenty four months) and there are varied stories to be told here as well. Sometimes the baggage is transformed into an entirely new shape, that old traditional leather bag with worn handles becomes a shiny hard plastic case with retractable handle and wheels! Sometimes the changes are not visually dramatic but important nevertheless, like an old friend with a few more wrinkles, a bit of frayed stitching, a few more scuff marks, a torn luggage label, an enriched patina.
On our MA at Brighton we aim to throw the bags about in a collaborative journey with student to student, student to tutor exchanges. The journey is one in which a sober reflection, on the social and cultural transport systems in which that journey takes place, plays it part.
We hope that for the visitor something of this comes across as he/she looks at this graduating and interim baggage carousel. For some this is only a stop over point on the onward journey for others they are leaving the airport terminal with their baggage ready to unpack. I wonder what they will find inside? Unpacking in life persists, baggage never actually goes away but one hopes perhaps that it is a little lighter, more refreshed, better organized and hopefully some of the excess has got lost on the journey never to return?
Peter Seddon
Deputy Head of Arts and Media,Fine Art MA Tutor,Reader in Arts Practice and Historiography,
Melissa Aitken
noose and pillow
i chase the grains of sandyou left me
and now i have my own noose
and pillow
silence will hug meand laughter make me high and crazed
numb or maniac
noose and pillowprotect me from myself
leave a little hopex
melissa aitken 1 June 2012
www.melissaaitken.co.uk
Sonya CheneryWebsite: www.snailsong.comEmail: [email protected]: @snailypie
Skelter-Fresh 2011Framed digital photograph
Familiar objects have the potential to meet in unexpected ways. I encourage this behaviour by constructing spaces and assemblages where objects question their prescribed existence, and explore their own ability to overlay experience with memory. Their interactions reveal the strangeness within the mundane, and the disorientating nature of place.
Lighthouse 2011Installation (Still from video documenting work)
Place has never been an empirical notion. Anything can become place every space can be one. A place can be a place or a non-place, or a place for some and not for others.
Marc Auge
Auge’s discussion of space is something that resonates greatly when I think about my own practice, and how I respond to: sounds, people, architecture and the landscapes I record. I’m interested in how we interact with the physical and virtual environments around us, the enlivened space where these worlds meet, and where I feel our notions of ‘space’ blur.
As with a viewer interacting with a piece of art, it is the unseen space between the artwork and the viewer where the work comes to life. This space is neither internal nor external, existing in its own right.
Always, and never, at home
How do we process and feel about the multiple layers of perceived space? Do these perceptions challenge our distinction between public and private, given that we can instantly access our online identity almost anywhere - Always and never at home. Whilst exploring and documenting these distinctions in my work, it is the space between the physical and the virtual, the public and the private that I wish to capture and express.
Jill Guillais
This Uneasy TaskProjection on a label, March 2012, Phoenix Studios, Brighton, UK
www.jillguillais.com [email protected]
You left them all nakedPeelings of potato, September 2010 - ongoing, Esam, Caen, France
Integral to Jill Guillais’ work is its multi-disciplinarity, so that she uses a wide range of media, specifically chosen for each individual work. Through successive manipulations and juxtapositions within sculpture and photography, or installations involving projection and monitors, Jill establishes new associations in the mind. She transforms objects and materials by taking away their original function and so undermines the expectations of the viewer.
Her artistic practice focuses on making something up from nothing and challenging perceived beliefs.
As one is drawing one is marking the paper, leaving a trace of their presence. Can do it with ink, pencil or pigment, but also can do it with pressure, and there’s evidence of the strength one has put on the paper - I was there, he or she were there, someone has been there anddid that.
But this presence, this trace also speaks of absence, as the person that did that, did it in a certain moment in time and place that is past.
Traces of presence are inevitably connected to the idea of fading and time and disappearance of presence.
Tracy Neild www.tracyneild.co.uk
Is it possible for the function of art to occur to its full extent and not be compromised by the establishment even though it may be in opposition to it? Dan Graham
Three rejected proposals and a failed appeal have transformed both the content and methodologies of this project into a critique of the academic institution rather than a critique of government institutions as initially intended. By being involved in a socially underpinned practice within an academic framework, I have realized that what is acceptable within a contemporary art sphere and what is acceptable and desirable within an academic one are sometimes very disparate. They both have very opposing agendas and governing bodies.
What are the implications of academia rules and regulations on the production of artwork, the freedom of creativity, the conflict between autonomy and ethics, as well as the present inability for socially engaged art practices to successfully exist on their own terms within this framework. How is the effectiveness of such a project then evaluated? Is it not dependent upon the social outcome of the work as well as the aesthetic impact? And if so, where does this leave my work, as there will be no social outcome or affect?
Ann Mai Lunde RØ[email protected] 2443 0187
På maven (On the stomach) 2011Monotype Screenprint
Heavy breathing 2012Performance with chalk
Through durational performance and printmaking I explore the body as a place of emotion and energy. As a response to the aspiration for a cohesive self-image, I reflect on personal experience. Combined with memory and imagination, a visual journey involves symbolic portraiture and layered references.
I am interested in physical and emotional space, which I attempt to define through an instinctive engagement with site-specific live and recorded performance. Raw moving image, audio installation and traces of activity are key elements, which test endurance and often suggest an absence or presence of the artist.
Self-portrait 2012Chalk
I am an artist who is continually developing and creating new styles in search of new techniques and innovative forms and structures to use in my art. I am influenced and inspired from the Abstract Expressionism movement, where the artists were working with space, time and expressing feelings rather than illustrating. I have transformed some of these qualities and questions that they brought up into a new body of my own explorative works. My work combines with color, rhythm, layer, texture, scale and avoid any points of emphasis of identifiable parts. I just want the viewer to see what lies behind the painting and let the painting tell the story. My paintings are a process of exploration. There are no messages or hidden agendas, other than to reveal the discoveries made during my investigations. My biggest achievement to date is that I have managed to extract and show aspects of the inner me through my work.
El [email protected] 665504
‘No, no. I don’t need to rewind. We have a lot to do. Let’s start.’150 cm x 180 cmAcrylic and oil on canvas
It has been almost two years now, the relationship between Ell Puppet and me. She is my Alter Ego, and she has gone from being a little knitted doll, to a big knitted puppet in my own size, to an abstract sculpture, and finally to a naked body made from chicken wire and without a head.
In the beginning she was satisfied with giving me small comments. But from this it developed to be long conversations between the two of us.
After fighting over some quite tough arguments and finding the way through layers of misunderstandings, we are now on track again. We are both agree that the main voice in my work has to be El Winlove’s, which, as you have guessed, is me.
Ell Puppet is my Inner Voice. She lives in my ‘Freedom - Chamber’, the space in my mind between my feelings and thoughts, and the Real World. There are no words in this Chamber, no rules, tabus, norms, worries... either. However, she knows exactly how to put words into the emotions laying there, and these words often ends up as the Titles of my work. Ell Puppet’s humour is dry and dark and I believe people to easy recognize situations from their
own life through her absurdity, laughter, freedom and enjoyment. Her humour creates a surface upon my work in which people can use to reach the seriousness laying underneath.
I am interested in how our Society is built up, how peoples behaviour reflects the Society, and visa versa. I believe; to get a better World to live in - finding and trusting your own Confidence is the answer. And the Confidence lay, in each one of us... yes, you got it... In our Freedom - Chamber.Let Ell Puppet show you the way.
I am a multi media Artist, always starting with paintings to describe both an Ideal World and the Real World. It’s a ‘meditation’ that triggers feelings, thoughts, ideas and creativity within me that I want to share. And to make it as wide and detailed as possible, I use a mixture of video, installation, animation, performance, music and sculpture. Each Media having different angles.
Mentality my AssInstallation
Snotty Pot Meditation85 cm x 120 cmAcrylic on canvas
GRADUATES
MA Fine Art2012
InTERIM
MA Fine Art2012
Kinga Amielucha
My work focuses on the interactions between physical objects and their intangible meanings. In my practice I use pre – existing objects to re – evaluate their common functions. I am interested in rearranging conventional structures. I believe in the idea that more can be expressed with simple forms which makes the work ascetic in its appearance. I find important relative elements in life such as time, taste and perception.
The work deals with the affirmation of insignificant things. It is a play with the
everyday surroundings. Overlooked, discarded objects start afresh as installations put into new contexts. In my work small, invisible things become significant and the idea of reconsidering what has been taken for granted is a constant concern of the work.
My recent works are concerned with space, light and idea in its physical presence. Insightful observations become a starting point for minimalistic interventions in which I am trying to challenge perception of the everyday.
Adam Byford
I make art works based on concepts that are inspired by nature, physics and astronomy. My work employs a range of media including light, film, sound, installation and the organisation of events, to convey my ideas. Through the work I aim to provoke thought on the sublimity
age limiter
of the universe, the notion of humanity’s place in its vastness and a sense of awe at its magnitude, extent and its more implausible traits. My current research/practice is based around the theme of time.
Tom Carder
Everything gives way Part i
www.tomcarder.com07782191050
Lawrence Daley
apotheosis
Apotheosis (ap-poth-ee-oh-siss) n, pl –ses (-seez) 1 the perfect example 2 elevation to a preeminent or transcendent position 3 elevation to divine rank or stature
Josephine Dimblebywww.josephinedimbleby.com07903361392
Land Regeneration (2012)Matting, plinths, stone chips, crates, grab adhesive, caulking gun, suit, human and Globe (2009)
Silent Performance installation over 2.5 working days , University of Brighton, Grand Pa-rade, 14 - 16 March 2012
Rosalind Faram
Seaposts Oil on Board25 x 21.5 cm
Rosalind works between the mediums of drawing, painting, sculpture and video. Esotericism, the history of painting and images from modern popular culture manifest themselves in the work, popping up through the framework of the established discipline of the artist. The abiding question is: “How to say everthing and nothing?”
Nancy Howard-Price
The whole orientation of my painting is directed towards the harmony and beauty of nature and landscape, as I seek to encapsulate that beauty and transfer it to canvas.
My fascination is with the dynamic properties of nature and landscape as I observe many of those same properties in human beings. That fiery restlessness and energy that underscores life itself.
How else could our few forefathers have engendered some six billion of us now
cohabiting on this beautiful planet.
It serves to convince me that with nature being the basis of life, we do well to observe it closely if only for our own wellbeing. Hence my firm conviction that all good art “nourishes the soul and soothes the throbbing heart”; as I ponder the joy to be found in nature and landscape that cycles through the four seasons, that is mirrored in the cycle of birth, life and death.
Fiery UndergrowthAcrylic on canvas120cm x 63cm
Emma Jex
Patrick Madden
I am an artist currently based in Lewes, East Sussex and I am a student at Brighton University. My work, which is geometric forms arranged to achieve harmony and balance between surface, colour, and form. My ideas are centred on uniting abstraction with ancient mystical concepts which has intrigued Modernist artists during the latter part of the 19th century and early 20th.
I use traditional printmaking techniques such as aquatint, monotype, etching and woodcut.
[email protected] 07758344877
I am currently in the process of looking at the human psyche and its influences; my recent studio practice is derived from a personal part of my conditioning, namely living with limited resources.
I am now in the process of developing ideas while trying to grasp the complexity behind such concepts and its relationship.
Cris Marin
the watchmaker
Sharmila Zeb
Bricks and Trolley II
Excess Baggage: MA anyone?
Some years ago an eminent colleague, who shall be nameless, remarked to me that the problem with MA students was that they came with ‘baggage!’ One presumes that this remark indicated a preference for blank slates but even he would acknowledge that this is impossible, that we all inevitably carry baggage regardless of who we are.
As a visitor wanders around this exhibition he/she will see many different approaches and highly varied works using a wide array of media. In places these are grouped together, as in our main gallery, in a supportive conversation and we must again this year thank our ex-colleague Barry Barker who returned from retirement to assist with its curation, acting as the chair of these ‘conversational exchanges.’ In the upstairs studios the works tend to be grouped per individual student where a ‘voice’ sustained over several pieces can be heard.
However in considering the opening remark of this introduction, it may also strike the visitor that what we are experiencing is a bit like the baggage carousel in the arrivals hall at Gatwick. Here is the emerging baggage, sometimes fresh and pristine, rather grand, highly polished, sometimes a little rough round the edges, a bit battered and covered in stickers! The bags suggest a journey or completed passage to the viewer but the start of its journey can only be implied from the visual evidence. What was it like when the baggage handler in the departure lounge chucked it down the chute, stacked it up hugger-mugger on trolleys, and loaded it onto the plane?
Yes, MA students do come with baggage in the form of earlier undergraduate work or a larger life experience, even a discontent with their lot, or at least a desire as they climb onto the plane to travel to another place for a little while, to take their baggage somewhere else, so that when it finally re-emerges it bears the stamp of the journey even if in the end it is the same old bag! Now it at least has a different sticker or a new sheen.
The MA experience is short whether the bags are fast tracked (twelve months) or take the slower queue (twenty four months) and there are varied stories to be told here as well. Sometimes the baggage is transformed into an entirely new shape, that old traditional leather bag with worn handles becomes a shiny hard plastic case with retractable handle and wheels! Sometimes the changes are not visually dramatic but important nevertheless, like an old friend with a few more wrinkles, a bit of frayed stitching, a few more scuff marks, a torn luggage label, an enriched patina.
On our MA at Brighton we aim to throw the bags about in a collaborative journey with student to student, student to tutor exchanges. The journey is one in which a sober reflection, on the social and cultural transport systems in which that journey takes place, plays it part.
We hope that for the visitor something of this comes across as he/she looks at this graduating and interim baggage carousel. For some this is only a stop over point on the onward journey for others they are leaving the airport terminal with their baggage ready to unpack. I wonder what they will find inside? Unpacking in life persists, baggage never actually goes away but one hopes perhaps that it is a little lighter, more refreshed, better organized and hopefully some of the excess has got lost on the journey never to return?
Peter Seddon
Deputy Head of Arts and Media,Fine Art MA Tutor,Reader in Arts Practice and Historiography,
