Opening Reception: Wednesday, September 18, 2013
It is said that line does not exist in nature* - that line is an abstract device used to help describe a three dimensional world. It is used to define a contour or an edge of a volume. However, in visual art line is a basic yet a varied and complex element.
Exploring the use of line in compositions has been my primary focus in these paintings. I have admired the skilful execution of line in work by such artists as Piranesi, Matisse, and Agnes Martin. Even artists for whom shape and colour seem to be paramount (Willaim Perehudoff), line is an important element. I have also been keenly aware of how we perceive line in a stand of trees in a forest or the powerful linear impact of a horizon.
My interest in line as a formal element led me to experimenting with various techniques to achieve linear marks – snap lines, straight edges, taped lines and lines executed freehand with a loaded brush. Often the beginning of the composition involved measuring to achieve certain dimensions or ratios, but as the process evolved I would become more contemplative and rely more on an intuitive approach as lines and certain other elements would be added or painted out.
As in most of my formalist work, narrative and content are left pretty much to the viewer. The fulness of the viewing experience depends not only on seeing the lines but also on what you might find "between the lines".
Artists: Arnold J. Kemp (USA), Tricia Sellmer (CAN), Lucy Harrison (GBR), Daniel Arnaldo Roman (PRI), Zoran Poposki (HKG/MKD), Laurence Wood (HKG/GBR), Luis Lara Malvacias (USA/VEN), Damon Ayers and Tessie Word (USA), Victoria Hindley (USA), Eva Petri (AUT/SVN)
Curated by: Zoran Poposki & Laurence Wood
Contemporary lives have become journeys in a chaotic universe, transforming it into a territory which may be travelled both in time and space, as Nicolas Bourriaud states in the Altermodern Manifesto. In such a changing terrain, individuals' daily practices, as well as their sense of self, rely on constant translation and mediation between identities and cultures, an ongoing process of negotiation of cultural meanings. The artists invited to take part in this exhibition consider this centerless chronotope of global negotiation and interchange between agents from different cultures as an emerging network of new pathways of translation between multiple formats of expression and communication. Through a variety of approaches to video, they explore the dynamic interplay between the global and the local on a concrete, material level.