Though excited to see the 2011 Turner Prize myself, particularly being displayed in my home city of Gateshead, it was a friend of mine who insisted I had to see Karla Black's work as he felt it related well to my own. 'Black's work is often infused with a sense of the processes behind it, processes which can evoke traditional feminine occupations' (Cain, 2011) and 'bridges the experience of tangible matter with the intimacy of memory or the subconscious... suggestion of performance psychologically involves the viewer with the making process, provoking instinctive responses' and the 'lost world of early childhood'. I personally found her work the most powerful of the show - ironic, as it visually it would seem the most muted and delicate. The materials have a very sensual appeal, and the exhibit as a whole a embraces the materiality of sculpture; we are encouraged to walk around it, to view it from different angles, to consider the effects of light on its organic form, to consider our presence in relation to it.
I was lucky enough that simultaneously, an exhibition of new work by Mike Kelley, in collaboration with Michael Smith was being shown in the floor above. Their 'A Voyage of Growth and Discovery' shows a 'pre-lingual man-child', a character developed by Smith named IKKI, attending the Burning Man festival in the Nevada Desert. Shown through a combination of video projections and installations referencing childhood, such as blankets, toys and climbing frames, left. Having previously looked at Kelley's work on childhood and his approach to craft, I found this exhibition an interesting culmination of his ideas, and, similar to Black, shows the effectiveness of playing upon the connotations of certain materials and objects.
I was lucky enough that simultaneously, an exhibition of new work by Mike Kelley, in collaboration with Michael Smith was being shown in the floor above. Their 'A Voyage of Growth and Discovery' shows a 'pre-lingual man-child', a character developed by Smith named IKKI, attending the Burning Man festival in the Nevada Desert. Shown through a combination of video projections and installations referencing childhood, such as blankets, toys and climbing frames, left. Having previously looked at Kelley's work on childhood and his approach to craft, I found this exhibition an interesting culmination of his ideas, and, similar to Black, shows the effectiveness of playing upon the connotations of certain materials and objects.
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