Yayoi Kusama at the Tate Modern

82 year-old Yayoi Kusama’s colourful, large, all encompassing works are, at first glance, fun, vibrant and exciting. Delve deeper into the Japanese artists’ paintings, sculptures and installations and you see an overwhelming struggle with obliteration, patriarchy and self-space spanning over six decades.

Kusama is Japan’s most famous living artist and made her name in New York in the 50s and 60s when she produced flowers with spiky inners and threatening red caves -- seen currently at the Tate Modern’s exhibition until 5 June.

Since 1977 Kusama has lived voluntarily in a psychiatric institution, and many of the works shown at the Tate are marked with obsessiveness and a desire to escape from psychological trauma. In an attempt to share her experiences, she creates installations that immerse the viewer in her obsessively charged vision of endless dots and nets or infinitely mirrored space.

It is after the Tate reveals this fact that the works become more disturbing and Kusama’s mental illness is highlighted with the repetitious, hallucinogenic, ominous nature of the spots and phallic, spongy white shapes covering inane objects.

She is renowned for her “environments’ and this exhibition is one after the other, with seeminingly no escape.

As the 1960s progressed, Kusama moved from painting, sculpture and collage to installations, films, performances and ‘happenings’ as well as political actions, counter-cultural events, fashion design and publishing.

The exhibition includes Kusama’s iconic film Kusama’s Self-Obliteration 1968, capturing this period of performative experimentation -- one of the more disturbing parts of the exhibition!

The last work -- before which a Tate worker asks if “you have seen the whole exhibition?” prior to letting you in -- is a new installation and a highlight of the exhibition for me. Infinity Mirrored Room - Filled with the Brilliance of Life 2011, is Kusama’s largest mirrored room to date and is filled with hanging lights changing colour creating infinite space and movement.

Pete Doherty exhibits blood paintings

Lead singer of rock band Babyshambles, Pete Doherty, is showing paintings created with his own blood at a new show in Camden.

On Blood: a portrait of the artist, displays artwork from the British rocker Doherty’s 2009 solo album Grace/Wastelands, as well as several canvases at the Cob Gallery.

Doherty -- who has been linked with a string of drug-related arrests -- told the Independent recently that he developed his “arterial splatter” technique by squirting his blood with a syringe onto a canvas. The paintings include elements of college and written lyrics and poetry written by the former Libertines star.

The show's co-curator Rachel Chudley told Reuters: "If you look at art through the ages, the subject matter has always been life. We all die and painting in blood is a reminder of our mortality. It's a universal media. I don't think there is anything gory about it."

According to sources, prices range from £4,500 to £8,000 for the original paintings and £500 for limited edition prints.

The jury is out, I am yet to be convinced I’d pay that much - but, according to reports some have sold already!

(pic source: Rolling Stone)

World renowned artists come together to support Shelter

More than 40 of the world’s leading artists and designers including Jake and Dinos Chapman, Grayson Perry, Antony Gormley, Julian Opie and Patrick Hughes have come together for an exclusive art exhibition in support of charity Shelter.

Shelter -- a housing and homelessness charity which runs a helpline, a network of housing aid centres and works with the Citizens Advice Bureau -- has created the exhibition which centres on the theme ‘Up My Street’.

Artists have donated pieces inspired by a street that has particular significance to them, drawing on characters and buildings as well as personal experiences and memories.

Patrick Hughes, Cloudy Heart

The exhibition aims to raise awareness of the thousands of families in Britain struggling to find and keep a safe and secure place to live. Every two minutes someone faces the nightmare of losing their home and Shelter is there to help whoever’s next, according to Shelter.

Original pieces of photography, street art, sculpture, graphic design and painting make up the diverse collection. Other artists involved include photographer Miles Aldridge, street artist Eine and DC Comics illustrator Frank Quitely.

All artwork will be auctioned in aid of Shelter. An online gallery of the exclusive artwork will be available to view at www.shelter.org.uk/upmystreet from Monday 27th February, with the opportunity for people to bid on the artwork remotely.

The collection will be on display in a free exhibition at The Conningsby Gallery in London from Monday 5th – Thursday 8th March 2012.

Anthony Gormley, Super Ego

“We’re delighted that so many talented people have come together to support Shelter," Tracy Griffin, Shelter’s director of fundraising, said. "This exhibition highlights that home is not just about bricks and mortar. The people, sense of security and wider community make it so important to each and every one of us.

“In these tough times homelessness really can happen to anyone. We hope that people will get bidding to help us raise vital funds.”

Birmingham-based painter Patrick Hughes said the charity is close to his heart. "Having a roof over your head is something we should all be able to take for granted, and most of us do," he said. "However, not everyone has a place they can call their own. I hope this exhibition will make people think about the importance of a home and raise awareness of Shelter’s work.”

Julian Opie, Roadscape

Taryn Simon

Young (36-year-old) photographer Taryn Simon's exhibition drew me in, if I'm to be frank, because it was free. But upon reflection her collection, A Living Man Declared Dead and Other Chapters, is most definitely worth paying for.

Taryn Simon with her collection. Photograph: Antonio Zazueta Olmos

The exhibition at Tate Modern, London (as well as the Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin and Museum of Modern Art, New York)was produced over a four-year period (2008-11), during which Simon travelled around the world researching and recording bloodlines and their related stories. As a journalist, it was this documented style that I found so intriguing. You could see the time, research, effort and concentration that had gone into each piece.

*photo from the Guardian

In each of the eighteen 'chapters' that make up the work, the external forces of territory, power, circumstance or religion collide with the internal forces of psychological and physical inheritance.

The subjects documented by Simon include feuding families in Brazil, victims of genocide in Bosnia, the body double of Saddam Hussein's son Uday, and the living dead in India. Her collection is at once cohesive and arbitrary, mapping the relationships among chance, blood, and other components of fate.

Not only an impressive collection of candid photographs, each paragraph is an enthralling -- often heartbreaking -- story of human plight.

Susan Hiller – Tate Britain

If you have a Punch and Judy phobia, I would advise you not to go to the Barbara Hiller exhibition at the Tate. In fact, if you LOVE Punch and Judy I would advise you to at least stay away from the video installations...as it may ruin your beloved childhood memories.

The huge video screens playing repeated, distorted images of the seaside puppets, accompanied with disturbing phrases, are the parts of Hiller’s exhibition that stick in my mind. There is however some slightly less obscure pieces to enjoy (such as the work above).

Hiller’s obsession with identity, language, history and documentation is apparent throughout her work. On reaching one room you’re greeted by another – slightly less disturbing but no less striking– sound/video installation, playing clips from the world’s lost languages. This was such an intriguing installation, conveying lost identity, words, languages and dreams.

Witness

The second installation displaying Hiller’s wordy cleverness is mesmerising. My friend and I could have spent hours walking around each speaker in, Witness (above). The glittering cables hang down in a blue-lit room, with speakers playing an array of languages. Walking round till your ears pick up a familiar tone is intriguing and engaging.

Hiller continually questions, what happens after? After you are gone? After the language has disappeared? The questions add a poignancy to her work, displayed clearly in Monument (below). The cross shaped work has blown up photographs of epitaphs saying phrases like: Henry James Bristow, aged eight, who "saved his little sister's life by tearing off her flaming clothes but caught fire himself".

Monument


If you can get past the Punch and Judy, Hiller’s – age 70 – retrospective is an engaging insight into poignant imaginings of an experienced master.

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Gabriel Orozco

My new Tate members card has been fully utilized of late - a fantastic present idea for any arty types - after I moved to London. The card allows freebies, discounts of cafes, use of members rooms and, most importantly, free entry to any Tate exhibition (with a friend too!).

I was aware of Gabriel Orozco's more well known works such as My Hands are my Heart (below) and Black Kites, but I'd never had the opportunity to view his collection of photography, installation and sculpture all at once. His latest show at the Tate Modern gives you an insight into his playful, provocative style on a huge scale.

My Hands are my Heart (1991)

The vast collection of vivacious photography and coltish sculpture such as LA D.S - a car seemingly a reflection of itself - is a joy to behold (below) and accessible for everyone.

LA D.S

The poignant, touching and funny obituaries with quotes such as "bassist and mock politician", "a painter of poetic realism" and "a cowgirl till the end" leads you to want to read them all (below).

Obituaries and Black Kite

So whether you're a fan already, or new to Orozco, his playful, interactive, stimulating works are a must see for all in this rare opportunity to see his vast collection of works.

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Bad Boy of the Renaissance

He’s always been known as a tempestuous, highly strung, complex and sometimes violent, passionate yet brilliant artist. Caravaggio’s dark, dramatic, realistic, strikingly modern works have struck chords with contemporary audiences the world over. But now it is his criminal record that’s causing more controversy than Pete Doherty on a Friday night in Camden or Ricky Gervais…anywhere in America.

An exhibition of documents at Rome’s State Archives shines a light on the turbulent life of the artist at the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th centuries. Michelagnolo da Caravaggio’s escapades – including frequent brawls, one of which brought him a death sentence from Pope Paul V – are described in the hand written police records, all bound together in heavy tomes and carefully preserved in this amazing repository of Rome’s history during the Renaissance and after.

Old ‘Vaggio was a naughty one, frequently getting into fights. He brushed with the law after throwing a plate of cooked artichokes in the face of a waiter in a tavern – all very Naomi Campbell. His landlady was not a huge fan either. He made a hole in the ceiling of his rented studio – so that his paintings would fit inside (obviously!). His landlady sued, so he and a friend (logically) pelted her window with stones.

These brilliant new tales are all documented with eyewitness accounts in this collection of ageing parchments.

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Anish Kapoor: Turning the World Upside Down

I came across a unexpected surprise this weekend whilst taking a sunlit walk around Kensington Gardens after a spot of shopping on the nearby highstreet(only place I can bear to go on a Saturday). The Royal Parks and the Serpentine Gallery have put on a large exhibition of outdoor scultptures by acclaimed London-based artist Anish Kapoor.

The free exhibition showcases some stunning recent works never seen before in London.

The first one we came across was Sky Mirror (2006) – a stainless steel, huge circular reflective sculpture. Placed in front of The Longwater (near Lancaster Gate tube), the mirrored sculpture produces a dwarfed reflection of yourself and other visitors – similar to his works at the Royal Academy exhibition but on a maximised scale and the natural setting adding an entirely new perspective.

See:(http://culturecocktails.blogspot.com/2010/06/anish-kapoor-at-royal-academy-beautiful.html)

The rest of the sculptures follow a similar large scale highly reflective, curved mirror surface format – creating illusionary distortions of the much loved surroundings, contrasting and reflecting the ever changing colours and wildlife of Kensington Gardens.

Anish Kapoor at the Royal Academy: Beautiful Chaos

“Mummy, is it real?” the profound question asked by a child at the Anish Kapoor exhibition to her mother is more accurate than expected. The exhibition at the Royal Academy invites the viewer to ask questions and involve themselves. The organic ambiguities of the sculptures allow them to become states of being.
Indian born Kapoor, is a British installation artist who won the Turner prize in 1991, with notable public sculptures such as Cloud Gate, Millennium Park, Chicago and Sky Mirror at the Rockafeller Center, New York, the doesn’t exactly have to prove himself in his latest exhibition.
This doesn’t, however, mean the works lack enthusiasm. On entrance to the gallery we are met with a glittering sculpture reflecting the Annenberg Courtyard of the picturesque gallery in each of its spheres. Tall Tree and the Eye (2009) appears to be some sort of mathematic structure, its ephemeral presence dislocating the symmetry of the classical courtyard. The day I went was perfect for it as the sun beamed through the courtyard, catching light on the sparkling monument.
Opening the indoor part of the exhibition we see, Hive (2009), occupying the Wohl Central Hall, the large geometrical and symmetrical form looks like an internal space but when you walk around you realise it’s also an object in space.
The most memorable part of the exhibition is definitely Shooting into the Corner (2009) and Svayambh (2007). Svayambh, is one of the most unusual and ambitious installations I have seen at the RA. It occupies the five galleries of the rear enfilade at the gallery. A huge red wax track runs through the rooms with a sold block of wax that slowly makes its way along the track. The block looks as though it just fits through the antique arches, occasionally splashing red wax onto the walls and floor of the white rooms. The word, Svayambh, translates as roughly as ‘self-generated’ from a Sanskrit word. This reflects the way the red block uses the building to shape its form, rather than, as is traditional, using a mould to cast a bronze sculpture, for example. Here, the medium is wax itself. Looking at, Shooting into the Corner, we are invited into a room filled with anticipated viewers as a straight faced assistant loads huge red wax blocks into a canon that shoot out wax into a corner of the white gallery every twenty minutes. The thrill of watching this event is undeniably exciting, murmurs run through the crowd as the canon spits out the shells of red wax, making a surprisingly deafening bang. This drama is what makes the piece so engaging. It also allows the work to be both a painting as sculpture as the walls are piled and splashed with the fired out wax.
The instantly recognisable ‘Kapooresque’ sculptures were the Pigment Works shown together in a room with When I am Pregnant (1992). Kapoor began experimenting with pigment colouring in the 1970’s with his work, 1000 Names. Walking around the rooms we see the organic sculptures at our feet placed together on the floor, they look as if they are natural and self made rather than products of sculpture. The surprises (of which the exhibition has many) are that some of the pigment works seem to be coming out of the wall. This surprise element is reflected in When I am Pregnant, as when you approach it you think the wall is flat, it is only when you get closer than you see it is convex. This sense of ambiguity is seen in most of the works in this collection, such as the emotive, Yellow (1999), that made me immediately smile. This looks, as opposed to the previous work, is concave, but it is only when you approach it that you see how concave it is. This, paired with the extremity of the colour, allows the work to overwhelm the viewer, as though it exists as a living being.
The mirror collection of works or, non-objects, are a concoction of shaped mirrors, distorting the viewers reflection, and are great fun. The whole exhibition itself is about involvement with the viewer. There were many children there when I visited, and I think this is that sort of exhibition that can appeal to all ages. I never expected to be as amused, intrigued, fascinated and surprised as I was on viewing Kapoor’s works. They are playful; form and formlessness intertwined with, at times, uncomfortable reflection. The interactive, awe-inspiring works set your pulse racing and senses raging, leaving viewers walking out with a smile.