Should we distinguish between This and That?
Related Information
23rd March - 30th March 2007
Opening times: 10am - 6pm
Preview: 23rd March 2007, 4 - 6pm
Venue:
10th Floor
Loxford Tower
Manchester
Should we Distinguish Between This and That includes the work of fourteen artists, who have each produced new artwork specifically for Loxford Tower, in which the exhibition is housed. Built as a hall of residence, Oxley Tower has been used more recently as offices and is soon to be demolished. The artists’ work occupies an ex-student flat that shows evidence of the building’s past life and impending fate. The rooms, now almost empty, have been cleared out for the demolition. Yet remnants of their former functions remain, with items of bedroom and office furniture scattered around. The transformation from flats to offices was obviously not total; the rooms are unmistakably bedrooms, with only a few cursory modifications.
Some artists, notably Andrew Lim and Timothy Fisher have utilised materials they found within the building as the basic materials of their work. For others, the visible traces of both of the building’s former uses provide fertile ground for a variety of responses to different aspects of its past and to the space as it is now.
Adam Cain’s simulation of a student bedroom responds most overtly to a particular past use of the building, recreating what was once there. Kate Hooper similarly references a bedroom’s past but does so by highlighting the absence of past objects rather than replacing them with their likeness. Her chalk lines, tracing the outlines of objects, resonate with the marks on the walls and floor that show where furniture has been removed.
Cain and Hooper’s works have a narrative dimension, suggesting uses and relationships that existed in the flat. This is typical of several artists who focus on the potential human relationships embodied by the site. Suzanne Smith depicts a paranoid interpersonal relationship that can be equally well situated in a domestic or office situation. Emma Peers materially represents a conversation, making present the fleeting moments that structure our social relationships in any space.
Martin Palmer and Richard Oldfield construct contrary versions of the space. For Oldfield the room is claustrophobic and leads to evocations of madness. For Palmer a similar room becomes a domain of ownership and mastery. Both artists use the feelings caused by a small bedroom to consider how space or territory elicit different mental states. Likewise, Jayne Kelly and Timothy Fisher portray psychic states that may be caused by domestic space and institutional space respectively.
Many of the artists provoke reflection on broader social issues that play out beyond the confines of this flat. For example, Hannah McKenzie and Sarah Dean. Dean’s consideration of representations of women is relevant in any setting. However here it chimes with the poster of a bathing suit clad woman in Cain’s installation, suggesting that representations function not in an abstract sphere, but through particular social situations that impact on wider society.
Joanne Masding, Bryony Moore and Claire Davidson invite us to literally look outside the building. Moore’s birds, Masding’s objects placed by the window and Davidson’s reproduction of the external view, point to the position of the flat as part of a tower block, part of a larger world. Bringing the external view into the interior of the building, Davidson’s pinhole camera highlights that soon inside will become outside when the building is destroyed. In this context the precariousness of Andrew Lim’s constructions also takes on a new significance, calling up notions of impending collapse.
The slightness of Moore and Masding’s objects and photographs, encourages awareness of the interior of occupied rooms as well as gesturing to the outside. Contrasting Oldfield’s claustrophobia, the rooms seem vast when housing their miniature objects. Their works, along with Palmer’s, are suggestive of childhood, a recurrence that seems pertinent in this former hall of residence. It is also echoed in the collective moniker “14 gifted children” that the artists have chosen for themselves. For many people (neglecting the increasing age diversity of university students) student life is a stage marking entry into adulthood. One has left home but is still reassuringly part of an institution.
Should we Distinguish Between This and That is the third exhibition put on by an ambitious group of final year sculpture students from Manchester Metropolitan University. Soon to have completed their degrees, these are names to watch out for in the art world.
Text by Amelia Crouch
Opening times: 10am - 6pm
Preview: 23rd March 2007, 4 - 6pm
Venue:
10th Floor
Loxford Tower
Manchester
Should we Distinguish Between This and That includes the work of fourteen artists, who have each produced new artwork specifically for Loxford Tower, in which the exhibition is housed. Built as a hall of residence, Oxley Tower has been used more recently as offices and is soon to be demolished. The artists’ work occupies an ex-student flat that shows evidence of the building’s past life and impending fate. The rooms, now almost empty, have been cleared out for the demolition. Yet remnants of their former functions remain, with items of bedroom and office furniture scattered around. The transformation from flats to offices was obviously not total; the rooms are unmistakably bedrooms, with only a few cursory modifications.
Some artists, notably Andrew Lim and Timothy Fisher have utilised materials they found within the building as the basic materials of their work. For others, the visible traces of both of the building’s former uses provide fertile ground for a variety of responses to different aspects of its past and to the space as it is now.
Adam Cain’s simulation of a student bedroom responds most overtly to a particular past use of the building, recreating what was once there. Kate Hooper similarly references a bedroom’s past but does so by highlighting the absence of past objects rather than replacing them with their likeness. Her chalk lines, tracing the outlines of objects, resonate with the marks on the walls and floor that show where furniture has been removed.
Cain and Hooper’s works have a narrative dimension, suggesting uses and relationships that existed in the flat. This is typical of several artists who focus on the potential human relationships embodied by the site. Suzanne Smith depicts a paranoid interpersonal relationship that can be equally well situated in a domestic or office situation. Emma Peers materially represents a conversation, making present the fleeting moments that structure our social relationships in any space.
Martin Palmer and Richard Oldfield construct contrary versions of the space. For Oldfield the room is claustrophobic and leads to evocations of madness. For Palmer a similar room becomes a domain of ownership and mastery. Both artists use the feelings caused by a small bedroom to consider how space or territory elicit different mental states. Likewise, Jayne Kelly and Timothy Fisher portray psychic states that may be caused by domestic space and institutional space respectively.
Many of the artists provoke reflection on broader social issues that play out beyond the confines of this flat. For example, Hannah McKenzie and Sarah Dean. Dean’s consideration of representations of women is relevant in any setting. However here it chimes with the poster of a bathing suit clad woman in Cain’s installation, suggesting that representations function not in an abstract sphere, but through particular social situations that impact on wider society.
Joanne Masding, Bryony Moore and Claire Davidson invite us to literally look outside the building. Moore’s birds, Masding’s objects placed by the window and Davidson’s reproduction of the external view, point to the position of the flat as part of a tower block, part of a larger world. Bringing the external view into the interior of the building, Davidson’s pinhole camera highlights that soon inside will become outside when the building is destroyed. In this context the precariousness of Andrew Lim’s constructions also takes on a new significance, calling up notions of impending collapse.
The slightness of Moore and Masding’s objects and photographs, encourages awareness of the interior of occupied rooms as well as gesturing to the outside. Contrasting Oldfield’s claustrophobia, the rooms seem vast when housing their miniature objects. Their works, along with Palmer’s, are suggestive of childhood, a recurrence that seems pertinent in this former hall of residence. It is also echoed in the collective moniker “14 gifted children” that the artists have chosen for themselves. For many people (neglecting the increasing age diversity of university students) student life is a stage marking entry into adulthood. One has left home but is still reassuringly part of an institution.
Should we Distinguish Between This and That is the third exhibition put on by an ambitious group of final year sculpture students from Manchester Metropolitan University. Soon to have completed their degrees, these are names to watch out for in the art world.
Text by Amelia Crouch
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Images:
Click here for more images
Publications:
Should we distinguish between This and That?
Participating Artists:
Suzanne Smith
Kate Hooper
Bryony Moore
Hooper & Moore
Hannah McKenzie
Timothy Fisher
Joanne Masding
Martin Palmer
Richard Oldfield
Adam Cain
Jayne Kelly
Andrew Lim
Emma Peers
Claire Davison
Sarah Dean
Click here for more images
Publications:
Should we distinguish between This and That?
Participating Artists:
Suzanne Smith
Kate Hooper
Bryony Moore
Hooper & Moore
Hannah McKenzie
Timothy Fisher
Joanne Masding
Martin Palmer
Richard Oldfield
Adam Cain
Jayne Kelly
Andrew Lim
Emma Peers
Claire Davison
Sarah Dean
