Now let me tell you, this is all about self. Certainly not « myself » but the exploration as a voyage of self…..They call it a unique experience - it’s certainly unique and finally when you have got over the first installment, you go on into China….we are also told that it is a risky trip into one’s self and that you will be metamorphosed by the artists in such a way that from one installation to the next, from one floor to the next you are supposedly INSIDE the works. Now this is really art (?) for you, as all these objects, paintings, installations, oddities, videos were created for the exhibition. Oh yes, you are about to see that they bring you close to the core of your being….you’ll suddenly see your most secret thoughts and fears. Now if you like, you can experience this as a journey of joy, horror, desire…..and I’m sure you are about to find it an unexpected experience….
If you are to understand something about this INSIDE, there will be a little to add about each artist or I would prefer to say - constructor - as if this is art, you are going to have to explain it to me.
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| Marc Couturier |
Now let's start by going into an empty room with every wall covered by pencil drawings which flow into one continuous spontataneous gesture. So much so that I thought I was closed in. For Marc Couturier (French and nearly as old as I am!), this work refers to
"the book of Genesis on which the third day, the waters withdrew from the earth on which Nature and vegetation are then created"
I suppose if you look at it very closely, you can see vegetation and nature - I didn't try for too long......
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| Abraham Poincheval (French) |
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| Abraham Poincheval (French) |
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| Abraham Poincheval (French) | | | | | |
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| Abraham Poincheval (French) |
I knew it, you've always wanted to have a bear in your sitting room and live in it. In actual fact, Abraham Poincheval, did exactly that for 13 days - like Jonas in the whale's stomach. Live like a bear, eat like bear and retire from the world. The experience was filmed - solitude yes, but I'm not that far yet.....
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| Ataru Sato (Japanese) | | | | | | | | | |
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| Ataru Sato (Japanese) |
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| Ataru Sato (Japanese) |
In actual fact I didn't find these uninteresting. Apparently the inside is like a personal diary of drawings which he has done since 2009. His thoughts, his encounters become the focal point of a moment. Moments of exchange and sharing with the spectator....can't say I find that about the solitary drawing.
I don't know who these two are by. One the right we were invited to go into a series of tents and this was one of the charming objects we came across. Not really strokeable, is it? On the other hand the face on the left was compelling. I am not going back to find out who it is by. That gaze is not easy to forget so perhaps recognizeable elsewhere
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| Peter Buggenhout from Gent |
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| Peter Buggenhout from Gent | | | | |
Now you thought that this was a photo of your local tip, didn't you? It certainly looks abandonned to me but Peter Buggenhout says that this is structure which symbolizes decay and renewal.....once it's cleared away, then it will be renewal for me.
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| Mike Nelson - London |
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| Mike Nelson - London | | | | |
Not a prison but a "studio apparatus" which is somewhere between exhibition and workshop. Walk inside of it and tell me what you think.....
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| Dran (French) |
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| Dran (French) |
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| Dran (French) |
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| Dran (French) |
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| Dran (French) |
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| Dran (French) | | | | | |
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| Dran (French) |
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| Dran (French) |
Now these were good and as they were done directly on the wall as we walked down to the depths, I felt there was a little more emotion. Dran took over the big staircse connecting the two floors of "Inside". Apparently it is suppose to feel like a "descent into the bowels of the building". Well, I'll go along with that but the drawings are filled with emotions, stories which unfold as you walk down the staircase slowly - which I might add, you are advised to do.....
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| Sookoon Ang (Singapour) |
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| Sookoon Ang (Singapour) |
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| Sookoon Ang (Singapour) |
A video installation called EXORCISE ME - Teenage girls and death masks pose languidly. Adolescence, is I grant you, a particular intense moment in the exploration of self. Doubt, anxiety, the search for one's identity and relationship with the world - but does it have to be so violent?
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| Andro Weku (Berlin) |
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A bit claustrophic no? Looks as if someone has taken possession of his mind....frightening!
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| Berdaguer & Péjus (French) |
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| Berdaguer & Péjus (French) |
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| Berdaguer & Péjus (French) |
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| Berdaguer & Péjus (French) | | | |
Now into a room which was so white, my eyes stung for a moment. These structures are based on drawings made by patients during a physcological test when they were asked to draw a tree. Practically like self portraits, but the question is, can you relate to them as such as a
"standpoint of our own history, trauma or failures ". I prerer to think of them as the trees of fantasy in a white forest.
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| Andra Ursuta (New York) |
This is entitled "Stoner" which deals with violence against woman through stoning. Am I going to see something less violent or even less symbolic?
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| Araya Rasdjmrearnsook (Thailand) |
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| Araya Rasdjmrearnsook (Thailand) |
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| Araya Rasdjmrearnsook (Thailand) |
Here you are Araya Rasdjmrearnsook tends to the dead by reading to them, making conversation or teaching them something. It's a video again when the artist has spent time in a morgue with unclaimed bodies. An act of reverence and removal from the intense activity of our world, she prolongs the link between life and death. A nice gesture, I'm sure. I think that I will go on talking to my Mother in the flat - or even in exhibitions which I know she would have liked.. I'm not too sure about this one.
Something on a wall
and don't you think that this is rather a good installation?
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| John Giorno - New York - visual poetry |
Just making sure that you are still with me as now we are going INSIDE China.
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| Self explantory ? |
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| YU JI Floor installation with plaster cubes |
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| ZHAO YAO Gret Perfomance 2014 : hanging pelt like peices of digital prints on leather..... |
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| YU JI - Tiny Figure Woman - 2012 |
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| Zhao Yao |
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| Renaud Jerez (Berlin) |
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| Renaud Jerez (Berlin) |
Zhao Yao from Beijing . The structures themselves are made from recycled material (and I would think you would find a lot of this in China, be it recycled ot not)....I don't know what to think....but without being told what I'm supposed think, I quite like the movement in this sculture and can even see a face...can you?
Finally I could smile - even if it was rather forced...Renaud Jerez created avatars out of a system of PVC tubing, aluminium, sports gear, spray paint and rubber. What a wild combination; but when you go onto read that these are headless, amputatedn bandaged skeletal figures you are looking at, which I suppose could be looked at a bionic and uncertain future, the smile is wiped from my lips. Sometimes I prefer my imagination rather than a sordid description of whatever is in front of me. How about you?
I came out a nervous wreck.....So let's go over to the Guiment Museum and see what the Han Dynasty can tell me.....
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