SPECTRUM at CHART
The
performance programme is at the year’s edition of CHART works with
demonstrating the vitality of colour and showing how it can be relevant,
engaging and complex in a series of conceptual performance art works.
The
diverse variety of performance artists is curated by the English curator,
writer and editor Francesca Gavin. Gavin has primarily invited Nordic artists
who work with different elements such as, architecture, sound, lighting and
textile. The artists will create individual performances but are asked to work
within the shared thematic of colour in creating their works.
Colour
has a bad reputation. From the Grecian concepts of aesthetics though 20th
century modernism to contemporary conceptual art, colour is often described as
something about spectacle, emotion, expression, the irrational. The responses
and experience colour creates in a viewer is often downplayed as simple
sensationalism. This programme of performances aims to resist this redundant
argument.
The
performance programme of CHART draws on David Batchelor’s concept of
‘chromophobia’. He argues, “colour is made out to be the property of some
’foreign’ body – usually the feminine, the oriental, the primitive, the
infantile, the vulgar, the queer or the pathological. Colour is relegated to
the realm of the superficial, the supplementary, the inessential or the
cosmetic… Colour is routinely excluded from the higher concerns of the Mind.”
The
aim of these works is to reposition colour as something equally important as
line, idea, and form in the creation of art. Show that colour is something
important outside of the expected mediums of painting or graphics. That colour
can be an intelligent way to engage with politics and meaning, and has an
important role in contemporary cultural production and communication.
The
artists in this programme will invited to draw on the idea of the spectrum or
create a performance around a specific colour (so there could be an excitement
amongst viewers to ‘collect’ the experience of different coloured
performances).
PERFORMANCES
FRIDAY
the 21st of August
Norwegian
artist Wrånes creates dramatic aural audio works. Featured in the Sydney
biennial and the last Performa, her space-specific performance works that often
use hanging elements, props, costume and architecture. For CHART, she will
perform a “vision for the future”.
SATURDAY
the 22nd of August
Sigurðardóttir’s
work focuses on interactive spaces and projects that investigate the idea of
the spectrum, space and movement. For CHART, the Icelandic artist will create a
Prism performance-installation working with colour as visual information gained
from scans of viewers invisible radiant energy.
David Mullett & Duncan Ransom
Director
David Mullett is unveiling his first abstract psychedelic virtual reality work
as part of the performance programme of CHART. Trained at the Royal College of
Art, Mullett is founder of VR agency Virtualize and has written about
innovations in Virtual Reality for Dazed, Sleek and Blackbook.
Duncan
Ransom is the founder of The Endless, a high-end Virtual Reality content
creation studio. With over 10 years experience working for major VFX studios in
the feature film industry, he is currently focused on the development of
delicious augmented and virtual reality based environments, interactions and
applications.
SUNDAY
the 23rd of August
Swedish
artist Nadine Bryne creates works that reflect an interest in ritual, nature
and femininity. Alongside a practise that includes sculpture and film, her
performance works have incorporated textiles, dance and fabric elements. For
CHART, she will create audio-visual work inspired by the projection and
contrast of colour.
Verhoeven’s
chaotic performative installation works include objects, sound, sculpture,
moving image and painting. She has also created collaborative real time
performances at the ICA, London and moving image performance with Jimmy Merris
at the Hordaland Arts Centre, Norway. She is creating a new performance
inspired by the colour spectrum for CHART.
Peter Jensen was born in Denmark and educated at Central
Saint Martins in London. He established his brand in 1999 and is known for a
mastery of colour and print, with work that crosses between fashion, art and
graphic image. He has collaborated in the past with Tim Walker, Dover Street
Market and Topshop, and a retrospective of his work was exhibited at the
Copenhagen Arts Museum in 2011.
Spectrum Risograph Print Project
This
commissioned project is a series of six limited risograph prints each inspired
by a different colour in the spectrum, which will be given away free. The
project aims to rethink ideas of value and consumption within the context of
the fair with works that explore wider ideas about the colour spectrum. The
contributing artists are Alex da Corte, Clare Woods, James Hoff, John Korner,
Peter Linde Busk and Richard Coleman.
Francesca
Gavin
Gavin
is a curator, writer and editor based in London. She has curated international
exhibitions including E-Vapor-8 (319 Scholes and Site Sheffield), The Dark Cube
(Palais de Tokyo), and The New Psychedelia (Mu). She is also the Visual Arts
Editor of Dazed & Confused, Art Editor of Twin and contributing editor at
Artsy.net, Sleek, Le Pan and AnOther. She has written five books including ‘The
Book of Hearts’, ‘100 New Artists’ and ‘Hell Bound: New Gothic Art’ and is the
curator of the Soho House group collection.
