Covid over and return to the studio and mono-printing – how to articulate the edges of these pocket objects? How to create a sense of from here to there; then to now…. a passage from left to right, layers of intensity? How to create groups that are distinct….
Without Borders arrived in Kyoto and opened at gallery Art Spot Korin on December 1st. Big thanks to Masahiro Kawanaka, artist-curator who installed the exhibition in my absence with help from participant Matthew Fasone. Great to see several contributers from Atelier Outotsu coming to see the work on show.
A fabulous show at the Glynn Vivian in Swansea recently ended. Carlos Bunga was the artist, last in Wales as part of the Artes Mundi exhibition. It began on the ground floor, with an exuberant field of yellow.
The show presents immersive works; cardboard is king together with other everyday materials. Architecture and homes are key themes and there are lots of opportunities to interact with the pieces to engage with the space. Bunga makes some exquisite small pieces in response to the gallery’s permanent collection depicting landscapes across Wales. They are immediate, sensory, beautiful. Magic.
This is a wonderful project I’ve been working on with elysium gallery since 2019. Over three hundred participants connected to twenty two groups around the world have contributed to this 1SSUE inspired project. It has aimed to bring creative people together, to collaborate in an international touring exhibition of works on paper – a collection of artists pages.
The pages will be bound together to make a unique artists book, forwarded to each exhibition venue to be dismantled, displayed, and then reassembled before moving again to the next location. The exhibition will travel to Japan, Norway, USA, Venice, Canada, and back to Wales. At the end of the tour, the book will be housed in a special collections library.
The pages are also globally accessible here:Â https://issuu.com/elysiumgallery/docs/catalogue
Without Borders has been curated by Jonathan Powell, elysium gallery Director and Heather Parnell, artist, and co-editor of 1SSUE artist books.
The exhibition continues at elysium gallery, Swansea until August 28th.
Around the House is crammed into a space 3.6 x 2 metres. It is a response to, and record of the space around my house; between home and the rest of the world during Covid–19 Lockdown. Thanks to photographer Dewi Tannatt Lloyd for rising to the challenge of recording the piece.
Finally, in May it was time to get into Gallery 3 at elysium to complete the work. After much procrastination and some tests with the help of a staple gun and my mate Nigel, we began to fill the tiny space.
More arranging of these latex skins for the Elysium show coming up at the end of May. Taking things a step further, I’ve begun building up and out, over chairs, boxes, plant pots. These things are immediately to hand but in the circumstances, burying or drowning objects in a pool of my outdoor floor casts seems entirely apposite.
Heather Parnell 