Looking forward – sound performance by Matthew Hopkins

Matthew Hopkins, still from ‘Hypnagogic Reconstruction #1 HEAD’, 2010-2011

To coincide with his current exhibition Heads, Matthew Hopkins is performing with musical collaborator Jonathan Hochman on April 2 at Gallery 9, Sydney.  Their synthesizer drenched industrial sound-scapes will serve as an accompaniment to Hopkins’ new video/sound piece Hypnagogic Reconstruction #1 HEAD.  The artist’s still (above) made Leg of Lamb think of DWARR’s ‘Screams of Terror’ video.  Freaky.

Hopkins is a busy man.  His band, Naked on the Vague, will be playing at the New Museum, New York, as part of the George Condo retrospective on April 14th.

Rock Solid

Anna Ephraim, 'Budgies', porcelain, pigment, cotton cord, sterling silver

Rock Solid at Pieces of Eight, Melbourne, features  jewellery created by 11 established visual artists.  Jeweller, writer and Rock Solid curator Meredith Turnbull invited participants to create sculptural works on a scale small enough to be worn on the body, and the results are diverse.

Madeline Kidd, 'Abstract Sculpture #5', found wooden objects, enamel paint', 2011, and 'Necklace with white and yellow beads', fimo, string, 2011

Christopher L G Hill shrinks multicoloured plastic bags into bangles, Anna Ephraim continues her exploration into natural history with a series of parrots fashioned out of porcelain and Madeleine Kidd presents wonderfully tactile baubles upon geometric components that reflect her abstracted, candy coloured paintings.  Uninhibited by the conventions of traditional jewellery making, the artists’ experimental (though not always entirely successful) work conveys a real freedom of expression.

Rock Solid, Pieces of Eight, 28 Russell Place, Melbourne, until May 7th

New Guy Bourdin film released

A new film about fashion photographer Guy Bourdin (who died in 1991) has been released.  Made by one of the photographer’s old assistants, Sean Brandt, the documentary features interviews with Mick Jagger, Bryan Ferry and David Bowie as well as film footage of Bourdin and his shoots supplied by his son Samuel.

In the film, Brandt tries to dispel allegations of cruelty pitched against Bourdin, who was accused of being unpleasant to the models he worked with.  Certainly the photographer’s vision was uncompromising.  He would only work with people under certain star signs, tried to dye the sea blue for a photo shoot and once turned up to the French Vogue offices on a camel.  Interestingly, Bourdin never published a monograph of his work during his lifetime, so the film’s a good opportunity to view his incredibly powerful, sexy (and in some cases, never-seen-before) images.

Hot Photo Friday – Mitch Epstein

Mitch Epstein, 'New Orleans I, Lousiana', 1974

Looking Forward – Bill Henson

Bill Henson, 'Untitled', archival inkjet pigment print, 127 x 180 cm, 2010/2011

Bill Henson, Tolarno Galleries, Level 4, 104 Exhibition Street, Melbourne.  Exhibition dates: 31 March – 21 April, 2011.

Some work by Jim Nutt

'Untitled', graphite on paper, 33 x 33 cm, 2008

'Untitled', graphite on paper, 38.1 x 35.6 cm, 2010

'Untitled', graphite on paper, 33 x 33cm, 2010

'Untitled', graphite on paper, 38.1 x 35.6 cm, 2010

Angela Brennan joins Orexart

Angela Brennan, 'Still life on black', oil on linen, 60 × 80.5cm, 2009, courtesy of Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery

Australian painter Angela Brennan (who shows with Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney and Niagra Galleries, Melbourne) has joined the stable at Orexart, Auckland.  To whom Achilles, swiftest of the swift, replied will be the artist’s first solo exhibition in New Zealand, and opens at Orexart’s Khartoum Place gallery on April 12.

Stuck for an exhibition title?

Then why not try the random exhibition title generator.
(Thanks GH).

Goodbye Toshiko Takaezu

A selection of ceramics by Toshiko Takaezu

Japanese/American ceramicist Toshiko Takaezu died last week aged 89.  Renowned for her closed pots and torpedo-like cylinders, her works ranged in scale from minute orbs to six-foot monoliths.  The ceramicist actively promoted the medium as an art form, and embraced the notion that the objects she created were to be seen rather than used.  As such, her works can be viewed as three dimensional canvases.  They are often enlivened by eruptions of colour and brush-strokes that recall the paintings of Takaezu’s contemporaries including Jackson Pollock and Franz Kline.

Takaezu strides past some of her sculptures

But some of the most beautiful elements of Takaezu’s work are invisible.  She left little pieces of clay inside her closed forms so that they emit gentle sounds when moved.  Other works contain secret phrases written within their interiors.  To discover these messages, the works would need to be broken.  Which is not to say that Takaezu was overly precious about her ceramics.  The Zen Buddhist saw her art and life as seamlessly intertwined, even cooking claypot chicken alongside the stoneware baking in her kilns.

Tally Ho!