'Light Show' at Bank Gallery
by Kirsty Cockerill
I started writing a review of 'Light Show' in the dark, the old-fashioned way, with pen and paper. The load-shedding affecting South Africa has reinforced the relevance of this interrogation in a local context. To quote popular band The Black Keys, 'You know what the sun's all about when the light goes out'.
'Light Show' curated by Bank Gallery's Henrietta Hamilton and Robert Fraser with artist Vaughn Sadie, negotiates light, this familiar medium we often take for granted - its practical and conceptual properties beyond the primary. Eight artists produced work for the show - Siemon Allen, Stephen Hobbs, Simon Jaques, Vaughn Sadie, Greg Streak, Bronwen Vaughan-Evans, Jeremy Wafer and James Webb.
It's refreshing to walk through the exhibition and experience the curatorial sensitivity which allows a space to be held by the eight works without clutter or absence. There is a consistency in the technical and conceptual quality of the individual works, which allows them to hang together and breathe with ease, though each artist's media and conceptual parameters are very different.
As you enter the space, your shadow is cast onto the surface of Allen's monumental work The Birds, 16mm film strands woven into a 4 x 2.2m grid. The original film of the same name by Hitchcock presented characters caught in seemingly random acts of violence, leaving the viewer uneasy with unanswered questions about the present and future. The artwork employs a similar strategy, binding the viewer's presence through their shadow onto the surface of the work and simultaneously reinforcing, through the construction and lack of projector, an inability to read the film as originally intended. The visual narrative of the film is made impotent and, as the viewer blocks the light, the evidence of their presence haunts the surface as an uneasy absence.
The viewer gets caught in a stand-off between Sadie's Pleasure Of Feeling In Control and Wafer's Clouding Over projected onto opposing walls. Wafer's projection, a 10 minute 28 second video, focuses on a section of the sky being covered by clouds. In the context of the exhibition, it is no longer ordinary but reads as a gentle reminder of nature's overarching ability to give, but more importantly, its ability to take away.
In juxtaposition, Sadie's projection of a single slide depicts three banal 80s style plug sockets. The use of a slide projector references outdated technology. Initially I feel a sense of visual comfort, even nostalgia, but the more I engage, the more the outdated aesthetic starts to reinforce that it's an image and hence superficial. It takes a while to be drawn to a piece of small text apparently engraved at the bottom of the image mostly camouflaged in the wall, reading: 'the pleasure of feeling in control'. Any complacency I had at that point was washed away.
Standing between Wafer's and Sadie's work made me feel like I was stuck in a room with passive-aggressives at war. Both works mediate and question our reliance on technology and our understanding of power. If we flick the switch and there's no light, then what? And quite frankly, if there's no electricity, how am I going to make my deadline for this review? I might have to mail it!
Moving through the exhibition I pass a small dead-end passage with an annoying light flickering at the far end. There is no label, but before I questioned why the gallery has not looked into getting an electrician, I realised that I have not seen James Webb's work. The flickering becomes relevant. After some research Untitled (Morse code) becomes a humorous breathing space. The lack of label is intentional, the viewer is meant to be caught in that inbetween space, without a departure point. I'm tempted to come back with a Morse code book and try work out what the text, translated into a blinking light bulb means. Then again I don't think my lack of knowledge hampers the reading of the work.
The irony with regard to the timing of this exhibition is not lost on me. As I write I'm considering smoke signal Morse code; it's a very unpractical last resort to making deadlines, and yes, I am being melodramatic.
I left 'Light Show' with more questions then answers, but the skill and relevance of the interrogation could not be disputed.
Kirsty Cockerill is Director of the AVA Gallery in Cape Town and was visiting Durban at the time of this show
Opens: January 24
Closes: February 21
Bank Gallery
217 Florida Rd, Morningside, Durban
Tel: (031) 3126911 or 083 2397036
Fax: (031) 3126912
Email: info@bankgallery.co.za
www.bankgallery.co.za
Hours: Tue - Fri 10am - 6pm, Sat 10am - 1pm
