Claire Marsh, Spectres of a Broken Body

SPECTRES OF A BROKEN BODY

the first Solo exhibition by Adelaide artists Claire Marsh

18/5- 5/7 at Carclew House

Curated by Adele Sliuzas

Shelter, 2011, Furs, beeswax, fibreglass, thread

I first came across Claire's work at the end of last year, and I was really excited to meet her and learn more about her practice. She is a really interesting person and it is so great to work with her, both for this exhibition and another coming up at Format at the end of the year. You might recognise Claire's work from the AGSA Graduate Exhibition, her work was on the cover of the catalogue, and in the advertising. A small, furry/spikey creature huddled in the centre of a persian rug. She also showed at the Helpmann Academy grad show, and was included in the PICA exhibition Hatched. 

Untitled no.7,  2011, squid ink on velum, human hair, thread,

The exhibition features works on velum, as well as sculpture and video, and is open Monday to Friday during Carclew's office hours. We are also planning an "Up late at Carclew" for later next month, so that you can check out the exhibition, maybe see what artists in residence Andrew Humphries and Ruby Chew are up to, and have a drink or two at the beautiful Carclew House. Stay tuned for details. 

Check out Claire's Website for more information about her practice. 

Untitled 2,  2011, squid ink on vellum

This is the Catalogue Essay that I have written for the exhibition:

Claire Marsh’s practice explores the body; its force, its thresholds and its relation to the self and other bodies. Through processes of visual and physical mutations, Marsh talks about what she calls “the silent, the creaturely and the horror of the self.” 

Hossein Valamanesh & Angela Valamanesh
26 April - 27 May

Greenaway Art Gallery,

Rundle Street, Kent Town

It’s not often that you see couples working together in art. The combination of two creative people can sometimes be volatile, but can also be very rewarding. Angela and Hossein are Adelaide’s answer to John and Yoko, Marina and Ulay, or Pollock and Krasner, only, without the high drama and alcoholism. Their exhibition together at Greenaway Gallery shows the connection that they share in their relationship and in their art practice.

This is Hossein’s 10^th exhibition at Greenaway, and Angela’s 4^th, which is pretty amazing. Hossein’s multi-disciplinary work looks at ideas of cultural memory, family ties and the universality of patterns and shapes. Angela focuses on the microscopic, picking out details from nature, and in particular looking at pollen grains. Both Hossein and Angela’s practice look at details that go un-noticed, putting them in an art space where they can be re-examined as beautiful, mesmerizing, and maybe even strangely familiar. Their aesthetic is quiet and reflective. Like other famous art couples throughout history, their ideas come together powerfully because of a shared passion. 

Make sure you check it out before it closes!

Hossein Valamanesh, Passing Time, 2011. Collaboration with Nassiem Valamanesh, MDF, monitor and media player, 61 x 52 x 52cm, 4 minute loop, Edition of 6 + 2 A/P

Angela Valamanesh, Earthly Garden #9, 2011, 4 parts, unglazed ceramic, watercolour on paper, 48 x 110 x 5cm

via aAR

Disappearance Catalogue Essay

Sometimes I am empty for a very long time.

I have no identity.

At first it is frightening. And then it

turns to an impulse of happiness. And

then it stops.

Happiness: I mean dead, somewhat.[1]

There is always emptiness, lurking, like a ghost. Hiding behind the veil of an image, this emptiness isn’t necessarily invisible. Perhaps it is something that you can see, hiding, but not hidden. In contemporary art, this emptiness is often encountered through work that destroys in the same moment that it creates, forcing the object to hover somewhere between being and nothing.

Nothing itself, as a sign, refers to nothing (no-thing). It is a void, nothing but its own name.[2] In art there is a relationship between the object and the void. It is a dialogue between the image and nothing, a falling between the images, the slipping between the crevices. There is always a gap.

I think of a desert, which has these objects, and there are guns firing, and smoke and dust, but no people. And I question if these objects too could be art. And what would it take for them to be art. And if these new objects can be called art, where did the things that we used to call art go, have they disappeared?

Disappearance considers the object of art within a post medium, post-apocalyptic environment. The notion of the object and its position within the gallery take on the possibility of its own obsolescence. Objects collapse into the void. Or perhaps the void is where they have emerged from, ghostly, singing, bedraggled and wet.

What has disappeared? It is not “no painting in an empty room”.[3] But something that points towards other possibilities, something that talks of non-presences. Heidegger describes it as a state which “Belongs to being and yet remains a stranger to that which-is.”[4] The link between vision and presence is broken and there is an engagement with nothing. A hum. What is left when the object has disappeared? The echo, the voice of the last thing said. 

Say a word over and over and over until that word has lost its meaning. With words there is always a possibility to mean something, or to mean nothing at all. Objects, like words, can lose their meaning, become aphasic. Instead of meaning something specific, they talk about how they relate, through their presence, to the objects and the people and the ideas around them. They ask: what is the relation of this word to the next, of this image to the next, between these objects, voices and gestures?

Reading between the lines and the crevices of art is part of what makes it so interesting. Don’t look for a narrative. But it is never purely about the materiality of the object either. It is a passageway towards looking at how materiality can be seen differently. Within the object, the image, there always exists something that can connect with, not just out of recognition, but something that connects you to thought. Deleuze said “what counts is the interstice between images, between two images: a spacing which means each image is plucked from the void and falls back into it.” Unlocatable. There is a dialogue with the outside of representation and what lies beyond the object. Images are shaken, untied, erased and reinscribed. Absence is a positive power for opening up, beyond representation to where the object has disappeared.

---

[1] M Duras, No More, New York,  Seven Stories Press, 1998, p15.

[2] B Rotman, Signifying Nothing: The Semiotics of Zero, London, Macmillan Press, 1987 p.98

[3] R Krauss, Theories of Art After Minimalism and Pop, in H. Foster, (Ed) Vision and Visuality, Seattle, Bay Press 1988, p.61

[4] B Bolt, Art Beyond Representation, New York,  I B Tauris, 2004, p.31

Disappearance, opening night

Here are some photos from Disappearance, an exhibition I curated with Madeline Reece in March 2012 as part of the Adelaide Fringe Festival. The Photo's were taken by my dear friend and budding photographer Amelia. There are some more shot's from the night on her blog Amelia O'Connor Photography. 

Riley O'Keeffe, Report from an Unidentified Space Station in f#, 2012

Brad Lay, Ghost Ship, 2011

Julia McInerney, Study for Ocean Floor Piece (Compass: Never Sure Endless Ways, Never Shore endless Waves) 2011

David Harry performing at the opening

Murrrrrrmmmmmurrrrrr

Welcome to Murmur and Stutter, a blog about art, curating and writing!

here is a little bit about me, just to get things started.

I am an emerging arts writer, curator and researcher based in Adelaide, South Australia. 

In 2011 I completed a Bachelor of Visual Arts majoring in History and Theory at the South Australian School of Art. 

I am a founding member of the Green Rat Collective, a group that aims to place arts writing at the forefront of artistic practice. Through the Green Rat I run a Critical Reading Group, forming a dialogue about contemporary art, research and theory in Adelaide. Adele is a member of Peer Studios.

As a curator I see my role as a way to form critical dialogue around art. Curating is a diverse and creative role. Curators can be seen as cultural producers, catalysts, weavers, personal assistants, designers, and motivators.

I aspire to be an international curator, working with institutions and artists to present new understandings of contemporary art. I hope to bring to the field a fresh dialogue about contemporary art practice, and a desire for more connectivity/jamming within global contexts.