- Venue
- Old Spitalfelds Market
- Location
- London
Cutting It!
‘Origin’ at Spitalfields which runs from 22-28 September offers quite a different ‘vibe’ from that of the ‘Collect’ exhibition at the Saatchi Gallery back in May; it appears smaller and the emphasis is on different media . True, Origin does feature wood and glass works but not in the same numbers or same scale as the’ Collect’ show, ceramicists though numerically represented don’t feel so present.
Some of the artists/makers who impressed me the most were those working in paper, in particular Jill Flower, Claire Brewster, Rebecca J Coles and Tine De Ruysser. However, before I go on to describe the work I should come clean about my own background and motivations. I am an artist/curator and for a number of years now have been curating collaborative Irish/Chinese exhibitions in Beijing where I have been struck by the much greater flexibility in definitions of what is art and what is craft.
Glass artists I have exhibited in China are accepted as such whereas back in Ireland they are immediately relieved of the moniker and labelled ‘makers’. In fact the definitions are sometimes so twisted that to do any work using materials usually seen in the crafts world is to be pigeonholed and dare I say it dismissed. A critic in Ireland once called my work (this particular piece was a painting on unstretched canvas with elements of silk) ‘as much about the making as the painting’ and they meant this pejoratively……..and I also think that they don’t get out much.
In contemporary arts practise it’s been very obvious in recent years that the pendulum has swung back towards highly crafted artworks, artworks that are technically achieved and demonstrate a considerable investment of time and effort. This swing has enabled many women artists to be taken seriously at last and it has also meant that the lines between art & crafts have been blurred.
With all this in mind I asked Jill Flower from the UK about her situation; she described her frustration at often being ‘sidelined’ by the art world and that the meaning behind her work is ignored. Her complex paper ruffs (Circle of Life series) and flowers made from recycled newspapers & magazines are subtle, rich in texture and redolent with meaning and the passage of time. She is delighted to exhibit in Origin but believes her work should be defined according to her intentions and intention is to make art, and I agree with her.
Tine de Ruysser from Belgium has no such misgivings she professes herself happy to work under the three umbrellas of art, design and craft, interestingly she described her most recent ‘money’ project as being more art than craft and when I questioned her about how this was different from the work she described as craft she spoke of it having greater ambition and aiming to have a global relevance and audience. I would be very loathe to say that craft has a less global audience than fine art, in fact I think that the opposite is often the case but, on the issue of greater ambition perhaps she has a valid point.
Rebecca J Coles with her individually cut out butterflies defied cliché though the sheer obsessive meticulousness of her work – these dense clouds of insects have a gripping complexity none more so than those she has cut from stamps. This is really grown up compulsive cutting out and she shares this refined obsessiveness with Claire Brewster whose birds and landscapes cut from maps are delicate works with a powerful presence. Both Brewster and Coles consider themselves more artists than makers though the craftsmanship in their work will appeal to both audiences alike.
Apart from the fabulous ‘body jewellery’ – sculpture really by Jasmine Giles, whose work reminded me of ‘Vanitas’ (a dress made of dried meat) by Jana Sterbak shown last year during the ‘Elles’ exhibition at the Pompidou Centre, felt that the advice she had previously received about making her work smaller (i.e.) easier to wear and probably more saleable, was erroneous and for her counter-intuitive. Giles’s pieces with their oblique references to the ancient sculpture of Artemis covered in bull’s testicles, had a monumental presence and if she had turned her back for a minute I would have been tempted to run away with one of them. Another jewellery maker Momoko Kumai also captured something of that monumentality in her gorgeous white neck pieces
If I had gone to ‘Origin’ as a buyer I would have been sorely tempted – there were many displays of utterly delicious works. The felt liquorice allsorts & flower jewellery by Florentine maker Danielle Gori-Montanelli reminded me of a textile driven Archimboldo, her fellow Italian Timea Sido makes intricately filigreed ceramic vessels and there was very European ‘lushnes’s to their approach. Lok Ming Fun’s lidded bowls, with their tiny pod like ornamentation both inside and out, are also objects of desire especially her latest range which is black with very restrained gold elements.
On the other end of the ceramic spectrum, Korean artist Hyosun Kim produces spare sculptures of distorted ceramic vessels, she speaks of herself as an artist rather than a crafts person and bemoans the fact that the divisive definitions are much more prevalent in the west than in Korea or China.
Finally if you visit the show, do have a look at Gill Wilson’s paperworks, Claudia Phipps’s architectural glass and the beautiful sloping console table made by Mary Marsh.
So in short I came away with many of my initial ideas confirmed about many makers being artists also – that if they had a different ‘discourse’ and if the work were displayed differently they could just as easily exhibit at ‘Frieze’. I guess ‘Origin’ is a craft fair in the traditional sense with small stands piled high with items to sell which are cheaper than items at ‘art’ fairs. Sometimes there’s just too much to see in a small space. I also regretted that the show lacked ethnic diversity, with only one black hat-maker, where are all the makers from British Asian & British Black backgrounds? or is the face of crafts in the UK resolutely white?
However, what you do get is a chance to meet with the people who made the work rather than gallerists, who after all, are business people first and foremost and so the interaction is more interesting and more authentic. Is it a show with an international dimension? not particularly, is it a show that is comprehensive? not really? is it worth visiting? Yes.
Fion Gunn
