Roger Hiorns will be recruiting Yorkshire youths, predominantly contemporary and performing arts students, to activate his atmospheric and quasi-dystopian installations, Untitled (Youth), for the inaugural exhibition of The Calder, a former 19th century textiles mill now home to The Hepworth Wakefield’s latest 600m² contemporary art space.
Hiorns, who is known for his ambitious works that often use transformative materials, substances and actions began the Untitled (Youth) series in the mid-90s whilst a student at Goldsmiths. Each work in the series uses the simple formula of a found object, a naked youth and a fire. This suggestive combination momentarily transforms the installation into an ephemeral contemplative act.
“The youth enters the space, a fire is prepared, the youth undresses, puts away his folded clothes, the fire is set and the youth sits on the object opposite the fire. He chooses to impassively stare at the fire or meet the public’s gaze, until the fire goes out,” says Hiorns of the work that can be shown as an individual piece within a group show or as a larger-scale all-encompassing exhibition experience.
For what will be his largest showing of this series to date, the at times stationary display of found objects made up of street benches, engines and vehicles will be activated by the performers at specific times throughout the exhibition. The installations will be accompanied by the atmospheric and everyday muted sounds of Wakefield Cathedral, directly transmitted into the art space.
There is a wry humour attached to this slightly choreographed sequence of actions, as many a viewer who caught a previous incarnation of the work during the British Art Show 7 might attest. A performer casually waiting by the side of the exhibition space, popping round a corner to remove their clothes as the audience waits has an element of absurdity to it that lifts the melancholy that the concept initially infers. One can imagine however, that the grand industrial scale of The Calder exhibition and the association with Wakefield Cathedral promise a deeper, less incidental encounter that will surely be a memorable christening for this new art space.
Roger Hiorns’ Youth series runs from 30 August to 3 November 2013 at The Calder, Wakefield.
The Yorkshire Sculpture Triangle also sees Hiorns’ Untitled (Seizure) on display at Yorkshire Sculpture Park in partnership with the Arts Council Collection.
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Find out about plans for the Yorkshire Sculpture Triangle.
2012: How was it for you? a-n interview Simon Wallis, Director of The Hepworth Wakefield.
