- Venue
- Sumarria Lunn Gallery
- Location
- London
Grzymala’s installation commandeers the small gallery. The only material used, tape, reaches across the space, while making the drawing ephemeral, as it slowly peels off the walls.
My first impression is that the piece is kinetic – not only due to the slow process of it falling apart, but the shape the lines of tape make. I can see them stretching across, reaching out, finally colliding with the wall and exploding outwards. Yet, somehow, the piece is still, like a photograph of an explosion. It is a time and a place. If it was kinetic, I imagine it would last a matter of seconds – traveling across the space, impact, outburst. Grzymala has shown all stages in one moment, and so multiple moments in time exist in the piece at once. The thought that it won’t last forever is a sobering one, yet exciting, because it involves the viewer, places them in the same instance as the piece itself. The viewer won’t be there forever, because the work won’t, and vice versa.
Manicule blog describes the work as a ‘violent outpouring of ink, frozen for a moment…’ (Manicule, 2011). Grzymala’s piece has also been interpreted by friends I visited with as an active object transfixed in time. The transition of the tape from one solid surface to another, across a plane, results in the viewer’s conclusion that it has performed an action.
I saw the black tape as rays of light, stretching across the universe, colliding with a celestial body that was the wall. This is a rather romantic view, one that I conjured subconsciously and then consciously deemed it appropriate.
Sumarria Lunn is a small gallery, and Grzymala would have, to an extent, designed the piece around the landscape inside. She chose to fill it with this one piece, overwhelming the space. It is monochrome, and I think it has more impact this way – yes, the viewer has less of a spectrum to appreciate, but the contrast of the tones is so absolute that the eye is immediately transfixed.
The reason I responded to the use of space before the use of colour is that the piece is so bombastic. This is due to the many directions the tape takes, the angles it creates, and so it looks in no way fragile – in fact I was curious as to the maximum weight the structure could support supposing something was thrown or placed on to it. The intertwining of the tape means each strip is supporting another, while at the same time, pulling each other down, as the entire work succumbs to gravity.
The process of creating the work must have compromised Grzymala at times, perhaps hindering the construction. Without careful planning, certain sections would have been an obstacle, preventing the positioning of other parts – in particular, the stretches of tape across the room. In an interview, she emphasised how this process is a performative one.
“Whenever I leave a work, I feel as if I leave a part of me, a part of my body behind. There’s a connection – an invisible line…”. (Creative Review, 2011).
Is it notable that Grzymala chose the metaphor of an invisible line to describe her emotions regarding her work, whereas the ones in her work are manifested quite clearly? It may be a coincidence, but I can perceive more about her work from the way she reacts to and with it. Are her feelings a personification of her work, or her work a representation of her feelings? The lines in her drawings are always connected to something, be it a surface or each other. This constant connection creates a very intense environment.
Grzymala has said, “very quickly my line left the page and continued on the walls”. (LookSeeNow, 2011). This description of her past, which developed into her philosophy, proves that her installations are sketches. Instead of beginning solely with a sketch, she also ends with one. Who is to say sketches should be 2D? It’s clear she became interested in marks as opposed to objects, but I’ve found that her work fuses the two.
The accompanying gallery leaflet states how Grzymala’s ‘focus is largely abstract’ (Sumarria Lunn, 2011). I think the word ‘abstract’ is misused here – the author seems to use it as the opposite of ‘realistic’, which it is not, despite popular misconception. Grzymala has portrayed her emotions and their exuberance, demonstrating how her line has left the page. Who is to say this isn’t realistic? It is a depiction of realism for her. It exists, therefore it must be real.
It then goes on to say how the design of the lines of tape ‘hold subtle resonance with the complex nets of architectural blueprints’ (Sumarria Lunn catalogue, 2011). I disagree with this statement, as, to me, Grzymala’s network of lines are unstable in their uniformity. Entangled, they aren’t designed to collaborate and explain, as an architectural diagram is, but each line forms it’s own path, where collisions are an inescapable eventuality. The result of this is accidental cooperation in forming a structure that supports itself. Raumzeichnung loosely translates from German as Drawings in Space. I can’t think of a more accurate description.
I hadn’t previously seen any of Grzymala’s work live, and I would have been better pleased with a larger exhibition, but this actual piece didn’t disappoint purely because the effect it created was anything but underwhelming. Having feared an anticlimax, everything I imagined her work to be from pictures was there in front of me. The proximity between the work and myself was mine to decide, which meant I could influence the relationship between us and, perhaps, how I felt in it’s presence. Had I been in London for a longer period, I would have returned to see the progress, the slow deterioration of the project.
I could have spent longer just looking at the intricacy of the piece. It seemed rude to leave when there was so much to see. I don’t feel as though I have fully understood the work, nor am I tired of it. I can only create my interpretation of it’s gesture.
