- Venue
- Bath Artists Studios
- Location
- South West England
A salon, a retrospective and an act of provocation in one, this multi-layered project straddled apparently distinct practices to amass a coherent set of challenges and questions. The central one was the seldom examined issue of value assignation: who decides what is good in art, and how?
Karen Wallis used her own back catalogue as materials in a new piece whilst retaining the individual nature of each. Despite housing 100 works, from a 1964 art school self portrait to recent drawings, the room was surprisingly ordered. Figurative oil paintings, hung salon-style, abutted sculptural elements and video in a neat, reluctantly compliant way, aping many an art society show. The works seemed to eye each other uneasily like human contestants in a competition.
The project’s premise was the subjection to judgement which shapes each artist’s career – informed by Wallis’ collection of responses received from her applications for exhibitions, residencies, funding and commissions. The bureaucratic distance of the submission and appraisal process was echoed in the show’s structure and installation, but transfigured from a plutocratic verdict into a democratic, open and self-effacingly humorous proposition. Visitors were invited to ‘curate’ their own selection, and to nominate their ‘best in show’ choice. As the artist herself was the steward at the gallery, this process was open to everyone from school children upwards, facilitated by a series of workshops and one to one discussions (though we may never know how her presence influenced people’s choices, a factor rarely salient in institutional selection contexts).
Within and between the works there was much to engage with, encouraging the selection process to snag on themes and patterns. You could follow chronologies: the progression of the artist’s technique and interests over time, or the maturation of her person. You could create narratives from portraits and family groups. You could identify conceptual themes, including the construction of personal identity, the implication of the viewer, perceptual psychology and the gender politics of art history. All the traditional ‘genres’ were there – portrait, landscape, still life, history painting – across various media, and each posed its own questions, most apparent in the figure paintings and drawings. Compositions reworked Durer, Rembrandt, Hals and Botticelli. Mirrored panels confronted the viewer with his or her own mortality and self presentation. In ‘Mother and Daughter 2’ (1996) the artist appeared to herself clothed in the mirror, but naked to the viewer and to the girl, who lingered on the threshold of adulthood and the depicted doorway like an embodiment of the externalised internal gaze which modifies the behaviour of each of us. This theme was echoed in other self portraits and studies with models.
Another strand of investigation explored the conventions of landscape. A series with the group title ‘After Courbet’ (2006) used decommissioned TVs, their screens replaced by canvases and partnered with short films of the same scenes. Each had a more-or-less incongruous soundtrack, one which could have come from the same site, but did not correspond to conditioned expectations. The roar of traffic overlaid a scene of snowy woodland, the sound of a river built to a harsh vibrating volume. It created a disorienting synaesthesia, frequently present in contemporary life but seldom paid attention; and suddenly I understood that the Courbet reference was not to do with subject matter but with treatment: a determination to engage with actual experience.
In ‘Tits’ (2001), a black-shirted torso and a pair of pale hands (the artist’s) performed a staccato striptease, buttoning and unbuttoning to varying levels and speeds over a suggestive but slightly sardonic chuckle, spliced and looped. As the actions reached their revealing climax, the laughter built to an alarming crescendo, then ebbed away as if decorum and composure had been reasserted. Why should it be ‘shocking’ that the breasts were those of a middle-aged woman? As well as containing wordless volumes about gender politics and attitudes to age, this video work seemed to encapsulate many of the concerns demonstrated throughout the show: it said this is life, strip away your expectations and the conditioning of history and you might get closer to your own reality.
The project was a self portrait in more ways than one; and a challenge to the very need for external approval, through its function as a self-generated retrospective. Although pre-selected, it had a confessional air. There was a willingness to share sketches, learning processes, and even (through the imagery) personal memories. All elements were presented without the division or hierarchy seen in most retrospectives, but on an equal plane as essential parts in the jigsaw of an artistic practice. In some indirect way it brought to mind Michael Landy’s 2001 project ‘Break Down’ where he publicly shredded all his possessions, including art works; the very visible physical loss involved in Landy’s piece also suggested a catharsis, however, whereas Wallis’ avoided both erasure and closure. Even without the construct of the participatory element, this show reflected the viewer back to him/herself and heightened awareness of the act of viewing and judging – not just in reference to the role of the selection panel, but also to the human propensity to assess others and ourselves.
Part 2 of Selected & Rejected followed on from 16th to 21st October, focusing on the Institutional Choice.
