- Venue
- Anscombe & Ringland
- Location
- London
For the purposes of the piece of writing here it has been necessary to specify an End Date but the show at Notting Hill’s prominently positioned Anscombe and Ringland is ongoing. There’s a live-art aspect, and whilst the content of this untitled exhibition changes frequently the structure and overall look remain constant. As in web-design content and style are handled separately. And it has to be admitted that the comparison with web-design is valid in more ways than one because there appears to be a functional aspect to this exhibition, questions connected with purposeful design intrude, but let us ignore these considerations for the moment. The show is by no means an example of ‘process art’ but appears to be the result of careful curatorial and artistic decision-making, involving the usual blend of sweat, tears and hopefully not blood.
On five large glass panes – recalling Duchamp’s Large Glass – and two smaller ones, surrounding an installation inhabited by performers together with the invigilation team, at the time of writing, sixty rectangular images are displayed in grid formation, in three rows. Each of the sixty images comprises in turn of (usually four) other photographs and text. The actual number of columns can vary presumably but at the time of reviewing there were a total of twenty (sixty divided by three). One effect is to create the impression of extreme order, and symmetry, at least on a surface level. However, looking through the glass, in the deliberate gaps between the images, a less regimented layout is apparent inside.
Ideas relating to fractals, golden ratios and pseudo-scientific linkages with the patterns found in nature are brought to mind. Rectangles sit inside rectangles and so on ad-infinitum. The composition of each of the sixty images is almost identical: one photograph occupies most of the area and three significantly smaller ones are arranged in a column to the right (connecting with the layout of three parent rectangles already mentioned). The four photos in each image, are presented in combination with text and, in a large typeface, numbers such as 725,000 and 1,750,00, titles of some sort for the pieces no doubt. The rectangles are organised into an array facing outwards of each window, effectively forming walls for the installation part, and further emphasising the object-oriented qualities of the work.
The subject matter in the photographs adds to the effect; they are of empty, dry, lifeless environments, bereft of human, animal or plant life, neat, post-apocalyptic, simulacra. The repetition and systematic grouping of elements adds to the uncanniness. Why these pictures of pristine interiors? What do the numbers mean: body counts, or durations in years since last lived-in?
Inside, trapped behind the photography, actors and invigilators sit at desks, pretend to communicate with each other, make imaginary phone calls, occasionally point at screens and move around, under our constant surveillance.
The installation is seductive; it is hard to leave despite the eeriness. Later I feel thankful for artists, for the fact of someone creating such an exhibition of photographs, a thought-provoking feast really, in a world otherwise preoccupied with material interests, money-making, careerism, hostile one-upmanship and so forth…
