AMY'S LONDON: INCURABLE DREAMS AT TATTON PARK BIENNIAL

Photo credits: Thierry Bal commissioned by Tatton Park Biennial.

Whoever said that the proliferation of the Biennale system need always be a bad thing? Maligned from Sao Paolo to Dakar as the transient playgrounds of an imported, global cultural elite, the rise of the biennial has nevertheless had a trickle-down effect that has lead to more modest manifestations of the format appearing in some interesting and unlikely places. Rather than overwhelm and overrun their locations these smaller biennials are often able to interact with them in a more intimate and nuanced way. Such is the case at the third Tatton Park Biennial, which I visited on a trip away from the capital last weekend.

BERLIN: IMPRISONED IN NEUKÖLLN

     

from the top: old shower room, photo by Abrie Fourie; installation by Eliana Heredia; video installation by Anne Duk Hee Jordan; bed-installation by Marc Bijl; canvas-installation by Surya Gied; photos by artfridge

This weekend is all about Berlin's 48h Neukölln art and culture festival with an endless list of things to do and to see. Two outstanding curators, Pauline Doutreluingne from Mindpirates and Bonaventure Soh Bejeng Ndikung from Savvy Contemporary, have organised the exhibition 'Positioning Osmotic Impulses' in the former youth prison and former asylum seeker accommodation centre including 20 international artists. 15 of the artists comprise the former cells, the rotten shower rooms, the spooky hallways. Five other artists did or will perform live at the location. 

Some pieces, such as Marc Bijl's 'Dutch Bed' (1999) were subsequently integrated into the complicated architecture; and others, such as Surya Gied's minimalist canvas-composition 'Die Zelle ist leer' (2012) evolved from a site-specific interaction. Eliana Heredia's room filling installation 'Magdalena und das Feuer' (2011), an anthropomorphic form, consisting of half burned and half unused muffin-paper-cups, was perhaps the most impressive work to me, as it visualised the idea of non-sense labour while having nothing to do being locked up in prison. The exhibition is, though, not all about misery, being locked up and imprisoned, but it also plays humorously with the space: Anne Duk Hee Jordan's two part video installation 'Disembodiment' (2012), showing a stop-motion plant growing out of a woman's butt, still buzzes the sound of 'PotAto, PotatO, TomAto, TomatO...' in my ears.

LONDON: A PAINTED SUN AS A YELLOW SPOT

  

all images: 
James Clarkson - A Painted Sun as a Yellow Spot, Courtesy Rod Barton Gallery  

In his response to art history and the glory of art-superstars, James Clarkson, a Sheffield-based, 1987 born artist, transformed an old Citroen Picasso into a room-filling installation at Rod Barton Gallery. What a great idea, since Rod's gallery somewhat reminds of pimped garage. Clarkson's work for this exhibition has been inspired by Henri-Georges Clouzot's 1954 film Le Mystère Picasso, where Picasso paints on a transparent canvas.

JÜRGEN TELLER. GET A LIFE.

courtesy Jürgen Teller

I just rediscovered this in my bookshelf: Jürgen Teller's awesome photos for Vivienne Westwoods Spring / Summer 2010 collection 'Get a Life'. The models are Ms. Westwood herself, her husband Andreas Kronthaler, fashion model Tati Cotliar and Pamela Anderson.