Working Together
September 6th to September 28th 2007
7 resident artists from Florence Trust bring their annual FT07 Summer Exhibition to Surface Gallery.
Working Together is a new programme for Surface Gallery, devised to promote the formation of new networks and critical contexts which emerge from collaborative work.
Surface Gallery welcomes seven of the most recent residents at the London based studio, Florence Trust. The artists uphold deep-seated bonds, established over their twelve month residency in the sublime architectures of the Grade I Listed Victorian church, which make up the spaces of the studio. It is this firm network of support and critical enquiry, most recently demonstrated in the FT07 Summer Exhibition, which the artists now wish to explore in a new environment.
William Clifford’s sculptures are an incisive response to the cultural and historical contexts of their surrounding space. Clifford’s work for FT07 examined the intersections of architecture such as the spaces between walls or the joints between walls and floors. Gudrun Haraldsdottir’s similarly site specific work explores memories and perceptions, in particular the fallibility in our understanding of our surroundings. Rossella Emanuele’s previous work appropriates the iconography of the architectures at Florence Trust. Entitled ‘Milk Font’, she fills a church font not with holy water, but with a rich, thick and indulgent velvety white liquid.
Images are Elle Pickering’s choice of medium. She uses landscape photography to explore the deterioration of manmade objects which, once abandoned, succumb to the powers of nature. Sarah Jane Hender uses various sources from cinema to children’s illustration to investigate her relationship with the image. Her reconstituted images evoke personal responses to the original and act as a portal to new realms of interpretation.
The processes in the making of an image are the subject of Jessica Tsang’s practice. By opening up the physical structures which make up a visual piece, she exposes the dialogue between the surface upon which a representation is inscribed and the piece as a visual phenomenon. Kristin Cross, also working with the physical form, takes various wooden objects from the built environment and by preserving them in resin, seeks to subvert scientific discourse of ordering and labelling.
Working Together offers new possibilities for theoretical and conceptual discussion, and enables the formation of new networks between artists, their work and curatorial staff at Surface Gallery. Upholding these values, a series of discussion forums will be organised throughout the residency to provide constant sources of critical dialogue. Public, Surface volunteers, artists and studios from around the region will all be invited to contribute. Check updates on our website for dates and times.