Purveyors

Curatorial Statement

Purveyors features new work from three emergent Manchester-based artists linked not thematically, but by a sensitivity to the frameworks in which they and their work operate. Each artist explores, by omitting or manipulating, the structures that govern the realisation, presentation and interpretation of their art. The artists seek to establish a theoretical Venn diagram to define the seemingly disparate elements of their respective practices. Thus highlighting a new, previously unknown, common ground.

Rob Dunne’s on-going project, ‘Non-Events’, undermines the convention of a work’s payoff. Anti-climax is the order of the day. Setting up a semiotic discourse and renouncing the conclusion to the discretion of the viewer; ‘Non-Event # 31 : Sparrow’ is an arresting two-channel video installation where we witness the apparent destruction of a fertilised sparrow egg. Unaware of whether we have witnessed brutality or trickery, our emotional reactions are neither revealed as justified or unsubstantiated. Ambiguity reigns in the kingdom of documentation. ‘Non-Event # 21 : Rental Videos’ acts as a metaphor for the project as a whole and Dunne’s wider practice. The piece sees rental movies dramatically edited to the extent that any material relating to their genre is removed: a porn film featuring only trivial conversation; an action film comprised of establishing shots. Not only are these products exhibited, but by re-introducing them into circulation, Dunne’s work finds viewers potentially unable to read the pieces as art.

Bryn Lloyd-Evans’ sensitivity to materials, objects and their codes allows him to comment on the prevailing trend of metatheorising in contemporary art. He holds up a mirror to the Emperor. His delicate and precisely controlled installations paradoxically reinforce and debunk the hegemony of art intellectualisation. A previous exhibition, ‘+Plus one’, saw him present the work of four young artists. Each was, although nothing alluded to the fact in the exhibition or accompanying material, fictitious. However the work presented appeared sound and considered. The overarching concern here perhaps, was the modus operandi of curatorial practice. In ‘Interactism’ Lloyd-Evans presented elements of an un-built structure. Scattered around the gallery space, these half-painted, bubble-wrapped panels and steel objects suggest a work in progress, whilst the title comments on the art-world’s construction of a new isms and theories.

Daniel Staincliffe’s work is primarily concerned with re-presenting details of the Everyday and offering these up for re-evaluation. The artwork is a vessel for communicating the value of subtlety. Performance is filtered through text, video and artefacts. Azure-winged magpies take flight. Staincliffe’s residency project ‘an urban ecology of chance’ was concerned with relinquishing overall control of the product to extraneous variables. Physical and conceptual structures were employed to this end, in order to reduce the role of the ego in the production of the work. But does the way in which the artist proclaims the results, altered by chance, as art, lean even heavier on the role of ego? In ‘Monday 28th April’ Staincliffe presented a framed digital print reading ‘From 8am until 6pm I planted grass with workers in Chaoyang Park.’ This declaration of a performance is accompanied by two photographs of the artist’s hands taken before and after the day's labour. Here the tangibility of performance is reduced from the typical documentary video to a black and white statement and fading memories. And once again the viewer is left without concrete evidence.

Using objects, media and formulas, the artists subvert our expectations of the art experience. Questions are raised about the construction, dissemination and consumption of contemporary art. The artists have used video installation, intervention and established art-world conventions such as the gallery ‘handout’ challenge our reactions to and beliefs in established modes of practice.

Daniel Staincliffe 2010