Success

Nope this isn’t a post about some amazing achievement or that I have somehow have a bank account in the black.  Its more of a reflection on what success is for me, and specifically in my art practice.  Whilst teaching here in Saas Fee (means to fund my art practice) I get asked a lot by my guests whether my artwork/practice is successful.  The two means for validation lie mainly on me telling them whether I sell my work regularly or am I famous.  I guess in this day and age you know one unless you are on some list of success even if you are Z list Celeb…

I am honest with my guests, I am not known however like most emerging artists we are labeled so for that very reason.  As for selling, it has not been a focus within my practice to make specifically objects.  Commodifying an art practice is something we all contemplate throughout our years.  However at present I rely on my snowboard coaching as a source of income whilst I develop my voice and direction in my practice.

Success for me is nothing to do with money or notoriety and its something I feel is harder to gain.  It is purely one thing for me and the works I make which is conversation or discussion (discourse if you want art-speak 2.0).  This very basic element within the art world and beyond is not that easy to gain.  Yes in the era of social media it is easy to put work out there for more to see but to hear back is not so simple.  There is very little echo from the majority of not just my work but my peers.  The little that does come back is more of support from fellow creatives who spur you on.  However for me I seek success in the form of something more in the conversation that good art creates.  Don’t get me wrong this is not purely about adulation or people describing works as life changing its the chat surrounding how it engages and interacts on different levels and people.  This discussion is not always sought from those that like or get the work but rather negative and constructive response is just as valid.  I come from a belief that good work is so when you have a response to it this can be in the form or negative: repulsion, hate or anger.  Whilst also the positive: resonates, refreshes perspective or challenges existence.  Work that sits in the middle is what just fades.

Following on from my previous post about being adrift, the reason to currently make work whilst not be located within a place or group.  I see this isolation as a hard time to know where to exhibit or present work when I barely exist.  For me the motivation of making work when I deep down know that the rational for the work being successful is this conversation adds to stalling of making.  The works are still there in my head and whilst I navigate the next few years I will create. However finding a means to connect with networks or environments where I can gage the validity of the work is part of the process and for me right now is the biggest challenge.

Auxiliary Progress…

Since arriving here in Stockton my time has been spent exploring not just the local landscape but also my current limits of my practice. I came here looking to examine how I install current workings of sonic works and how I can develop or bridge the gap that I find between what I am making and what I am trying to offer.

The first few weeks were spent contemplating speaker architecture and how installing speaker drivers within a form that dissolved or collapsed whilst it functioned worked.  Drawing on the inspiration of the local area and its regeneration hopes/plans.  I have been thinking heavily about addition and reduction as methods of creation both in sound and process works.  Glitch process that I have been known to use is a perfect example of how regeneration seems to operate, existing ideology is rehashed the result is urban planning that though clearly considered it is not until it is implemented you realise the functional errors of such planning.

The focus on heritage and community, the life and death of generations that have called a place home.  The time that passes by and the marks those leave on a place last longer than structures in many cases.  Replacing old is not something that should be done without consideration and awareness for those that live within it.  The Auxiliary residency is based within a community that is exposed to many different social factors.  It is an opportunity to live within a place that is struggling to come to terms with how it should function.  The oddity is that with all the trials and time that it takes to rejuvenate a place it somehow still continues, functions without much thought.  Time will change the nature of a community however daily this is not something that is really brought to your attention as each day was like the last.

Mid way through this residency my father has a stroke which alongside my research here at the Auxiliary has given me a new perspective.  Seeing a parent go through a life changing moment in their existence brings reality home.  I have recently been back and forth between the residency and my parents to see how my father has progressed with his recovery.  Even though I have not been making as much as I would of hoped it has provided much needed reflection, thinking more about the sound works that have been started yet not finished.  The last few weeks here in Stockton I hope to realise some new works with little or no focus on completion yet more or presenting something that is mobile/fluid and evolving.  

 

 

THERE IS ONLY ONE CATCH AND THAT IS CATCH-22 – Y GALLERY, NYC

THERE IS ONLY ONE CATCH AND THAT IS CATCH-22
A project curated by Blanca de la Torre

May 15th – June 28th, 2015.
Opening Reception: FRIDAY May 15th from 7pm to 10pm.

Y GALLERY is pleased to present “There is Only One Catch and that is Catch 22 ”,a group show curated by Blanca de la Torre at Y Gallery. It will be the first exhibition at Y Gallery’s new space in the Lower East Side in the fifth floor of a historical building located in 319 Grand St. NY 10002.* This exhibition features the work of seventeen international artists, and will be comprised of drawing, photography, video, installation, sculpture and mixed media works by:

Artemio, Greta Alfaro, Alberto Borea, Juanli Carrión, Danilo Correale, Chueca, Leonardo Herrera, Christian Jankowsky, Enrique Jezik, Ximena Labra, Antonio Vega Macotela, Detext (Raúl Martínez), Kate Newby, Alejandra Prieto, Wilfredo Prieto, Avelino Salas and Joaquín Segura

About  “There Is Only One Catch and That Is Catch 22”

Participation in the present moment implies the tacit adherence to a cult of certain contradictions. This is a world of crossed messages, symbolic traffic, and sudden transformations in which it becomes clear that there is no idea of “sense,” beyond that present in the multiple nature of this concept.

This is an exhibition that takes this basic problem as a point of departure. Catch 22 is a logic trap initially suggested by Joseph Heller in his eponymous novel published in 1961. Set during the II World War the novel develops this idea but in close relation to the operating area of ​​military bureaucracy, strict and absurd at the same time. The term later became part of the English vocabulary because of its accuracy to refer to certain unsolvable puzzles in which the only way out is denied by an inherent fact of the problem itself. Furthermore this impossible scenario appeals broadly to current circumstances such as arbitrary political decisions, militarism, and absurd bureaucracies worldwide.

The artists included in this exhibition provide works that connect to different explorations of what is considered a biconditional tautology. The works outline different vanishing points, either referring to military and political connotations of this construct; or to that section of invisibility of certain processes or social situations, as well as the efforts to maintain that invisibility.

On the other hand, the technique chosen by each artist plays a key role in representing this paradox by operating as a dialectical device that allows us to enter the circuit where the intractable political liability inherent to the material sets its own speech and takes us into the eternal dilemma of the concept before or after its formal resolution. Thus, the works venture into a double connection with the Catch-22: the conceptual approach of them, together with the hoop stress and the disorder between the material and the concept represented, which also canceled its value in use and intensifies the fetish of merchandise.

– Blanca de la Torre, 2015

Artists in this exhibition: Alberto Borea, Alejandra Prieto, Antonio Vega Macotela, Artemio, Avelino Sala, Christian Jankowski, Chueca, Danilo Correale, DETEXT, Enrique Ježik, Greta Alfaro, Joaquín Segura, Juanli Carrión, Kate Newby, Leonardo Herrera, Wilfredo Prieto, Ximena Labra

at our NEW SPACE

319 Grand St 5th floor
New York, NY 10002

www.ygallerynewyork.com