Passing Through Dublin Contemporary
Mutantspace skills exchange artist Hilary Williams gives us her thoughts on Dublin Contemporary 2011 that’s on until October 31 in venues across Dublin and tells us of her plans for a group walk in Dublin this coming Sunday, 16th October, from Bray to Greystones Dublin along the Cliff Walk. Meeting at 11am in the morning
Sitting here thinking on this calm, sunny, Autumnal, yet slightly windy day, thinking I must get some sheets out on the line…
First must get the man in my life some lunch, poor man for the first time ever he is grounded. No golf, only me, the TV and some books for company. Both legs are bandaged, one had a mole removed, the other a skin graft.
Life is full of possible Performance Art.
No matter which way I move, turn, come and go it all seems to present possibilities of creativity, the mundane joins the adventure, the chance is happy with chaos, how one presents it is the trick….
I have been to Dublin Contemporary twice now. It gives me much to ponder on, but I have few to converse with.
I could document my husbands legs, make many gory images and then install them as some wondrous cultural spiel…
Still seriously I am always hunting what art is today as in contemporary, having being through the college milieu of understanding all the eras, cults and spins, I have sort of have come to a resting place of understanding.
There is a question which asks “Where are we after the age of ideology?” in print on the stairwell? I asked some passer bys and they were not sure. Maybe an age of individualism? Where we can sort out where the cultural shift is going?
I now hunt stuff that resonates with my own work, which is?
Big pause here as I can’t put a quick fix statement of my own work…
Briefly it takes from my observations, experiences, fears, wishes and possible philosophies all tunnelling into images, stories, fragments of my life and others.
Sorts of inconsistent, unorganised bits of life and of mortality with tongue in cheek.
“We are all only passing through, sometimes happy sometimes blue, tell them you saw me passing through.”
This old sixties Leonard Cohen’s song gave me impetus for an idea for a walk.
Sunday 16 th October there will be a collection of people who have someone over the waters, as in left or living elsewhere.
We will walk from Bray to Greystones Dublin along the Cliff Walk. Meeting at 11am in the morning.
Hopefully will have some refreshments in a local bar and café after the walk of about an hour concludes and then people can get the Dart back to the starting point, having enjoyed the fresh air, good weather (hopefully) some exchanges with others, some conversations around where we are at today. How we can cope with the loss of loved ones living away, or how we can attune to living here as a non national. Or maybe something else entirely.
This will be videoed and hopefully put into a solo show at a later date. At Signal Art Centre, Bray, Co Wicklow.
This is giving me great thrust to research what can make a walk a piece of art.
“Isn’t it really quite extraordinary to see that, since man took his first step, no one has asked himself why he walks, how he walks, if he could walk better, what he achieves in walking…questions that are tied to all psychological and political systems which preoccupy the World.”
Honore De Balzac, (from Tracing The Headland, Wanderlust, (A History Of Walking.) by Rebecca Solnit.
Right this minute two foxes are either fighting or mating right under this window, Its dark so I can’t see but there is a weird collection of odd noises, one snuffles and snorts, the other a kitten like whimper. What’s going on?? I look out and see two foxes chase out the garden and streak away down the road.
Right some days later…
The foxes were fighting? I saw one limping down another road. Another day.
Right back to Dublin Contemporary.
I remember ROSC, 60 and 70s, as a teenager it blew me away but then I was unaware of Contemporary art or Modern Art as it was labelled then.
Conceptual art seems to figure strongly here and the idea is more important than the finish. I have seen Venice Biennale and Documenta in 2007 so should be able to compare.
I loved the old building Dublin Contemporary was housed in. the deadly air of medical studies, bits of corpses still almost haunting the place.
The work initially did not have a strength and who factor, I felt both National and international artists were still spelling out the messages of how fucked up this nation is and generally the world…Not sure if I need all that lesson learning. Maybe I did?
Thomas Hirschhorn; The Green Coffin was both horrific and strongly amusing. The ridicules patch up of green filler under it, the mannequin body beautiful (parts,) the corny pretend GIGO bags and watches, we are all really blind to the harm done to others as we parade our little selves in such trappings…Yours truly the exception!
I enjoyed a good rest in the huge Cradle by Wang Du until a class of school kids invaded it and started messing …
Untitled plastic bags by Kader Attia left me thinking, I need to tone down what I do, I make and present too much, all I need is some bags and place them on plants, easy peasy???
Nevin Lahart made me laugh with his strange wry humour, big cardboard piece, big fluffy toy? Some arms arrowed at it, nothing happens, then big noise and out shoots lots of beer cans up in the air. So we can’t fix things “lets party?” It made me smile a lot.
I interacted with Cleary and Connolly’s Studio 1 plus minus.
I have it on my own camera as in the camera follows you and you’re morphed into a black and white design like movements. So maybe bold but making art with an others art is fun even if I never use it.
I also enjoyed Alacia Frankovich`s Volution where a sort of fun dance/romp in the street mimics art/sport kids play. I love the plain interaction on the spot.
There were too many to mention but the ones I liked were the simple ones that had some connection with the world they inhabit, the walk on a hill, the bit of paper placed on the top says “ I will be back” that photographed and the photo placed in the gallery, his shoes and socks also simply there too!
This helps me in the walk I have created that is the kernel of my upcoming show in January/ February 2012
The cliff walk between Bray and Greystones has a uniqueness that I found interesting, it is right on the edge of sea, sky, land, and a man made railway that flits in and out of many tunnels, the cormorants, gulls, seals, hawks, all add their own sound colours.
On a walk like this one is changed, from the urban path where no one tends to make eye contact and speak, on a path with no traffic but bodily beings we all have a clan like cohesiveness.
“Lovely day,”
“Where are you from?”
“What’s the name of your dog?”
“Watch the skiddy bit up there” etc.
Sometimes the conversation can be more intimate and spread to major issues depending on the types of people.
I have my own rule, if eye contact and a greeting is given by the other I will respond but if not then I do not initiate it, some do “vant to be alone.”
We have one off spring who has returned, visa up and no work so I suggested she do a photo shoot of my “piece” White form Passing Through, We worked collaboratively on this path, I enjoyed her skills with the camera but she respected my concept and the results are the documented images of this work done on this site.
They will be part of the Gallery outcome later, so a sneak preview for you here.
Now I conclude.
Tomorrow is another day…
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