At one of my
local visually impaired groups we had a speaker from the Whitechapel
Gallery. I had not been to this gallery since
I lost my sight, but remember visiting the area in the 1970s and 1980s.
The gallery
itself has been a showcase of culture reflecting the many changes in the
population. With the closing of a
library, the Whitechapel Gallery took over the premises and was completely
remodelled and fitted into exhibition spaces for large works, smaller
installations and an archive of the gallery itself.
Sarah Barrett
had presented the gallery to our local group and I made a mental note of
dropping in. Some of our members
remember workshops in the past and another has attended audio descriptions
arranged for the visually impaired community.
It had been suggested that the Whitechapel Gallery could make an audio
CD with items of interest. Sarah has
done this.
My visit was done
totally on a whim and on arrival at the nearest London Underground station
(Aldgate East), I was given directions at the exit by the staff, who know where
it is (next door- if you take the correct exit)
I was greeted
on arrival and though I asked for Sarah by name the staff I spoke to were very
much aware of the visually impaired community.
I met Sarah who gave me an audio CD with the October to December
programme and we made a tour of the building with the permanent collection,
long term exhibition and smaller scale shows.
The gallery was mid show and news of their programme can be found on http://www.whitechapelgallery.org/
Giuseppe
Penone:
The following text has been written by me with the inclusion
of some of the press release technical details of the bronze sculpture of
Penone. Sarah and Daisy Malabar sent me
those details with a selection of images from which I have chosen two of the
bronze tree.
Spazio di Luce
(Space of Light) (2012)
Credit for both images:
The Bloomberg
Commission: Giuseppe PenoneWhitechapel Gallery
Installation View
Photo: David Parry / PA Wire
I found the work fascinating in that I could touch it, put
my head in it and make a sound. Visitors
are encouraged to touch the object and with yet another bronze object under my
belt I was beginning to understand the process after the Royal Academy’s Bronze
show with the information on the Lost Wax casting process.
Information from the Whitechapel Gallery:
“Over the past 45 years, Italian artist Giuseppe Penone has
examined the relationship to nature. For the latest Bloomberg Commission, the
Whitechapel Gallery has a twelve metre bronze cast of a tree, with a radiant
gold-leaf interior, which spreads across the columned gallery.
The tree is carefully balanced on its branches and divided
into sections to allow
visitors to move between the separate elements. The work
contrasts with the urban environment surrounding the Gallery, highlighting hidden nature within the
city. It also references the Whitechapel Gallery’s Arts and Crafts architecture
which features the Tree of Life motif on its façade. The installation is accompanied
by a year-long programme of talks and events exploring the rich relationship
between nature and the city.
Giuseppe Penone (b.1947) became the youngest artist to be
admitted to the
legendary Arte Povera group, an Italian movement coined by
curator Germano Celant in 1967.”
(My visit to the Boetti exhibition can be found on
http://profwhitestick.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/tate-modernboetti-and-kusama.htmlBoetti refused to join the Arté Povera group and set up another grouping)
“Inspired by the radical politics of the late 1960s, these
artists
challenged the conventions of sculpture, often using
everyday materials.
This new site-specific work for The Bloomberg Commission,
Spazio di Luce
(Space of Light) (2012), is made using the ancient technique
of Lost Wax casting and the interior and exterior of the tree are deliberately reversed.
Reflecting Penone’s interest in how we relate to the natural world by touch,
the bronze exterior registers thousands of finger prints left by the foundry
workers who covered the original tree in wax as part of the casting process.
The inside of the sculpture is layered in gold leaf, creating a glowing contrast
to the dark patina which assimilates the appearance of tree bark. A second
sculpture Essere Fiume (Being River) (1998) also is on display and I could touch this work consisting of an original stone shaped by the flow of a river in Tuscany and a
sculpture of the stone, hand carved by Penone to mimic the original.”
After inspecting this and the bronze work, Sarah and I climbed
the stairs where there is a display of Aspen magazines. This includes works by Yoko Ono, Warhol and
Lou Reed among others. I mentioned to
Sarah that I had been to the Dieter Roth Diaries on show at the Fruitmarket in
Edinburgh. Sarah briefly described some of the items in the showcase. We discussed Fluxus. We moved into a changing space for selected
works from private collections, in this case another Italian artist, Maurizio Cattelan.
An introduction to this changing
space is made below. I was attracted by
the rug on the exhibition floor. It has
the look of a packaging of cheese from Bel Paese. I recognised the map of Italy (Boot shaped),
kicking little Sicily into the sea. The
colours are vibrant and reminded me of Italian painter Severini, who painted a
Quaker Oats packet (on show in Estorick Collection - http://profwhitestick.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/estorick-collection-of-modern-italian.html
)
Il Bel Paese
Credit for image:
Maurizio Cattelan
Il Bel Paese1995
Wool carpet
Diameter 320 cm
Courtesy Collezione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo
Another small installation involved a small squirrel and Sarah described it as it was too small for me to make out. A large cubic metre bag of masonry rubble was on show and I could touch that. Another Cattelan piece is a set of clothes in a body shape hanging from a rack and there is a play on Catttelan with a sign in neon which I could just about make out. The letter t has been written 3 times in the shape of a cross.
The following is from a press
release by the Whitechapel Gallery:
Collection Sandretto Re
Rebaudengo: Maurizio Cattelan
25 September – 2 December 2012 Gallery 7
Since the 1990s Patrizia Sandretto
Re Rebaudengo has collected contemporary
art. One of the most important
private collections in Europe, it includes leading international artists such as Doug Aitken, Jake & Dinos Chapman, Thomas
Demand, Damien Hirst, Paul McCarthy, Reinhard Mucha, Sarah Lucas, Paola
Pivi, Anish Kapoor and Mike Kelley. A series of four displays at the Whitechapel
Gallery over one year will show highlights from the collection and draw on
its themes.
Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan
is often known as the art world’s joker, using
what seem to be stunts to address
universal themes including power, death and authority. His memorable sculptures include Pope John Paul II struck
down by a meteorite, his staging an exhibition of a ‘back soon’ sign on the door
of an empty gallery or reporting a robbery of an ‘invisible exhibition’ to Italian
police. His work often blurs the line between art and reality to provoke reaction.
The display offers an opportunity
to experience some of Cattelan’s intimate earlier works.
Highlights include a sculptural
installation featuring a stuffed squirrel which
has shot itself at the kitchen
table, titled Bidibidobidiboo (1996). Titled after the fairy godmother’s song in Cindarella, it caricatures the idea of childhood
innocence. In another sculpture the emblem of the 1970s terrorist group
Brigate Rosse is turned into a neon Christmas greeting by Cattelan, while in Il
Bel Paese (1995) a cheese naming Italy as ‘a beautiful country’ becomes a rug
on which to walk. The idea of art potentially reforming society becomes the
butt of Cattelan’s joke, when he makes an effigy of himself dressed in iconic
artist Joseph Beuys trademark grey felt suit, hanging by the neck from a
clothes rack."
Conclusion
A very enjoyable visit with a lot
to explore on both a drop-in basis or by arrangement. I have included the notes from the gallery of
the objects and would like to thank both Sarah and Daisy for encouraging
visually impaired visitors to visit.
A new show – Mel Bochner – has an
audio description session on two dates.
These are of the same subject and more details can be found on the
following links:
November audio description:
http://www.whitechapelgallery.org/shop/index.php/fuseaction/shop.product/product_id/1441?session_id=13498998230e4223c0a9a3f54a181560f5afc4777f
December audio description:
http://www.whitechapelgallery.org/shop/index.php/fuseaction/shop.product/product_id/1451?session_id=1349900053a5e582f19ee127d3c510cec6b4cfc38f
