For the next two weeks I have the pleasure of assisting Fabrica’s newest exhibition Cluster by Annemarie O’Sullivan. I’ve helped with Technical Production for 6 months now, mainly with video art installations, so I was particularly excited to get involved with a sculpture based installation.

Working with materials so carefully is wonderful, all the structures are held together by tension once the clamps are removed, so a slight misalignment can throw the balance of the structure, or at worse destroy it. O’Sullivan has immense craftmanship that I can only aspire to, an incredible understanding of the materials she is working with (sweet chesnut) and a passion that stems from a calling toward creating her work.

Talking to her at lunch I discovered that she actually studied Sports Science at Loughborough, and then went on to teach at a Primary School. O’Sullivan’s turn towards sculpture was born from a want and need to do create, to go outside and work with natural materials, and from this she has a great knowledge of the local natural landscape. She then went on to make outside willow sculptures and structures, and then to study a City and Guilds in Basket Making. This is the first time that she has honoured this craft on this scale, and I’m looking forward to the final arrangement of these winding cocoons. I may have sanded the prints from my fingertips (You can’t wipe off chalk marks, as the willow can’t get wet) but I’m looking forward to seeing it develop into a final installation. 

Absolutely covered in paint. Day well spent at Fabrica Gallery for their forthcoming exhibition of The Otolith Group’s piece ‘I See An Infinite Point Between Any Point And Another’. I haven’t actually seen the piece yet (the preview is on Friday and I’m really looking forward to it), but I’m excited by seeing how the space is shaping up. If you’re in Brighton then I’d love to show you around. I love using my hands, and this is always one of the fun parts of volunteering at a gallery. I need a bath. 

(P.S. Sorry for the terrible quality, I forgot my proper camera, and my phone had to do.)

The above pictures are from Installation training at Fabrica, in which 5 very willing volunteers (Me, Manny, Fran, Patricia and Rachel) were trained in wall mounting, fixtures and power tools. As someone brought up by a family of tradespeople, the latter got me very, very excited. It’s all in training for the next exhibition with The Otolith Group, which I am very, very excited about, and also because working in the arts doesn’t mean sitting in an office all day.

The unbelievably patient Jason (Sculptor, Carpenter, Installer) taught us everything, didn’t mind when I broke things, or asked stupid questions, or made loud noises. In fact I think all of that was the point, you didn’t have to be perfect when you’re learning, because otherwise you worry too much to ever learn anything. He taught us by presenting us with a wooden box, which we could destroy using any of the skills we’d learned, as long as we reattached everything we removed. I really enjoy destroying things, even the blade of a jigsaw, which I reattached to my ‘sculpture’ by wire as a commentary to winning a personal best that I would break something first. The ‘works’ were then fixed during a lesson on Mirror plates, and although we didn’t have time to line them up properly, I think it’s a rather wonderful little exhibition.

All of the sculptures were the product of us learning things, so I’d like to claim us as the beginning of a movement. Therefore if anyone wants the first work of the ‘Fabricans’ then message me for any offers on £5,000. Seriously. I am poor. 

I have really, really missed working with my hands, Rachel (who is a wonderful installation artist, and I cannot WAIT for her graduate show) and me were talking about it with brief bursts of excitement as we made progress (or broke things). We both volunteer in various arts organisations in different roles, but both at heart like to get creative and make stuff. I come from the (very amatuer, very much still learning) gallerists perspective, while Rachel is an artist, and it means a great deal to both of us in terms of evaluating space, engaging with materials, and the act of production itself. I was joking with the Gallery manager Lauren Schneider (Also a sculptor, talented bunch) that this is my inaugural sculpture show, and to quote a cliche, there was definitely something that awoke in me by being creative with materials. So watch this space for yet another thing I want to do but don’t. 

Melanie Manchot - Gathering or, I’m going to be on television, and Manchot has made me fear children slightly.

If you’re a UK resident, in approximately a week and a half’s time, you’ll see me participate in an experiment that looks at an unbelievably interesting phenomenon in crowd theory called crowd de-identification. I don’t want to ruin too much, but it’s for Derren Brown’s latest series The Experiments, and you’ll see how morality is tested through certain exercises. I’m honestly not a bad person…honest. It was quite nicely coincidental that the exhibition I’ve been invigilating at looks at crowd identification and how we react within a crowd scenario.

Melanie Manchot’s exhibition Gathering at Fabrica consists of two films, Celebration (Cyprus Street) 2010 and Walk (Square) 2011, which deal with crowd identity and the power and presence of walking. As taken from Fabrica’s website, Walk… works on the concept of ‘walking as a form of expression: processions, parades, pilgrimages or protest marches, such as in the recent wave of mass demonstrations across North Africa, the Middle East, mainland Europe and the UK.’ However, what intrigued me is what happens when they got there, and how being part of something, for whatever reason, affects your own individual personality.

Celebration is interesting through its presentation of identity and film as portraiture. As I learned, Machot spent a lot of time getting to know the East London community that she eventually filmed and as a record of generations of multiculturalism and immigration in Britain, it is superb. It’s not my favourite, but like in Walk, I found myself with favourite individuals, the girls with their mouths open, the boy offering drinks, the cross-generational dancing couple.

One of the best things about this exhibition has been asking people who saw Walk in its entirety if they noticed anything that made them laugh, or feel uncomfortable, as after watching the film only once I found myself liking, or disliking certain children, based solely on how they were presented in the 20 minutes that they were together. I hope to be able to find the film online at some point, as I’d like you to see what, or who, I’m talking about. There aren’t any pictures either because it’s so new, it was filmed days before the exhibition.

There’s one child who maintains the same, stoical stare throughout the entire film. He doesn’t move, his eyes flicker slightly, but his mouth doesn’t succumb to a smile, he doesn’t look at who’s next to him or behind, he just looks directly at the camera. It’s not intense, he knows it’s not important, but he knows he has to do it. His gaze is immoveable and penetrating, and has me worried for the boy’s future.

The second, and probably my favourite, is a girl who starts by smiling as if it’s a school portrait, all teeth and bright eyes and perfect hair. As the camera goes round, you catch her smile again, unchanged and solid. The camera comes round again, and suddenly you see the strain in her eyes, her eyebrows dip uncontrollably to pull up the collapse of her face, which is tired and wants to relax, but there is sheer desperation to keep the smile going that is both funny and uncomfortable to watch. She eventually breaks it, and just as the camera takes her out of view, the look of panic and disappointment remains and that is the impression you are left with, not the smile she tried so hard to maintain.

I guess one of the things I found most intriguing about Manchot’s work was her ability to single out every individual - as a crowd we are often faceless and overwhelming, take for example the recent London riots and Occupy Wall Street, in which an individual is only recognised when a direct focus is placed upon them, essentially then taking them out of the crowd situation. Each individual in Manchot’s work is intimately presented to you in the context of others, leaving you with no choice but to face the individual, and power of the crowd simultaneously.

Gathering will be at Fabrica until 27th November. Come and say hello on Friday and Saturday mornings as that’s when I’ll be bothering members of the public.

Stéphane Cauchy – Cascade Fabrica, Brighton. Until the 29th August. I’ve been making much more of an effort to engage with my local arts scene (I don’t like the word scene for some reason, but I suppose that’s what it is), and I’m slowly uncovering galleries and spaces bit by bit. London has somewhat a monopoly on art if you live Down South, and Brighton offers literally loads of things in and around the surrounding areas.  Chichester has the Pallant House Gallery for instance, which I’m going to next week because I’ll actually get to see some Frida Kahlo. Tomorrow I’ll be trying my hand at being an Exhibition assistant at the Lighthouse Gallery on Kensington Street, I’ll give you some more information about that tomorrow. I’m not new to Fabrica, but I’m pretty new to Visual and Sound Art, so forgive my ignorance while I talk for a while. For a piece that, at times, is essentially calm, there is incredible tension in Cauchy’s slowly filling silver pails. The chaos caused by a full bucket is preceded by this wonderfully strange game that the viewer is drawn into; an aim to find the next to fly back up into the rafters. Cauchy’s work suggests mortality, and with this, a meditation on the cyclical nature of death, as the buckets perpetually fill and release, to return after a series of releases. I always love seeing the reactions of others to visual art, and Cauchy’s work triggered a series of interesting responses, some startled by the sudden splash of water, others deeply meditative. Some laughed and were interested more in the construction of the huge pulley system, some laughed and walked away. Fabrica is a wonderful space, and previously lived as a church, so the acoustics and wealth of light serve an enormous advantage to a piece like ‘Cascade’. I previously saw (or should I say heard) Janet Cardiff’s ‘Forty Part Motet’, and again, the gallery asserts as immense personality of peace, power and reflection. I tried taking a video of ‘Cascade’ myself, to capture the movement of the buckets, but my camera’s phone is terrible. Here’s a nice video made by Fabrica instead:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=jd891Z3tfm0#at=49 (Click the terrible resolution photo to see exhibition details)
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Stéphane Cauchy – Cascade

Fabrica, Brighton. Until the 29th August.

I’ve been making much more of an effort to engage with my local arts scene (I don’t like the word scene for some reason, but I suppose that’s what it is), and I’m slowly uncovering galleries and spaces bit by bit. London has somewhat a monopoly on art if you live Down South, and Brighton offers literally loads of things in and around the surrounding areas.  Chichester has the Pallant House Gallery for instance, which I’m going to next week because I’ll actually get to see some Frida Kahlo. Tomorrow I’ll be trying my hand at being an Exhibition assistant at the Lighthouse Gallery on Kensington Street, I’ll give you some more information about that tomorrow. I’m not new to Fabrica, but I’m pretty new to Visual and Sound Art, so forgive my ignorance while I talk for a while.

For a piece that, at times, is essentially calm, there is incredible tension in Cauchy’s slowly filling silver pails. The chaos caused by a full bucket is preceded by this wonderfully strange game that the viewer is drawn into; an aim to find the next to fly back up into the rafters. Cauchy’s work suggests mortality, and with this, a meditation on the cyclical nature of death, as the buckets perpetually fill and release, to return after a series of releases.

I always love seeing the reactions of others to visual art, and Cauchy’s work triggered a series of interesting responses, some startled by the sudden splash of water, others deeply meditative. Some laughed and were interested more in the construction of the huge pulley system, some laughed and walked away. Fabrica is a wonderful space, and previously lived as a church, so the acoustics and wealth of light serve an enormous advantage to a piece like ‘Cascade’. I previously saw (or should I say heard) Janet Cardiff’s ‘Forty Part Motet’, and again, the gallery asserts as immense personality of peace, power and reflection.

I tried taking a video of ‘Cascade’ myself, to capture the movement of the buckets, but my camera’s phone is terrible. Here’s a nice video made by Fabrica instead: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=jd891Z3tfm0#at=49

(Click the terrible resolution photo to see exhibition details)