handle with care

“They are basically a unit of space owned by a corporation in which to ship objects,” explains Walead Beshty, the London-born author of the FedEx series. The fact that FedEx was able to copyright the dimensions of their boxes – in Beshtys’ own words – this idea of a company being able to “own” an empty volume of air that was only designed to transport goods seemed so surreal to him that it motivated this artwork that turned into a decade-long series.

Since 2007 Beshty constructed glass boxes that would fit inside the FedEx shipping containers, exactly matching their interior dimensions. He send them out to the museums or …. without any padding or additional protection. Then, when the piece arrived to its final destination, it was usually cracked but not totally shattered (Beshty constructed them constructed from shatter-proof glass).

That way, the key element that gives each art-piece its uniqueness happens in transit – the shattering gives each piece its own individual story. 

All of the art pieces were named after the FedEx deliveries: the date of shipment, tracking number and box dimensions, then put on display (e.g.: FedEx® Large Box ©2005 FEDEX 139751 REV 10/05 SSCC, Priority Overnight, Los Angeles-New York trk#795506878000, November 27-28, 2007).

Keep up with Walead’s work online: regenprojects.com/artists/walead-beshty

Sources:
https://weburbanist.com/2017/02/09

Picture from:
https://www.yellowtrace.com.au/walead-beshty-fedex-works/ 

washed away by nature

The following photograph is the artwork of Belgian photographer Geert Goiris. Except his activities as an artist, he teaches practice-based research at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp and at the Sint-Lukas Brussels University College of Art and Design, and is also a visiting lecturer at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. His work has been extensively shown in Europe where he gained a success with various exhibitions such as the ‘fresh hell’.

In his photographs, Goiris seemingly builds open narratives that the viewer can tap into. He focuses on the elusive space between himself and his surroundings. He captures the various natural phenomena, landscapes and architecture monuments. Behind this artistic approach lies an invitation to look at his work with artistic intention, imagination and perception. He raises a question: What relationships are interwoven between the real landscape, its representations and social actuality?

He is clearly attracted to capturing mostly distant and inhospitable places that are unsuited to human life due to their extreme conditions, though in some images as this one, we can see the traces of earlier occupation, now being slowly absorbed by nature.

Keep up with Geert’s work online: geertgoiris.info

Sources:
http://www.centrevox.ca/en

Picture from:
http://www.contemporaryartdaily.com

don’t ignore me

The artwork that we’ll be discussing in this article is actually a social campaign for UNICEF China that aims to remind the Chinese public to remember the 1.5 million underprivileged children in the country. This particular ad was published during the lead up to the Beijing Olympics (2008), but unfortunately the situation for children is still not ideal. These homeless boys were painted to present children them as almost invisible, easy to ignore.

The standard of living in China has improved over the few decades. However there are still widening gaps between rich and poor, and urban and rural areas. Many children, especially those from minority ethnic groups, live in remote areas and lack access to good quality health services and education.

For example an estimated 27.3 million children between the ages of 6 to 17 years old drop out of school. Furthermore, according to the Global Times, a new report reveals that one-third of China’s rural students are “left-behind children” (rural children under the age of 16 whose parents are migrant workers, or who have one migrant-worker parent with the other incapable of guardianship).

According to Shanghaiist (2017) the reported number of children left in this condition varies drastically, with estimates falling anywhere between 9 to 60 million. Obviously, it is impossible to know exactly how many children have been left to live by themselves out in the Chinese countryside, but it is obvious that this is a serious issue.

In just five days, UNICEF was able to raise funds totalling approximately USD 30,000 for the welfare of underprivileged children.

Artists:
Kevin Lee, Haohui Zhou, Bin Liu
Advertiser:
Unicef China
Agency:
Ogilvy & Mather, Shanghai, China

Sources:
http://theinspirationroom.com/daily/2008/dont-ignore-me-4/
http://shanghaiist.com/2017/07/26/left-behind-children-survey.php

Picture from:
http://osocio.org

what was and what will be

One might be forgiven for thinking these incredible pictures are photographs, but they are in fact the work of a British artist Darren Reid who paints street scenes that look like the real thing. His style of work is known as contemporary realism and originates from a line drawing of a photograph and then is painstakingly painted.

This particular painting “the things we leave behind” is concerned with that point between ‘what was’ and ‘what will be’. The expanse of sky above the rubble represents the void of the building that has been demolished, the figures are for narrative the title will make the viewer think about what is left behind and forgotten in creating opportunity for progress, that in constructing the new we inevitably have to deconstruct the old.

Reid wanted to capture the destruction generated by the rapid development happening in his local environment. In painting, the technical rigor required to render a realistic image demands a concomitantly higher level of attention from the viewer; it calls for a deeper engagement with the subject matter at hand. And even though the current fad in contemporary painting encourages more abstract forms, the interest Reid’s work has garnered thus far indicates that skill is still an appreciated quality in art.

Reid’s process is simple but laborious. He begins by taking a number of photographs of scenes and landscapes that are familiar to him, and then selects the image that he finds most technically challenging. In the process of making Before the Storm (2015), for example, Reid meticulously outlined every detail in the image before he painted it, and the result is a picture-perfect depiction of a harbour in Brixham, uncanny in its photographic quality.

The question Reid faces is this: Why create paintings identical to photographs when he could paint from imagination? For Reid, his painting practice might be labelled as photorealist, but his interpretation of the images he chooses to paint has a narrative quality not always prevalent in photographs.

Keep up with Darren’s work online: @darrenreidpaintings

Sources:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2852124/British-artist-Darren-Reid-paints-street-scenes-look-just-like-real-thing.html
http://www.dailyserving.com/2016/01/fan-mail-darren-reid/

Picture from:
http://www.plusonegallery.com/artists/199-darren-reid/works/2244/

mirrored tombstones

“From a distance, the mirrors shine brightly but the closer you get the less attractive they become because they reflect reality,” says Parisian artist, Kader Attia, speaking on his series “Holy Land”. The environment altering installations of mirrored tombstones have been displayed in two locations, one on the Canary Islands and the other in the countryside of Tucson. Attia’s Interest lies in the conflict of identity, specifically cultural backgrounds and ethnicity.

Upon visiting Holy Land, people are firstly confronted with stunning and lively reflections, but upon further consideration, they also find a strong reminder of their own mortality.

The French-Algerian artist has always been interested in the conflicts of identity, particularly in regard to cultural backgrounds and ethnicity. For Holy Land, he chose to place the material items within nature in order to form an uncomfortable tension and to remind us of our own individuality, as well as our “human vanity and the desire to dominate nature.”

Keep up with Kader’s work online: http://kaderattia.de

Sources:
https://www.juxtapoz.com/news/street-art/kader-attias-mirrored-tombstones/
http://mymodernmet.com/kader-attia-holy-land/

Picture from:
http://kaderattia.de

the pillars

This article is focused on the importance of knowledge in the society. I know – books went out of style a long time ago and people use them mostly out of necessity or just for the entertainment nowadays. But books are so much more than that, they are important tools, or at least they can be, if you know how to use them.

Indeed, historically certain books have had dramatic impacts on the thinking of whole societies. Consider, for example, Charles Darwin’s book, “The Origin of Species,” published in 1859. The theory of evolution first popularized by this book has dominated the thinking of “educated” people around the world for over a hundred years. Hardly anyone reads that book any more, but the movement it helped to spawn continues unabated. It was like a match that started an inferno that is still raging.

Of course, some books have positive rather than negative results. The Bible comes to mind immediately, but it is in a class entirely of its own because it is the infallible, inspired Word of God. Other examples of influential books could be mentioned, but the point should be clear enough: books are important tools for human beings; they play a key role in the transmission of information from one generation to another, or in the communication and spread of new ideas, as well as other important tasks.

This are the “Pillars” – the work of Ishmael Randall Weeks, that show us the true “power of knowledge”. He creates works on paper, sculpture, and mixed media installations and often incorporates found and recycled objects.

In Pillars, four columns made of concrete and built-in books function as the framework of an imaginary building or the basis of our ideas, where the different layers of the materials reveal their historical and sensitive burden. Because from knowledge we build the pillars of the mind.

“My work encompasses site-specific installations, sculpture, video, and works on paper. In these works, issues of urbanization, transformation, regeneration, escape, collapse, and nomadic existence have been predominant. The foundation of my larger-scale work lies in the alteration of materials (including such source materials as books and printed matter, empty tins, old tires, bicycles, boat parts, and building construction fragments) that are often altered to create sculptural objects and architectural spaces. These works take the visual form of functional objects while stripping them of their productivity to address notions of labour and utility, forcing an examination of our understanding of culturally specific forms while simultaneously exploiting and adapting their particular codes and associations.”

Keep up with Ishmael’s work online: @ishmaelrw

Sources:
http://www.foundationforcontemporaryarts.org/recipients/ishmael-randall-weeks
http://southasastateofmind.com/south-likes-ishmael-randall-weeks-arroniz-mexico-city/
https://chalcedon.edu/resources/articles/what-difference-can-a-book-make-the-impact-and-influence-of-the-genesis-flood

Picture from:
http://www.federicaschiavo.com/Artists/Ishmael-Randall-Weeks

the game of shadows

Tim Noble and Sue Webster are London-based artists whose work combines trash, light, shadow and humour. They collect and transforms these random objects into “statues” that show us two realities. At first glance, we see just the piles of trash, the products of a throw-away society. But we soon discover, that the piles are in fact precise constructions that cast shadows under directed light.

The play of shadow andlight simultaneously recalls one of the oldest philosophical critiques: Plato’s Cave Allegory: that it is the artist’s responsibility to create objects that can transcend terrestrial life by giving us a glimpse of the metaphysical.

This piece of work called “Trash culture” was made by collecting 6 months’ worth of trash (mostly food and beverage packaging that is a major component of global pollution) made by the couple of these artists. A pile like that can be found in almost anyone’s trash can over the space of six months to create another couple’s profile.

Tim Noble and Sue Webster’s work–through shock, horror, and beauty–exposes the deeper infirmities of our shadow selves. In bringing such sickly corpses to light, perhaps we can begin to reconfigure our relationship with the natural world we seem so bent on destroying.

How much trash do you generate in a six-month period? Measuring the amount of trash you send to the landfill is a great first step towards reducing it.

Keep up with Sue’s and Tim’s work online: @myblackbaby + @timnoblesuewebster

Sources:
http://www.artworksforchange.org/portfolio/tim-noble-and-sue-webster/
https://www.blainsouthern.com/artists/tim-noble-sue-webster
http://weirdfictionreview.com/2012/07/tim-noble-and-sue-webster-give-a-few-extra-turns-of-the-screw/

Picture from:
http://www.artworksforchange.org/portfolio/tim-noble-and-sue-webster/

smoking kills

You may be a little confused by my choice of the title of this first article and wonder why am I trying to connect the current president of USA, cigarettes art and politics. Well, let me start this off with a quote that I think very well expresses what I’m trying to say.

“The opinion that art should have nothing to do with politics is itself a political attitude.”
(George Orwell)

If you think that trying to connect art and politics is stupid and pointless, well hold on. Nowadays, in the world of internet, media and technology the art is everywhere around us. It can find you while you’re scrolling through your feed on Facebook or wait for you on the corner of the street you pass every day, you can see it in the news you read or hear it playing on the radio. I could go on and tell you that art is hidden in every single one of us and that people themselves are art, but this article is not exactly about that.

The point I’m trying to get to, is that the art is one of the most influential means of communication today, even if we don’t always realise that.

And even though you may not agree with that, you can’t deny that art has a great power. Every piece of artwork carries some kind of statement, the form of self-expression, that you sometimes may not see at the first glance, but it’s almost always there. Art is created by people, by members of this society and so it reacts to political and economic changes in the world and to all its struggles.

At the end of the day art reflects life, sometimes it imitates it, but mostly it allows us to express ourselves. Sometimes the messages behind it are hidden, and in cases like this one an artist uses his work to share his statement and beliefs very clearly.

This first article is dedicated to the British artist Antony Micallef, more specific to one of his most famous artworks – a series of miniature oil portraits of Donald Trump on the front of Marlboro cigarette packets, “finally putting the presidential candidate’s image to good use”.

Bearing the now familiar “Smoking kills” tagline, Micallef, is trying to express the threat that Trump means for the society. As he explains, “I thought a warning sign of the imminent danger of a narcissistic sociopath fitted aptly into the concept.”

He says, “I think Trump being elected is born through a lack of desperation and lack of education. When we swap education for entertainment and take away cohesiveness by stripping jobs, extremism grows. It grows in all forms like a fungus or a cancer and spreads to all the weak parts of society who desperately want to belong to something.”

And his work was met with a great support. You can see people printing these pictures on their t-shirts, carrying them as signs to protests or simply posting them all over social media and that’s definitely not something neglectable. Now whatever your political beliefs and opinions are, you cannot deny that art is a very powerful means of communication with huge audience and following.

Micallef’s work in this case is a great reminder that artists will always have something to say and they will continue to challenge, provoke and inspire, no matter what.

Keep up with Micallef’s work online antonymicallef.com + @antonymicaellef

Sources:
http://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/donald-trump-antony-micallef
http://antonymicallef.com

Picture from:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BPiE2DMlWSa/?hl=en&taken-by=antonymicallef