Meschac Gaba: The Museum of Contemporary African Art 1997-2002

Meschac Gaba’s twelve room installation The Museum of Contemporary African Art 1997-2002 is one of Tate’s most inspiring acquisitions of contemporary art in recent years. It is the single largest work bought by the gallery and was acquired in 2012, sixteen years after its creation. This installation does not have a permanent home but travels the world. I had the opportunity to visit it in its most recent temporary accommodation at the Deutsche Bank KunstHalle in Berlin. Gaba’s installation marks the beginning of a long term co-operation between Deutshe Bank KunstHalle and Tate Modern. However, this building has only managed to display seven rooms of this installation. I wonder what Gaba would say at his art being cut short by five rooms - maybe he wouldn’t care.

Although there is excitement surrounding a travelling exhibition and there is a fantastic panic to see it in a limited time, there is also something sad about an artwork which has no permanent home. I think this feeling is particularly prominent with The Museum of Contemporary African Art. Having gained a scholarship from the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam, Gaba created this museum as he believed his art had no place in the western world. African contemporary art did not exist as a concept and so he built himself this museum to house his creations. The fact that this exhibition is always temporary, for me, highlights the artist’s concern that his artwork doesn’t fit into a permanent collection in the west. Then again, it is owned by Tate and how many artists can say that?

The first room I walk through is the ‘Draft Room’ containing a weird mix of decommissioned banknotes from Benin, cut into small circles, and fake frozen food, bits of chicken including the feet and vegetables piled against the walls. Hardly surprisingly this room comments on consumerism, particularly the waste created by the west. Gaba shows that even the feet of a chicken are considered food in Africa. The money in this room is interesting; money is something that rules the art world. In many ways it controls the snobbery and prestige of a piece of art and the more popular an artist or an artwork, the higher its value. And yet money is just paper. Here Gaba shows it as completely worthless and having no value to him. But theoretically, if his artwork and his installation were not tied to monetary value, could his artwork really exist in the art market? Is it money that gives art meaning and a continuous life?

 

The ‘Architecture Room’ allows visitors to build their own museum out of children’s building blocks. I enjoyed this all-inclusive interaction with the space. On the simplest level, the idea that anyone can create their own museum in theory, leads to the deconstruction of elitism. Those without an education in architecture, without the money to pursue this dream but who possess the imagination, can enjoy building too. Does this also devalue architecture though, like the bank notes in the ‘Draft Room’, does the architecture become worthless because anyone can do it?

 

The coloured ladder shows the progression of Gaba’s installation until 2002. The curators’ names are displayed on one side of each rung and the institution they worked for on the other side. As the installation moved to different sites, more rungs were added. This method of showing the exhibition’s development and its rising worth as the height of the rungs increased is very much like a child marking his height on a doorframe as he grows over the years. Gaba is marking his own success, this is the perfect way to literally measure it, not in money or in academic papers but in the physical and practical marking of steps.

The ‘Art and Religion Room’ is the wooden structure in the middle of this space. Its intermittent wooden panels create a structure you can see through. It may be structurally sound but it would not withstand force or abuse and it would not keep out the rain. Perhaps this is a comment on the precariousness of the different religions is displays. Objects and symbols of Christianity, Budhism, Judaism, Islam and Hinduism are all present. Their conflict and similarities in ideas and religious texts mirror the mish-mash structure they are held in. These religious symbols, combined with every day objects, are suggestive of the underlying culture and lifestyle that goes alongside faith.

On the surface, Gaba has created something for himself, regardless of its monetary value and its expression of thoughts and ideas. It is not until you look closer though that you realise Gaba has created the impossible; the balance between inclusivity and elitism, value and worthlessness, the fighting forces which surround individuals whether in different counties, the east and the west, or in different classes. This is a gentle but incisive comment on ongoing social problems and it is wrapped up in one man’s dream of having his own contemporary African museum.

A Streetcar Named Desire at the Young Vic

I am still a shameless X-files fan, Scully was the FBI agent that every girl wanted to be and every guy wanted to be with. So, seeing Gillian Anderson play such a powerful role and being 5-10 metres away from me at any given time, made me a little bit weak at the knees.

One of Tennessee Williams' most famous plays, A Streetcar Named Desire is on at the Young Vic until 19th September. It is an emotionally intense stage performance of three characters, Blanche DuBois (Gillian Anderson), Stella (Vanessa Kirby) and Stanley Kowalski (Ben Foster) set in the seedy underbelly of downtown New Orleans.

This play questions the motives for violence and lust to the extent that you cannot take sides. It scrapes the surface of mental illness and screams 'uncomfortable' to us. There is a constant contrast between the systematic undressing of Blanche, her vulnerable and sexually charged human form and the hard, strong lines of the revolving stage, the metal posts, the corners of the bed and the bath tub, even the iron stairs which squarely ascend to the upper level of the theatre.

Every character is tragic in this play but Blanche is the most misunderstood, doomed as soon as she wheels her suitcase to the front door. I think every woman has a little bit of Blanche in her, those moments when the world cannot provide the love and attention we so desperately need, the constant clawing of reality and the existence of ourselves as an ideal, flawless and untouchable individual. Blanche is our extreme. I think it is our intense relationship with Blanche that causes us to desperately despise her. She is a needy and selfish character, self-absorbed to the extent that she cannot accept herself as part of the disappointing world that surrounds her.

Taken from Tate online. Ref: T01794

I forgot how incredibly sad this story is and I found myself close to tears at the end when Blanche (Gillian Anderson) was paraded around the revolving stage, looking at the sky of a world she did not recognise. This last scene reminded me of a print by William Hogarth, Plate 8 of A Rake's Progress. This series of prints depicts an eighteenth-century rake who loves money, fame and glamour. He spends everything, goes mad and ends up in Bedlam, Bethlem Royal Hospital in London. In the eighteenth century Bedlam would charge a small fee to visitors wanting to come and look at the patients, it would be a day out, a chance to judge and gawp at those deemed insane. In Plate 8 of A Rake's Progress we can see two well dressed women to the right, an example of these visitors. They snigger and cling to each other, disgusted yet pleased with what they see. As an audience at the Young Vic we were these women, gawping and judging the vulnerable character before us, trying to understand what caused Blanche's mania but really just pleased to be able to walk out of the theatre after three hours and back into our normal lives.
 
This play has effected me. It has infected me with the memory of that last scene. The cast were faultless and the performance was excellent.

I am now even more in awe of Gillian Anderson...I think it's time to re-watch the X-files!

20,000 Days of Nick Cave

I don't know very much about Nick Cave. He is an Australian musician famous for being in a couple of bands, his emotionally raw, obsessive lyrics, he is the front man of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, a band formed in the 1980s but really I have never connected with him.

My boyfriend lent me an album of his and to be honest it felt like a good melody spoilt by that drunk guy in the pub who puts on the jukebox and ruins your favourite song. His lyrics never seem clever enough for the intensity of his voice and yet I feel like I am missing the point to his songs, some hidden meaning that I am not hipster enough to understand. So why did I go and see the premiere of 20,000 Days on Earth at the Film4 Summer Screen at Somerset House, a film about Nick Cave and his life?

Well, Nick Cave is from Brighton, near where I live, my boyfriend likes him and I was trying to be nice, and there wasn't anything else I really wanted to see at Somerset House this year. Everyone loves Sense and Sensibility but I don't want to see it again and I'd cry all the way through ET.


So I unpacked my three picnic blankets and my extensive feast of Sainsburys food and we settled down under a marginally threatening sky and prayed it wouldn't rain. It didn't. Just before it got dark we were graced with an impressive rainbow doming the entire venue and Somerset House flashed with coloured lights and booming music as the screen came to life. The film was excellent, so much more accessible than Cave's music. It was perfectly shot as a documentary, never dwelling on sections of Cave's life for too long, it flipped from scene to scene through psychedelic music and graphic speed. Iain Forsyth and Jane Pollard, the co-writers and directors, did a fantastic job and Cave was interesting and succinct. He talked about life and his family in a way I could understand. I got the impression that he always felt lonely and was desperately searching for more, people maybe, in the form of fame and yet he loves his family. He is obviously extremely proud of his wife and his children and really, he is just an ordinary dad deep down.


The film, being warm enough, having a good spread of food and it not raining all contributed to a great evening out under the stars. The perfect way to celebrate my graduation in MA History of Art from the Courtauld, housed in Somerset House.

Masterpiece London 2014

Masterpiece London 2014, Royal Chelsea Hospital

Masterpiece London art, antique and design fair 2014 came to a close yesterday after it successfully concluded its fifth opening year.

Perusing with the rich and fabulous amongst Old Masters, medieval sculptures and modern canvases was an understatement. Tickets were £25 (my tickets were free, courtesy of the Courtauld), small ciabatta chicken rolls were £7 and cans of lemonade were £3 from the inside cafes. I wanted wine but my overdraft said no.
For some reason I thought that the artwork I would see at Masterpiece would be by artists I didn't know, either because they were particularly rare or because I was not as up to date as I thought with the art market. I thought I would leave sheepish and anxious, worrying about never getting a job because I didn't know enough about the art world. Panic over, I knew plenty!

Entrance to Masterpiece London

 All of those artists I have loved throughout my childhood, education and degree were there. It became quickly obvious that academia rules the art market to a large extent. I was able to look at beautifully coloured Chagalls without glass hindering their beauty, without the worry that some nutter might vandalise the work; the man that threw acid over Rembrandt's the Night Watch in the '90s automatically springs to mind. The art at Masterpiece were without ropes keeping you within two or three feet. Many guests wandered around with glasses of wine and champagne, pointing with one hand and sipping with the other. I could have touched the layers of acrylic, the wavy mountainous oil paint which dazzled the artificial lights and no-one would have questioned me because I could have been a buyer.

The guards outside the most expensive artwork and jewellery booths addressed me as 'Good morning madam', at first I looked over my shoulder to see who they were talking to. This felt like a different world to people I meet on the train, the hustle and bustle of commuters in the stations, always in a rush, it was different to the students I meet, even if they are at one of the top universities for History of Art in Europe. The people at Masterpiece had nowhere else to be, no worries, they could afford to be there on a Wednesday at midday without taking the day off work and without a limit on their credit cards.

Taxdermy Fox with Squid

I bumped into a lovely lady in the Crane Kalman Gallery unit trying to haggle for a Lowry for £500,000 cheaper…I’m not sure what the original price was but in the end she gave in and paid in full. A woman admiring a Picasso sketch of Jacqueline Roque, Picasso’s second wife, stood behind us and commented on how beautiful the artificial woman looked. I did not see it as one of Picasso’s best, it lacked his usual flair like several of his later sketches, but she proceeded to purchase the drawing nonetheless. I bravely asked a woman in one of the sculpture units how much the 3^rd reduction of Rodin’s The Kiss was going for, she answered £580,000.

Perhaps a classist observation, but after Grayson Perry’s Channel 4 programme on class a year or two ago it seems topical. Unlike the middle classes, always in competition, almost aggressive in their social climbing, the people visiting Masterpiece London seemed satisfied. There was no competition because money was no object, these people had never been without comfort because they inherited it and honestly, they were the friendliest group of people.

Artists featured at Masterpiece included Chagall, Picasso, Matisse, Bacon, Bridget Riley, Peter Blake, Lowry, Graham Sutherland, Reynolds, Lely, Warhol, Dali and Degas. The list is endless! One of my favourite pieces was a lithograph by Degas Nude Woman Standing, Drying Herself (1891-2). Although quite usual in subject for Degas, he did a series of nudes bathing, this piece had a particular charm that not all of the painterly versions possess. It was incredibly beautiful in its simplicity. Alongside the art were several units of antiques, jewellery, woodwork, furniture, clocks, globes, sculpture (Egyptian, Roman, Greek, modern), taxidermy animals and a maserati. Walking into that enormous space filled with treasures must have been how people felt when they first wandered into the Great Exhibition in 1851. It was a fantastic day out and I couldn’t fault it.

Visit http://www.masterpiecefair.com/ for more information on the fair.

A Very Happy Chicken

What has Waldemar Januszczak gone and done this time? Nothing, apparently. Yesterday’s Sunday Times Culture supplement extended an olive branch to Tate Britain, not from the beak of a pristine white dove but from the beak of a chicken, as Januszczak reviewed the new folk art exhibition at Millbank.

The Sunday Times Culture. 15/06/14. Pages 18 & 19.

I have seen this exhibition advertised on the tube but I haven’t visited it yet. I know very little about folk art but it did not strike me as an exhibition that Januszczak would find awe-inspiring. Januszczak, during his Curtis witch-hunt in April stated that the ‘Tate Britain’s obvious problem is that it no longer connects with its audience’ and to be honest I am not sure that this exhibition strikes mass appeal; it is a niche genre.

Januszczak, on the other hand, loved it. Dredging the kindest adjectives from the lake of his mind he writes a coherent and uplifting review of an exhibition which ‘takes us on a notably airy journey through the Sherwood Forest of native creativity.’ He notes that ‘times change, and so do aesthetic dynamics’, perhaps suggesting an acceptance of the direction of Tate Britain under Penelope Curtis. This exhibition is ‘lovely’, ‘carefully colour-coded’, ‘inventiveness, a belief in effortless skill’ and ‘Judging by this delightful and beautifully presented tribute, it is, essentially, a happy language driven by important communal understandings.’

Confused by such a heart-wrenching review, it is like reading about a child experiencing its first memorable Christmas. I am pleased that Januszczak has kissed and made up with Tate Britain but I think I need someone to throw a glass of fresh water in my face to really believe it.

Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2014

Having handed in my MA dissertation the day before, in a blur of confusion and angst, a formatting crisis and a 2.30am printing session, my mother and I set off for the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition on Friday (mildly hungover from dissertation celebrations).

Stolen Thunder II by Cornelia Parker

For anyone in yearly attendance of the Summer Exhibition, you will agree that one needs a couple of days to process the vast display and sheer volume of work hung floor to ceiling. A million different themes and subjects, mediums and colours, this exhibition is not for the faint-hearted. You can do little to prepare yourself for this overwhelming but incredible collection.

This year felt far more cheerful and witty than previous years with work such as Stolen Thunder II by Cornelia Parker, a play on last year’s Stolen Thunder I, which was a play on the red sales dots showing the popularity of an original print.

Work No. 398: ‘Assholes’ by Martin Creed

Work No. 398: ‘Assholes’ by Martin Creed in the Lecture Room was another jovial piece. I researched Creed’s Work No. 227: The Lights Going On and Off for a lecture Penelope Curtis is delivering next year at the National Gallery and I didn’t really understand the significance of such a simple piece. It is not until Creed talks about his work in interviews that realisation hits. Art has the potential to fill a space, to be all-consuming, you can be locked in a room with it and unable to escape it, it is power. Creed does not only work with visual art but also works with music. In an interview by Mikel Toms, Creed explains that music is an interesting medium for art as you are able to watch it being produced; it takes you on a journey as the symphony unravels. Painting however, only allows you to see the finished product; in many ways the process is irrelevant. The Lights Going On and Off was a visual piece of art, it was making sculpture like a piece of music. It filled a room and provided a journey through a changing space, like music filling a car from a stereo.

Assholes is nothing like The Lights Going On and Off, it is simply ‘assholes’ spelt out in white neon lights, placed centrally on a white-washed wall, unassuming and happily offensive. However, around every letter is a sort of aura, it is its own energy. For some reason this piece would not work in another colour. The light is pure and fantastical, phonetically spelling ‘arseholes’ to give the reader the same northern dialect as the artist himself. Light, like music, fills a room. If this room was dark it would be the only artwork that could be seen and it would reflect off of the entire space in varying degrees. This art is another of Creed’s all-consuming, inescapable pieces providing a journey no matter how crude.

Tom Philips’ After Henry James.

Cake Man (II) by Yinka Shonibare

Other pieces included Cake Man (II) by Yinka Shonibare, a wonder in textile as well as contemporary sculpture. This piece is in every child’s imagination, there is something magical about it. It is the precarious balance of colour and height. Everyone wants to be the hero by catching the cake at the top of the pile which is mid fall. It was good to see an overlap of literature and art with a quote from Henry James’ The Middle Years in Tom Philips’ After Henry James.

Finally, Joe Tilson exhibited several similar pieces on Venice, although they were not curated together but separated to different rooms. Stones of Venice San Nicolo Dei Mendicoli Venusia depicts a small twelfth-century church in the centre dedicated to St Nicholas, originally used for worship by poor fishermen. The church is surrounded by a coloured tile effect. It brings the classical Venice, in the form of early architecture, in conjunction with the modern tourist, surrounded by colourful stalls displaying jewellery and clothes. The different orientation of the tiles on this piece remind me of the cramped shops of Venice down tiny streets, the never ending crowds of people brushing past you and the colours made in the water by the surrounding buildings.

Stones of Venice San Nicolo Dei Mendicoli Venusia by Joe Tilson

If you have the stamina and the concentration, the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition is a fantastic exhibition of contemporary art. You may even pick up a piece to take home as prices vary between £40 and over £600,000.

Penelope Curtis: Matriarchy in the U.K

‘Phyllida Barlow is 70. I mention it immediately because it is the most impressive thing about her.’

Although commencing his article with this rather damning statement, Waldemar Januszczak does try to give Barlow’s most recent exhibition at the Tate Britain some merit for being able to successfully fill the gigantic Duveen Galleries with her installation Dock. This merit of course does not last long, ending a brief review of the art world’s ‘taste for older women’ with a comparison of Dock to a ‘humongous episode of Blue Peter…some old loo rolls and a box of toothpicks borrowed from a giant’. This comparison is hauntingly reminiscent of an article by Januszczak last year in which he criticised Fischli and Weiss’s Rock on Top of Another Rock over a substantial spread, challenging visitors to ‘hurry along to the Serpentine if you want to see a carrot balancing on a Coke bottle and witness the collapse in artistic values.’ Rock on Top of Another Rock has remained a permanent feature of the Serpentine Gallery and, although perhaps not to everyone’s taste, it does portray natural beauty at its most primitive. It is harmless in that it is natural, it is not made from non-biodegradable plastic, it does not dominate the surrounding park, and it is not painted bright orange.

Rock on Top of Another Rock by Fischli and Weiss. Taken from http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2013/3/8/1362742543724/764ac9ea-eb49-4370-bd5d-36dd2e841204-620x372.jpeg

Having complimented Barlow with the back of his hand and a light slap in the face, Januszczak then seamlessly progresses to criticise the woman responsible for the Tate Britain since 2010, Penelope Curtis. I met Penelope Curtis for the first time last week for a business meeting in which she appeared highly organised, passionate about the Tate, pleased with the work I had done and was interested in my professional opinion, regardless of her obvious seniority. As Januszczak’s previous employer, the Guardian, has coherently put it, he has ‘called for her head’ describing her as a ‘disaster’ who ‘has to go.’ However, Januszczak’s argument seems rather unsubstantiated, claiming that the public have lost interest in the collection at the Tate Britain leading to a 10% loss in visitor numbers last year. This decrease in visitors is hardly surprising when over a quarter of the gallery was closed until November 2013, due to its huge £45million refurbishment. Other than this figure, Januszczak supports his argument only with his opinion that recent exhibitions at the Tate have been below par and that he hasn’t liked Curtis’ exhibitions in the past.

Whether or not you agree with Januszczak’s statement that Curtis has been a disaster, I think it has to be taken into consideration that she is a woman at the top of her game. No, not the sexism card I hear you cry! I am not implying that Januszczak’s attack has been misogynistic; in fact it would be misogynistic not to challenge an art director because she is female. However, with so many of the top London art galleries directed by men shouldn’t we be encouraging a woman who has reached the top of her field? The Royal Academy is directed by Chris le Brun, the Tate Modern by Chris Dercon, National Portrait Gallery by Sandy Nairne, the National Gallery by Nicholas Penny and the Hayward is directed by Ralph Rugoff, to name a few.

As one of hundreds of female graduates in History of Art I find it disheartening that so many of the top jobs in the art world are still dominated by men. I am aware that things are changing with women like Iwona Blazwick, Director of the Whitechapel Gallery, slowly changing the system. However, female graduates need to see successful women in order to aspire to be the best in their field. How can they possibly do this when the most successful female art director in the UK is being forcefully encouraged to step down over what is essentially a difference of opinion?  Janusszczak’s article is not the first to criticise Penelope Curtis with Zoe Pilger at the Independent covering the reopening of the Tate last November. Titling her article ‘Matriarch of the Museum’ she then bluntly states that ‘Curtis is single and has no children. She lives in Shepherd's Bush.’ Maybe this is just public interest but would a writer describe a man as single (possibly) but childless? Probably not.

Sources:

http://www.waldemar.tv/2014/04/tate-britain-is-in-a-right-old-mess/

http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/apr/11/tate-britain-boss-attacked-over-gallerys-direction

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/penelope-curtis-matriarch-of-the-museum-8933484.html