Sidsel Christensen
20th March – 13th April ArtEco Gallery 533 Old York Road London SW18 1TG www.artecogallery.com/
From ancient history through the classical era and beyond, mankind has long been mesmerised by the four elements of Earth, Water, Air and Fire. From Babylonia to Greece, the concept of the four elements has come to symbolise everything from different facets of the cosmos to alchemical experiments and even personalities and zodiac signs. ArtEco Gallery, London, is to announce its group exhibition ‘Elements’, exploring these four facets through the works of Mat Chivers, Sidsel Christensen, Hyojun Hyun, Kyounghee Noh and Lise Wulff. Part of an annual themed exhibition, ‘Elements’ comes as a prelude to Earth Day (22 April). “I wanted to explore different perspectives of nature,” explains the gallery’s Kristin Hjellegjerde.
For Chivers, a childhood hobby of breeding tropical moths in a small shed at the bottom of his garden sparked the use of moths as a form of leitmotif in his artistic practice. In ‘Elements’ he presents three drawings that form part of a new series of work combining intuitive mark-making with pure geometry. Featuring the Oleander Hawk Moth, Eyed Hawk Moth and Indian Moon Moth respectively, the insects are presented within a geometric field, created in colours that constitute light – Chivers uses yellows, reds and blues in hand-ground Japanese Sumi ink. By combining symmetry and asymmetry, Chivers purposely creates an air of ambiguity, and the moths represent a potent allusion to the metamorphic process, which in itself harks to the alchemical properties of the four elements.
Meanwhile, Christensen presents the video work Study for Composition IX, an exploration of the purity of nature and what it can give us. Part of a series of video studies the artist has conducted since 2009, the work looks at abstraction from the Modernist tradition, examining how the lens-based medium constantly resists ideas of formal purity, remaining instead a direct representation of an exterior reality. “On one level the work expresses an interest in how to articulate a removed, abstracted sense of space, as a psychological location,” explains the artist. “On the other hand, it seems that the possibility of maintaining an abstracted, idealised space is constantly punctured through the history and social reality in the mind of the artist.” In this artwork, Christensen explores how a body can be positioned within landscape portraiture, juxtaposing the body, sea, mountains and sky to create shapes and textures in free interplay.
Presenting oil on panel works, Korean Hyun’s works focus on an attempt to capture fleeting moments of the uncanny as he experiences them during daily life and his travels. It is the capturing of these moments, as they change from the familiar to something different or special, which captivates the artist. Works in the series The Forest in Glasgow’s Park have been inspired by the changeable weather of the Scottish city, allowing Hyun “to perceive various appearances of the same place – intervals of sunshine during the many cloudy days in this city allow me to experience stronger sensations of light and colour, in ways different from Seoul.” With their deep green, mossy colour, the works maintain an earthy feel, while exploring the influence of outside factors.
For Noh, it is a mixture of unfixed fragments of ideas, images and feelings that have combined to create her evocative paintings – at once hyper-detailed and roughly unfinished. Careful brushstrokes create hauntingly beautiful images, yet are framed by rough slashes of paint, leaving empty white space as if the canvas were partially left unfinished. Previous works encompass several landscapes, and her detailed, labour-intensive depictions of forests, clouds and the sea draw the viewer’s attention, not to the detail of the works and the intricate pencil lines, but rather, to a reflective stillness. “Over the past two years my interest has shifted to the notion of space and what it means to produce paintings,” she explains. “ I enjoy playing with the notion of painting as well as space – the fact that a work is only a piece of painted fabric, rather than attempting to seduce the viewer to read the piece as another reality. To be honest, it is an on-going conversation between myself as an artist and the act of painting.”
Last but not least, the works of Wulff are influenced by nature and natural materials. “When I paint, organic shapes are strongly present,” explains the artist, whose works focus what the land, and thereby, nature, have to give us. A nest-like mound of twig-like pieces emits music by Norwegian composer Mathias Eick, while, nearby, shapes made of entwined metal wire form shadow pictures that flow into one another with the fluidity of water, depending on the light of day, complemented by ‘woven stones’, similar in construct yet made of yarn instead of wire. The dichotomy of these different hard and soft materials offset each other, revealing, like the petals of a flower, different natures and levels to each piece.
“This exhibition reflects on the beauty that we still have a chance to embrace and to care for – whether through the land art of Lise Wulff or the video installations of Sidsel Christensen,” continues Hjellegjerde. “In the works of Mat Chivers one is shown how something simple, like a moth, can become beautiful, while Hyojun Hyun’s fresh, green nature has been disturbed, mirroring our own relentless need to find that ‘untouched’ retreat – the ever-tantalising virginal nature so hard to find in today’s fast-paced industrial world.”
About the Artists
Matt Chivers
Born in Bristol, UK, Mat Chivers studied at Nottingham Trent University, where he received his BA(Hons) in Fine Art, Sculpture, in 1996. He is also an ERASMUS of the Escuela des Belles Artes in Barcelona, Spain. Chivers has exhibited extensively over the last decade in both group and solo exhibitions, including Sculpture & Drawings at The Thelma Hulbert Gallery, Honiton (2012), Fascination, curated by James Putnam at Maddox Arts, London and States of Flux at the Bridport Arts Centre (both 2011). The recipient of the Devon Arts Culture Award, Arts Council England Grant and ECO 2009 PROOF/New Art Examiner Editorial Award, among others, his work can be found in public and private collections including The Fitzwilliam Museum, Bristol City Council, The Met Office, Soho House Group and Dartmoor National Park. For more information, visit www.matchivers.com
Sidsel Christensen
Sidsel Christensen is a London-based artist engaged in moving image, live-events and performance-based lectures. She maintains an ongoing working relationship in Norway, where she was brought up, as well as a BA from Goldsmiths and MA from the Royal College of Art respectively. This year Christensen was featured in Modern Painters as one of ‘100 Artists to Watch’. Exhibiting nationally as well as abroad, London shows from 2009/13 include partaking in The Object Of The Attack at the David Roberts Art Foundation, showing work at The South London Cultural Centre, Vilma Gold, ICA and The Royal Academy. Christensen has shown a more substantial body of work at KINO KINO, Centre for Contemporary Art in Norway, and is setting up a new central body of work for the show at Oval Art Space, London this year. She was awarded the The Open Art Prize 2011 in London, and is also preparing a London solo show with Open Gallery for 2013, with new work on the back of this. For more information, visit www.sidselchristensen.com
Hyojun Hyun
Hyojun Hyun was born in Mungyeong, South Korea in 1983. He received a BFA in painting in 2009 from the Hong-Ik University, Seoul. He is currently working in Glasgow, UK where he received his Master of Fine Arts from the Glasgow School of Art in 2012. Shortlisted for the Saatchi Gallery and channel 4’s New Sensations, The Marmite Prize for Painting and the Griffin Art Prize, 2012 exhibitions include New British at Muse Gallery, London, New Sensations at Victoria House, London and Chalet Prize 2012 at The Chalet Studio, Glasgow and Don’t Leave Me This Way at Kunstquartier Bethanien, Berlin. Other exhibitions include No White After Labour Day, GSA, Glasgow (2011), Between the Acts, KEPCO Art Center Gallery, Seoul and Scope, Hong-lk Museum of Modern Art, Seoul. For more information, visit www.hyojunhyun.com
Kyounghee Noh
Born in 1982 in Seoul, Korea, Kyounghee Noh studied at the Slade School of Fine Arts, London, where she received her MFA in 2012. Previously, she completed her BFA at the College of Fine Arts at Seoul National University, graduating in 2005. Recipient of the 2012 Monnington Prize at the Slade School of Fine Art, recent exhibitions include Rising Stars at Coombe Gallery, Dartmouth, Jerwood Drawing Prize at the Jerwood Space, London (both 2012) and Between the Acts at Kepco Plaza Gallery, Seoul. For more information visit www.kyounghee-noh.com
Lise Wulff
Born in Oslo, Norway, in 1970, Lise Wulff firmly set out for a completely different profession than the artistic one. She studied economics and business administration, and worked as a consultant for the Boston Consulting Group, and later the PA Consulting Group. After some years, she realized that she had ended up in the wrong place. She returned to school, studied art for three years at Det Tverrfaglige Kunstinstitutt, and graduated in 2004. Wulff explores a range of various techniques and materials. Organic shapes and natural materials are recurring characteristics. Further, she is involved in several art projects related to dignity and to the environment, most notably she is the founder of the environmental art project The Scream from Nature, which aims to raise consciousness about the relationship between humans and nature, see thescreamfromnature.com. Wulff is a supporting artist of the UN-led initiative Safe Planet, see safepla.net. Lise Wulff is a member of the professional organisation for visual artists in Norway, NBK, and the leader of BKiB, the organization for professional artist in Bærum. Recent exhibitions include Lost Garden at the Henie Onstad Art Centre, Norway; Ahojat the Museum Kampa, Czech Republic: and Beneath at Galerie Califia, Horazdovice, Czech Republic (all 2012). For more information, visit www.lisewulff.com
