ART NEWS: Dec.03

At the heart of Nida Sinnokrot’s exhibition “Horizontal Cinema” we find the interactive 16mm film installation “When Her Eyes Lifted” (2016). It is part of the cinematographic apparatus body of work developed by Sinnokrot, for which the artist coined the term Horizontal Cinema. The installation comprises three modified projectors turned on their side and arranged on a wooden box so as to form a kind of semicircle. This wooden box and the accompanying motor system built from analog and digital components are in turn placed on a carpet in the center of the room. The three-meter-long film reel that runs through all three projectors is thus shown in a horizontal position instead of the usual vertical orientation. This is further emphasized by the visible perforations at the projection’s upper and lower edges. Since the projectors don’t have shutters, each individual frame is frozen within its respective borders—as in Muybridge’s early motion studies, movement emerges in the cumulative progression of individual frames. Info: Carlier | Gebauer, Gallery, Markgrafenstraße 67, Berlin, Germany, Duration: 26/11/2022-21/1/2023, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 11:00-18:00, www.carliergebauer.com

The exhibition “Data Relations” brings together artist-led projects that lyrically wrestle with some of the key issues and challenges of our contemporary data-driven society. The exhibition includes major new commissions and site-specific installations by Australian and international artists and collectives who critically and speculatively engage with the ways in which the data economy and related technological developments manifest in interpersonal and wider social relationships. The exhibition title is drawn from a text by Ulises Ali Mejias and Nick Couldry in which the authors outline “the new types of human relations that data as a potential commodity enables,” which they surmise will, in time, “become as naturalised as labour relations.” Beyond the technological mirage of abstraction, false neutrality and obfuscation, and of more data as the answer to the mysteries of predicting the future, are human-led decisions, with all their attendant hierarchies, biases and existing relations. Info:  Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA), 111 Sturt Street, Southbank, Melbourne, Australia, Duration: 10/12/2022-19/3/2023, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 10:00-17:00, Sat-sun 11:00-17:00, https://acca.melbourne/

Gözde İlkin, presents his solo exhibition “The Eye of the Earth, the Mouth of the Ground”. İlkin stitches, paints and draws on found domestic fabrics – carriers of human culture and heritage – repurposing them as her canvases. Her most recent body of work looks at traces left by the elements – wind, rain, sun – on natural landscapes, approaching rocks as memory objects that encapsulate a specific era. Paralleling how the found domestic fabrics on which she stitches and paints preserve elements of human culture and history, these stones act as a repository where earth’s memory can be processed. Through incorporating figurative and animal motifs that draw on shamanic practices and mythical narratives, Ilkin’s visual language erodes the distinction between human and non-human, giving way to a representation of multiple pasts in which the natural and the man-made are entwined. Info: Gypsum Gallery, 3 Road 218, Maadi Degla, Ground Floor, Apt. 2, Maadi, Cairo, Egypt, Duration: 12/12/2022-25/1/2023. Days & Hours: Mon-Wed & Sat-Sun 12:00-20:00, http://gypsumgallery.com/

Beneath the chaos there lies a quietude. Faint voices drowned out by the oversaturated fabric of modern life. In “The Loudest Silence” Ziping Wang draws out these voices. Pairing her distinctive maximalist aesthetic with enigmatic depictions of everyday objects and natural forms, she peels away sections of densely packed canvas to allow us brief moments with an unlikely stillness. Wang creates vibrant, brimming reflections of the contemporary tech-scape by extracting universal symbols from classical art, product packaging and internet forums. Cartoon cows and pixelated chicken drumsticks float suspended alongside the figures of Japanese scroll paintings slipping mysteriously behind folding blinds. Grids reminiscent of editing software streak across the canvas. Wang’s works overflow with universal symbolism and trans-cultural markers, cultivating a distinct visual language that immediately captures the viewer’s attention. Inspired by secret codes and online slang, she conceals and modifies these collective symbols. The result is a complex and evocative cryptology that communicates the distinctly contemporary feeling of information overload. Info: Peres Projects, The Shilla Seoul, B1, 249 Dongho-ro, Jung-gu, Seoul, South Korea, Duration: 15/12/2022-10/2/2023, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 10:00-19:00, Sat-Sun 11:00-19:00, https://peresprojects.com

Ivan Seal creates eerie and uncanny still-life paintings that visualize realistic depictions of found objects. He blurs the lines between reality and fiction by illustrating abstract and distorted forms that derive from his imagination. In the exhibition “I wake up fresh and rested most mornings”, his massive, bulky, crystalline forms are brought to life by scraping and squishing fluid oil paint with knives and self-made scrapers. These circular forms are positioned within a background made of shifting colour tones to create the illusion of crystals, eyes, and portals. The enormous forms later transform into points of entry or exit that act as gateways between two universes. The paintings look outward and inward, observing what is in front of them while also being the object in view. Seal was inspired by this duality and presents a selection of earlier pieces along with new ones. A.I. word generators were utilized to create the titles for the artworks, drawing inspiration from pharmaceutical terminology.Warriors, monsters, and spiritual beings prowl or guard in the spaces between the crystals while standing still, unable to move due to the impasto technique that floods their bodies. These creatures were inspired by characters from the role-playing game Dungeons and Dragons. Tiny models, which are intricately painted, are utilized as visual representations of the roles that each player has during the game. Info: Allouche Benias Gallery, Kanari 11, Athens, Greece, Duration: 17/12/2022-17/1/2023, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri 11:00-19:00, Sat 11:00-17:00, https://allouchebenias.com/

Once a year, the Salzburger Kunstverein dedicates an exhibition to its members and offers them the opportunity to exhibit their works. In 2022, the Annual Exhibition is held in the Great Hall of the Salzburger Kunstverein as well as the Museumspavillon (Salzburg City Art Gallery). The Annual Exhibition “Was fehlt” [What Is Missing] takes the curatorial concept as distributed to the invited artist members and transforms this into a question about voids—whether political, social, spatial or in the imagination. If we examine the artistic contributions to the exhibition, we find means of dealing with abandoned buildings and things, with memories, longing and other unexpected life plans, as well as with topics of mutual support, environmental awareness and the endurance of indeterminacy. Since many of the suggestions do not fit into an either-or, the exhibition becomes less an answer to the initial question than a stimulus to further thinking. Info: Salzburger Kunstverein, Hellbrunner Straße 3, Salzburg, Austria, Duration: 17/12/2022-5/2/2023, Days & Hours: Tue-Sun 12:00-19:00, https://www.salzburger-kunstverein.at/ & Museumspavillon (Salzburg City Art Gallery), Bernhard-Paumgartner-Weg 5020, Salzburg, Austria, Duration: 17/12/2022-5/2/2023, Days & Hours: Mon-Fri 14:00-18:00, Sat-Sun 11:00-15:00, www.salzburger-kunstverein.at/

The exhibition “Escher – Other World” allow visitors to experience the work of Escher as never before. His famous prints, featuring optical illusions, impossible architecture, reflections and the natural world will be combined with spectacular installations by Belgian artistic duo Gijs Van Vaerenbergh. The exhibition is divided into two sections representing day and night, a contrast that fascinated Escher. The first part of the show, “DAY”, arranged by theme, will be displayed in the large, daylit galleries, where the work of Escher and the spatial installations of Gijs Van Vaerenbergh will challenge and enhance each other. The second part, NIGHT, will showcase a number of authentic themes in ther side galleries. This unique interaction sheds new light on Maurits Cornelis Escher who, 125 years after his birth, continues to inspire people the world over. Info: Kunstmuseum Den Haag, Stadhouderslaan 41, Den Haag, The Netherlands, Duration: 18/2-10/9/2023, Days & Hours: Tue-sun 10:00-17:00, www.kunstmuseum.nl/