“The Allegory of the Cave”
Art Container, Tallinn, Estonia. August 27, through September 19, 2010.
Preview August 26, 18.30-11.30 with a performance by Linda Persson and dancer, Laura Kvelstein at 7.30pm.
Organised by Natasha Rees.
Noah Angell
Dean Brannagan
Simona Brinkmann
Charlesworth, Lewandowski and Mann
Chris Grieves & Richard Battersby
George Henry Longly
Ben White and Eileen Simpson (Open Music Archive)
Linda Persson
Natasha Rees
Jani Ruscica
Ian Vail
Alys Williams
Josephine Wood
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The Allegory of the Cave brings together the work of sixteen artists based in the UK and Finland, whose practices utilise light,
sound, performance and moving image. The title of the exhibition is taken from a parable in Plato’s famous text, The Republic. The
story documents a fictional conversation between Socrates and Glaucon discussing prisoners who have been chained up in a cave
all of their lives, witnessing shadows of things and themselves created from a fire, which burns behind them. They understand
these shadows as a singular truth. Within this story, Plato outlines the idea of reality and how it has a two-fold implication – actual,
solid, Form and mimicry of form, in this case, the shadows. Without ‘Form’ or Ideas, Plato suggests, the prisoners’ reality can
never be complete or resolute.
A trace of these ideas withstands in contemporaneous art practices, as a widening discourse about form and conceptual apparatuses
are recurrently debated. This exhibition aims to bring a perspective on things in flux and of the subtle alterations of time and space
through the use of ephemeral media. Adjacently, the idea of things that form and reform, alter and shift, affects not only the
navigation through space but also the gauge of its hosting architecture. Within Art Container’s disused polymer factory-cum-
gallery, the works create a duality between fluid and less distinct notions of structure, which at once become simultaneously
unstable and stable - through their formal suggestiveness. The exhibition plays with the notion of structure as an entry point to
understanding the structure of ideas and how their formal qualities affect perceptions of what’s being looked at and how this may
affect affiliations to meaning.
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Noah Angell's slow airs is a prison film composed from Frederick Wiseman's Titticut Follies and From the Land of Light, a privately
issued UK spiritualist recording. In it, life on earth, in the general sense, is viewed as a poorly run prison for the criminally insane.
Dean Brannagan’s video Malaise, scans a build up of detritus at ground level. The angle of the projection has been altered by 180
degrees, to disrupt the view of this detail. Simona Brinkmann and Dean Brannagan will present a collaborative sound installation
entitled Duel, a multi-channel piece in which sound effects of gun shots are 'fired' across the room in different directions from and
between two sets of stereo speakers. Duel is a re-working of an earlier site-specific, single-channel installation (Gunslinger, 2009) in
which the artists used the sound system of a church to play intermittent sounds of gun shots, progressively slowed down to resemble a
rumble of thunder. For The Allegory of The Cave, Duel will seek to activate the exhibition space as a site of potential conflict, riddled
with invisible tensions and divisions.
portable audio cassette player that pulsates recordings throughout the fabric of the building. The soundtracks it plays are chopped and
mixed collages of news reportage and genuine recordings of three separate incidences of TV broadcast signal intrusion in Britain and the
United States. These incidences are framed by and weaved into stories of newsworthy world events that occurred in the exact month of
their broadcast, from Chernobyl to the Kings Cross fires, the audio tracks present an uncomfortable dystopic view of a remixed past.
As a promo for their pre-Autumn 2010 Collection, Richard Battersby and Chris Grieves' video Zummer is set in a foam universe,
tended by benevolent lilo-riding dragons. Endless guava streams flow beneath the never-setting purple sun as dinner is served at The
Pleasure School, a feast of beetroot and blueberry canapés washed down by Fizzy Zummer Splash.
George Henry Longly has sent a collection of coloured light bulbs with instructions to install at various points throughout the gallery;
offices; reception areas; rest rooms and the exhibition spaces themselves. Longly is interested in how the coloured bulbs will create
locations throughout the building and act as a 'filter for a different way of looking; how experiencing the environment bathed in different
colours imbues the event of looking with a particular sentiment, whatever that may be'. Both front of house areas and the gallery spaces
are addressed as a way of shifting the critical analysis associated with looking at art, beyond the parameters of the gallery walls and into
the public realm. Eileen Simpson and Ben White (Open Music Archive) promote collaboration and seek to explore its significance
and value for creative production. For Declose (a 12” vinyl record, played here) they invited producers and members of the Burnt
Progress community (London UK) to create new remix tracks, short vocal snippets, percussive noises, samples, breaks and beats - made
entirely from the out-of-copyright music in the Open Music Archive. The project adopts the form and structure of the battle record to
build open vinyl code – which, like Free/Libre and Open Source software, is distributed freely. Linda Persson presents two works for
the exhibition; 'The unpredictable interstices of process' is a collaborative performance with Estonian choreographer/dancer Laura
Kvelstein, using repetition, anagrams and sounds. This investigation will explore the capacity for opening up space (in it's broadest sense)
for experimentation. In addition to this, Persson installs a kinetic light sculpture that incorporates a CCTV camera and monitor, entitled,
‘Myriad of alterations’. Natasha Rees’s video, ‘From gardens where we feel secure.’ uses found, S8mm footage of American troops in
Vietnam in 1967, and an appropriated Chant du Travail performed by unknown French, Guinean workers. The video is a slow reveal
from a series of colourful, blurred sequences. Jani Ruscica will screen Evolutions, a digitally transferred S16mm film that he made in
2008: “According to Cicero, evolution signifies the unfolding of a scroll. Evolutions unfolds the worldviews of youths, structures of
filmmaking as well as the thin line between fact and fiction. Topical at a time when reality is often merely packaged fiction. The piece
has been realized communally. The seven episodes in the film, the seven stories about worldviews and the birth of the universe, have
been created together with youths from 12 to 19 years old who share a passion for theatre. The stage for each episode and story is set up
in a film studio. Minimalist sets, artificial lighting and authentic sounds morph the studio, a ”blank canvas”, into a temporary surface of
projection for each protagonist’s worldview. The episodes are variations on the same theme… The minimal sets and objects used in the
film carry multiple meanings and references. This creates a friction between the real and its representation, between fact and fiction.” -
excerpt from a text written by writer and curator, Marita Muukkonen.
Ian Vail’s Wave (I turned(you looked)) is a 2-monitor video work. ‘The sea and it’s motion is the archetypal image of time. ‘Wave’
generates an effect that slows down the sea progressively across the frame. Through this effect, the structure of video reveals itself and
points towards the structure of looking and its resultant forms of representation. It is this structure that is key to the work with the open,
continuous roll of waves working with and against the closed video loop.’
Alys William’s Flat Packed 62 is a sculptural re-imagining, re-forming and re-presentation of the site-specific Installation Flat 62
(2010). Using the journey as central to the premise of the new piece, questions on the act of re-location are raised and a new mobile
architecture of the original site is constructed on new ground. Flat 62 was a site-specific installation created in the Tamworth building for
the Market Estate Project in March 2010, which was later demolished. Williams stripped back areas of the abandoned flat to plaster,
Charlesworth, Lewandowski and Mann’s sound piece is an improvised device attached to a
wood-chip and cement, whilst preserving other fragments of the domestic interior. The contrast between the stark cave-like structure of
the building and the fragmented areas, which conserve their domestic make-up, were explored throughout the site. Using sound, video,
objects and text to bring these highlighted sections of the site to life, the viewer was offered moments from its inhabited past. Using
boxes and items of luggage, Williams re-constructs Flat 62 and makes it transportable. The rooms, videos, sounds and objects that made
up the installation on-site are now presented in miniature, packed up and in storage within the luggage. Some boxes are left ajar, others
contain holes for the viewer to look into and others allow content to spill out as sound or projected image. The piece reflects on our
relationship with domestic space and explores this bond's influence on memory, biography and translocation.
Josephine Wood’s No Rest for the Wicked is a performance for video that, like much of Wood’s practice represents a shifting surface of
connections, a charismatic and semi-autobiography played out in video performance. Wood is pre-occupied with national identity and
social decline in Britain and her relationship to both.
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Artist biographies:
Noah Angell lives and works in London. He has recently shown work at 2010.8 organised by Chris Hammond, MOT International,
London; A Tergo organised by NIS, Limoncello, London; About Now organised by Veronika Spierenburg, Message Salon downtown,
Zurich; Noah Angell Rana Hassanieh organised by Sam Basu, Treignac Project, France; I haven't seen the place I've looked at organised
by Deborah Farnault & Emanuella Giora at the Syndicat Potentiel in Strasbourg, France; SITU organised by Carl Slater at Holy Trinity
Church, Lincolnshire, England; Dramaturgy of the Subject organised by Zeigam Azizov at Open Space, Vienna; Schizmo organised by
Emma Holmes at 10 Vyner Street, London and a solo Screening/Lecture organised by Anette Overgaard Nielson at Rum 46 at Aarhus,
Denmark.
Dean Brannagan lives and works in London, UK . Recent shows include Mass Observation X-Ray at the Perseverence, London,
(2010), 60 Years Of British Art, Hayward Gallery London, (2007) and There Is Always An Alternative, TemporaryContemporary,
London (2005). Working mainly with Performance, Video, and Sound, Brannagan’s practice also includes sculpture, drawing and
painting. He studied at Newcastle Polytechnic and The Jan Van Eyck Academy in Maastricht, Netherlands.
Simona Brinkmann lives and works in London. She has exhibited both in the UK and internationally, including at: MOT International,
London; Netwerk Centrum Voor Hedendaagse Kunst, Aalst, Belgium and Marc dePuechredon, Basel. Recent shows have included
((audience)) festival of surround sound art, New York, Albany, Syracuse (2009/2010); Murmurart: An Introduction at 20 Hoxton Suqare,
London (2010); Supermarket Art Fair - [the] Evidence booth, Kulturhuset, Stockholm (2010); Dub Shop at Kleio Projects, New York
(2010); SITU, organised by Carl Slater at Holy Trinity Church, Tattershal; The Aesthetics of Anxiety (2007), Look! Look! Look! (2008)
and The Gallery and The Store (2009) at Marc dePuechredon and Volta5, Basel; Contested Ground at 176 Gallery/Zabludowicz
Collection, London (2009) and a solo presentation at Art Athina, Marc de Puechredon booth (2008). She was awarded the Clifford
Chance Sculpture Award in 2007.
Charlesworth, Lewandowski and Mann are based in London. Recent exhibitions include: Take Hope, Take Courage Gallery, London;
drink up, have fun, don't suffer, there is no death, don't feel guilty, god loves you no matter what you do, you are the perfect holy child of
god, case fucking closed, The Sassoon Gallery, London; The Marquise Went Out at Five O'Clock - Edel Assanti – London; Stardust
Boogie Woogie, Monika Bobinska Gallery, London; Shards of Utopia, Late at Tate Event, Tate Britain, London and SUPERMARKET Art
Fair (X-Ray Stall) - Kulturhuset – Stockholm.
Richard Battersby and Chris Grieves both live and work in London. Recent screenings and shows include: X-Ray and [the] Evidence
at Supermarket, Stockholm; Contested Ground At 176 Project Space, London; The Coma Lounge Edinburgh, The Collective Gallery
Edinburgh; The Coma Lounge Knightsbridge, Artprojx Space, London; New Dome Summer Exhibition, London; Annual Members’
Exhibition Studio Voltaire, selected by Michael Bracewell and Linder; Marriage is Punishment For Shoplifting, Scarborough; and Land
of Nod, 27B, London.
George Henry Longly lives and work in London. Recent solo shows include CHIP FOAM Galerie Chez Valentin, Paris, Non-building
Structure, Luettgenmeijer, Berlin and the touring exhibition Mass Damper.
Ben White and Eileen Simpson (Open Music Archive) work at the intersection of art, music and information networks. They seek to
challenge conventional mechanisms for the authorship, ownership and distribution of culture – particularly through working with archive
material. Recent projects: Free-to-air at Cornerhouse Manchester (2007) and ICA London (2008) and Ghost Trace Stellar (2009) centred
around the invitation for bands, musicians and producers to perform and record cover versions of the material from the Open Music
Archive. The new performances reanimated the long forgotten songs and were recorded under copyleft licences – ensuring the new
material is freely available and all subsequent modifications are made available under the same terms. For Clips, Blips & Loops (2007),
out-of-copyright music was recorded from a public collection of music boxes in Stockholm, and members of the Swedish electronic
music collective Fylkingen were invited to rework the recordings.
Linda Persson is a Swedish artist based mainly in London. She has exhibited nationally and internationally e.g. 2010, Studio 44,
Stockholm, Sweden (artist & curator), 2010 Woodmill Projects, London, 2009 Collective Gallery, Edinburgh, 2009 The Drawing Room,
London, 2009 Arlington Arts Centre, Newbury, U.K, 2008/09 Utsikten Kunstsenter, Kvinesdal, Norway, 2008 The Wharf Road Project,
London, 2007 AK28, Stockholm, Sweden (SOLO SHOW). Forthcoming shows: 2010 Örebro Länsmuseum, Sweden
2010 Galleri 54, Gothenburg, Sweden; 2011 Solo exhibition at AIRSPACE, Stoke-on-Trent, U.K. She is also the founder of X-ray at the
Perseverance. Screening and performance opportunities for artists, on a monthly basis at a local pub in Hackney, London.
Natasha Rees is an artist and writer based in London, UK. Rees has exhibited at: Studio Voltaire, London (2008); with V22 Projects for
The Wharf Road Project (2008), London; Dicksmith Gallery, London (2008); Studio 44, Stockholm, Sweden (2010), Woodmill Projects,
London (2010); RBR Contemporary Art, Tokyo (2010). Rees also founded and edits [the] Evidence, a thematically organised journal that
invites artists, writers and thinkers to contribute according to their personal and professional interests. The publication will host a special
event at Café Oto, London in September 2010.
Jani Ruscica (b.1978) is an artist working with film, video, photography and other media. His recent exhibitions include 5th Momentum
Biennial, Moss, Norway 2009, Tracking traces KIASMA Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, 2009, Life Forms, Bonniers Konsthall,
Stockholm, 2009, as well as screenings in institutions such as Centre Pompidou, Paris, TATE Modern, London and MoMA, New York.
Ruscica is based in Helsinki and was educated at Chelsea College of Art and Design in London and at the Academy of Fine Art in
Helsinki.
Ian Vail lives and works in London. He works primarily in video and has screened and exhibited work at Supermarket (Stockholm), X-
ray (London), Chorlton Arts Festival (Manchester) and Eastern State Penitentiary Museum (Philadelphia).
Alys Williams (born London 1979) is a multimedia artist who creates installation, site-specific projects, sculpture and video, which
explore the convergence of performance, the object, text and image. Her work has been exhibited internationally at venues including; The
Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), London; Jerwood Space, London; UMAM D&R Beirut, Lebanon; The British School at Rome,
Italy; PULSE Miami, USA; Shunt Vaults, London and Dilston Grove, London. In January 2008, she became a contributing video artist
with the Open Gallery and was invited to become Artist in Residence in February 2009. In 2010, she set-up VITRINE GALLERY
(London Bridge SE1) with Rennard Milner, which they now co-direct and curate an ongoing programme of exhibitions and events.
Josephine Wood is a British artist based in London. Recent exhibitions include ‘Press', RED Gallery, London and 'Mass Observation',
X-Ray at the Perseverance, London. Her practice covers drawing, painting and video performance.
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With thanks to Josephine Wood for proposing the space, Linda Persson, Sandra Jogeva and the team at Art Container for their help and
technical support, installing this exhibition.
