Originality Is Reified

2006, Casey & McAree
Installation

Hollow Gallery
4th floor, 330 Upper Street, Islington, London N1 2XQ

Opening Night 7 February 2006, 6.30pm – 8.30pm
10 Febuary – 4 March 2006, Fri – Sun 12 – 5pm or by appointment

Sam Adams
Casey & McAree
Liane Lang
James Rawlinson

The group show at Hollow Contemporary Art features artists whose works are informed from significantly different backgrounds. They will respond to the gallery space by applying themselves and their work directly onto and within the architecture of the gallery for a week, challenging preconceived ideas of the disparity between the studio and the gallery.

The premise of the exhibition has been developed in response to John Berger’s statement in The Shape of a Pocket; ‘Originality is reified; so is its creator’, this offers an interpretation of the idea of the ‘white cube’ gallery space which has been an unchallenged arena of discourse. ‘The white cube was traditionally seen as an emblem of the estrangement of the artist from a society to which the gallery also provides access. It is a space with a direct line to the timeless, a set of conditions, a place deprived of location, a magic chamber, a concentration of the mind. It preserves the possibility of art.’

This exhibition seeks to demonstrate and experiment with the procedure of montage: the notion of superimposed elements disrupting contexts that invert the interruption of action. This notion of collage has, historically, been regarded as a revolutionary formal innovation in artistic representation that has occurred in our century. The interest of collage as a devise for criticism resides in the incorporation of an actual fragment that remains ‘representational’ while breaking the illusion of realism. To lift a certain number of elements, whether they are from original works, objects, or pre-exiting messages, and integrate them in a new creation in order to produce an original totality manifesting ruptures of diverse sorts. I see this project as an opportunity to use the space as a place of contemplation, consideration and imagination. As a basis for the exhibition, the idea of collage offers an unpredicted significant step in bringing art and life closer to becoming a simultaneous experience within a space such as Hollow Contemporary art.

Casey & McAree work both collaboratively and individually. Their Installation feature a diverse juxtaposition of materials, referencing art historical practices including Romanticism and Expressionism in an analysis of contemporary practice.

Curated by Ali Beddoes

Casey & McAree - Print

Casey & McAree - Resist the Entrenched

Casey & McAree Installation Hollow Gallery