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28 Oct 2009

Exhibitions by our MA Students II

Hello All,
as promised, here's what the second MA Student Exhibition Group have been up to at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery at the University........
their project was to install two new displays in the cases in one of the exhibition rooms at the gallery. They were dealing with some rare and fragile ceramic museum objects so the white gloves are not merely a fashion statement, but instruments of authority!......the students constructed their exhibiton displays with some very interesting narratives, directing attention to the sculptural, the painterly and the functionality of 18th century ceramics and highlighting their social and cultural use......There was some considerable deliberation on the aesthetics of display (as you can see!) but I think the results are quite striking (and informative)....do take a look and let us know what you think!











We will be returning to assess the effectivity of both the Ceramics Exhibition and the Sculpture Trail Exhibition at the end of the module.....work is always 'in progress'...
Mark

25 Oct 2009

Exhibitions by Our MA Students

Hello All,

The Museum & Gallery studies Theory-Practice divide was collapsed last week, with the final installation of the student's exhibitions at the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery at Leeds University. Divided into two groups, the students divised two fantastic exhibitions......

A Sculptu
re Trail and A Ceramics Display....
...both exhibitions are now part of the Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery displays. You can view them until early December...do go along and let us know what you think and post a note on here!

Here's the SCULPTURE GROUP, next to part ONE of their finished Sculpture Trail.....which explores the complex relationships between sculpural practices, materials and theories....you can even get invloved yourself and make a masterpiece!................The students got really involved in the processes of making the exhibition itself...as you can see...........................Looks like the Blue Peter Studio!............there's more to come (when I get the pics) on the CERAMICS GROUP Exhibition project....
Mark

13 Oct 2009

Museums and Critique

At last I've managed to find some moment to Blog...(it's been a bit manic this semester...) anyway, it appears that at the heart of Rebecca's post on 'Bigger Splash' (and Hattie's reflective comment) is the suggestion of a kind of ambivalence (I liked the arm wrestling your dad analogy) towards critique...it's rather like the museum (or in this case the RA) was openly inviting critique only in the acknowledgment that such critique merely acts to reinforce its own position and authority? There's a distinct connection here with the stuff that Banksy and Bristol Art Gallery did a few weeks ago (did you go Rebecca?)...thousands of people queued round the block to see a metaphorical stoning of their grandmother...the stones turned out to be sponges (and they weren't even wet ones!), so no damage was done.....I'm sure there's more to be said on this thread?

mark

2 Oct 2009

A Bigger Splat


The reviews of this not-retrospective of Anish Kapoor at the Royal Academy that have been published in the last couple have weeks (read Adrian Searle's here) have emphasised the violence of these wax and pigment installation-performances, though in material, formalist terms. However art that appears to do violence to the institution, both spatial and ideological, reinforces these structures rather than subverting them. It's like arm wrestling your dad; he's just letting you think you can win.