in some ways a reversal of Katie Paterson’s harnessing of cosmic ideas and bringing them down to human scale
I like how they both start to question materiality on a ‘base’ level, exploding this to an almost confrontational size, linking to Graham Harman’s concept of ‘undermining’ wherein there is a temptation to pursue (defining) materiality down to the most basic building block – this becomes a very literal confrontation of what we might consider one of these ‘base’ elements
the confusion of scales relates to my miniature – perhaps I could consider in future an enlarging of a rock surface in this way?? making a human-sized pebble?
Simon Starling, Shedboatshed
In Shedboatshed Starling took a shed, turned it into a boat, sailed it down the river and then turned it back into a shed
lots of similar themes to my work at the moment – using found materials/objects, playing with the definition of objects (does it depend on what it’s made of, what it looks like, what it does? what if it’s made of another object?) – I love the idea of taking a material on a journey, almost imbuing it in some way into the final ‘object’ – suggests/hints at what prior journeys it has made and where it might go in future
has hints of the ship of theseus? might be quite an interesting figure to introduce to my work potentially?
describes his work as a ‘physical manifestation of a thought process’ (here)
also ‘According to the Tate’s curator Rachel Tant: “He’s interested in the creation of objects; he is a researcher, traveller, narrator. He looks at how things got to be the way they are, and reasserts a human connection between processes we take for granted.”‘ (from same article as linked above)
Simon Starling, Autoxylopyrocycloboros
Autoxylopyrocycloboros was a voyage in a steam powered boat fueled by burning wood from the boat’s own hull (the voyage therefore ending when the boat sank)
really like the concept behind this artwork – nice and neatly metaphorical, fairly easy to be interpreted but still with a lot of depth to it
again the figure of a boat (and potentially to ship of theseus?)
interesting dynamic between having a lot of environmental undertones – this seems to me to be a metaphor for the unsustainable mining of the earth’s natural resources – and the environmental impact of the piece itself
would be interesting to know if the wreckage was salvaged or left as this is a dilemma I face in my own practice – to what extent is any environmental commentary of an artwork undermined by its own detrimental environmental impact
this article has some interesting comments on the ability of an individual object to convey a narrative (page 7): ‘The tricky thing, however, is judging to what extent the objects Starling displays are capable of divulging the narratives he conveys. Indeed many of his critics accuse him of loading objects with more ideas than they can communicate without the help of lengthy and involved background stories or explanations. But […] this is the case with most objects in the world which are, in essence, accumulations of data tracing their passage through space and through time. Some of this data is obvious in the object, some of it isn’t.’
‘between political and poetic’
‘invoking the ghosts of dead artists as collaborators’
how can the past resonate with the contemporary
create immediate experiences that are initially engaging and then the viewer can decide whether to go deeper into the various layers of the work – breadth emerging from initial grabbing engagement
work being able to be read on many layers
therefore important to present something initially captivating
navigating a ‘visually cluttered world’
trying to slow things down
his works are ‘bizarre detours’, centered around journeys, often not even A to B but A to A
‘kicking against the ease of image production’
autoxylopyrocycloboros kind of slapstick, self-defeating
talks about the physicality of image making as important to his process – interesting to think about this documentation side which is obviously very necessary with journey-based works
propositional works – suggesting at something which is never realised – more about the journey than the point of arrival – interest in process/travel – how you get there and not what you get to
(my own work highlighting this perpetual journeying of objects through the world – nothing is ever realised/in a final form)
Anna Harris 