TRANSMISSION

Hannah Rae Alton, Tommy Grace, Rory Macbeth, Mark Selby

curated by Monica Meriggi

Exhibition: 16 – 31 January 2010

Private View: Friday 15th January, 7-9pm

Open: Thurs-Sun, 1-5pm

Artists Talk: Saturday 23rd January, 7.30pm

…In the same way as a schizophrenic mind may hear a multiplicity of voices, a level of confusion is induced by an over-exposure to language. Through the things we learn, through news, discourses, empty small talk, the books we read, the lyrics of the songs we listen to, our minds become full of concepts, interpretations, opinions, beliefs, and structures of thought.

The mind is the opposite of a ‘tabula rasa’; it is an erupting container of concepts. Trying to ordinate these thoughts is a difficult task, perhaps requiring a mechanism to shut out the competing voices. We try then to listen carefully to the sense; we try to establish a dialogue between us and ourselves, between us and others, between us and the concreteness of the world. We try to interrogate the way in which we communicate, talk, write, think; we question the way in which we translate and interpret a message, a word and the language. We then start to observe the language hidden behind the pervasive signs and codifications, and we begin to experience openness to the imaginative places, objects spelt out in words. Our minds float over something unexpected, beautiful and non-mediated, immediate; something which speaks for itself…

TRANSMISSION brings together four artists using different media and approaches, who each share a particular interest in communication as dialogue and interpretation. Whether it is the interpretation of one’s words, the translation of a text, or a reading and understanding of the world; the dynamics between intention and result and between transmission and reception are significant in the artists’ investigations of communication. The artists’ common ground is an interest in what’s hidden behind the immediacy of signs. What is beyond our grasp and understanding: meaning. To be universally understood meaning has to be common and uniformed; it requires a conventional acceptance. The critique of this common meaning that we could call “truth” is carried out by the artists in different ways. Their differences are as important as their similarities. Their differences show the rhizomatic nature of the truth - of each truth.

TRANSMISSION means then a creative process of interpretation rather than an assimilation of unified information. It is the capability to create personal meanings and understandings. By playing with the visibility of the sign and the invisibility of significance, art can expose our fragile being and the tragicomic failure of the search for a higher and universal truth.

Hannah Rae Alton lives and works in London. She graduated at Royal College of Art, MA Communication Art and Design. Exhibitions include 21g group show at Dazed and Confused (2009) and the solo show Like there’s no tomorrow, Sassoon Gallery, Peckham (2006).

Alton presents Downward spiral, a video that reflects the artist’s interest in the miscommunication of a language disorder such as Aphasia. She is interested in codification and translation, and the route by which an idea is made manifest. Her concerns are the vulnerability of the information in transit, and the difference between what is intended and what is understood.

Tommy Grace was born in Edinburgh in 1979 and graduated from Edinburgh College of Art in 2002. He now lives and works in London as an artist and designer. Recent exhibitions have included: Dummy, Ingleby Gallery, Edinburgh (2009); Separates, Limoncello, London (2009); and A Colour Box, Arcade, London (2008).

In the series Greeking, Grace designed and printed newspaper using typographer’s ‘dummy’ text. This printed matter is subsequently cut and re-assembled directly onto the gallery wall in a series of formal patterns. His interest lays in the way in which we read and interpret what is before us. Are we looking for a meaning when there isn’t one? Are we creating meanings that don’t correspond with the intentions of the text?

Rory Macbeth lives and works in Leeds and London, he is a lecturer and co-founder of Pilot. Solo exhibitions include The Long March Back to Progress Nassauischer Kunstverein, Wiesbaden, Germany (2009) and Buy One Get One Free Galerie Sara Guedj, Paris (2007). Macbeth’s practice investigates the relations between the concepts created in our minds and the things, between our interpretation of the word and the word as it is. By pointing out the incongruence between the two he is reflecting on the impossibility of knowledge.

For Predictive Text Macbeth sent out horoscopes reconfigured by the predictive text function on mobile phones and he is currently translating a Kafka novel into English without any knowledge of the original language and without the use of a vocabulary. “The Wanderer” will be presented as performative reading during the opening night of TRANSMISSION.

Mark Selby works with sculpture, video and installation. He lives and works in London where he graduated MA in Sculpture at Wimbledon College of Arts. He is recently been awarded with the Clifford Chance / UAL Sculpture Award. Recent exhibitions include Fault Line : Art in the Age of Anxiety, The Nunnery, Bow Arts Trust, London (2009), and Affluenza, Clerkenwell, London (2009).

Selby’s sculpture Lets Sit Down and Talk plays with functionality and its distortions and refers to today’s technological enhanced way of communicating. This ironic and dysfunctional piece of furniture speaks of alienation and distance and it is the result of the artist’s interest in the use and misuse of technology and its impact on physical relationships; through his work Selby poses questions on how the communication between individuals can be obstructed and transformed by the complexity of our technological tools.

Download Press Release PDF here.

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