12 February 2020
Gary and Isabel’s exhibition at the Cello Factory came in good time to inspire me toward the Launch project. With both artists sharing an inclination toward metaphoric abstraction from the world around them, I was keen to hear them speak about their works at the exhibit.
Isabel’s work overlays multiple scales of the occupied world into unique, illusive narratives. Her use of laser cut elements of vertical circulation reflect her architectural design practice and a fascination with aspects of navigation through space. The use of acrylics and watercolour works adds a ‘lived’ quality to her overlayed scales of space, which, viewed through openings, creases, peekholes and lattices incorporated within the architectural language, allow a closer inspection and subsequent revelation of hidden surprises within each individual piece. The play of light and shadow in the 3 dimensionality of integrated elements adds a depth, dependent on the context of display, the time of day, and viewing distance. I especially admire the interplay of art, craft and design in these ‘spatial objects’, reflecting the moods, culture and dynamic banality of everyday life in the built-unbuilt space.
Gary’s artworks, whether in blue ink, highlighter renderings or intricate embroidery, reflect objects collected from a conscious-subconscious purview of his environment. The materiality of the variegated yarn lends a manipulated, yet speculative aesthetic dimension to his blue and white embroidered works. (He later revealed, that his positioning of stitches and visual density was reflective of the making process as a means of thinking, rather than a pre-determined visual aesthetic carried out in the making.)
Through the use of filled-in ‘negative spaces’ around his assembled objects, shaped as silhuettes of objects in perspective, Gary adds a 3-dimensionality and depth to his artworks, which appears as a unifying contrast to depth and dimension in Isabel’s Maquettes.
I thought that the Cello Factory acted as a good curatorial space for this collaboration, giving the artworks space and presence, yet adding its own minimalist character to my viewing experience.
Lastly, the press release of the exhibition allowed an inspiring study of curatorial writing in the context of our launch project. Bringing out the processes and underlying concepts in both artist’s works, the text weaves the overarching theme of ‘fictionalization’ and artificiality through their unique narratives. I hope to take this to my group’s launch publication, and to work towards such a seamless narrative in individual perspective, while viewing each of our works through the lens of Form, Space and Materiality.
design factory 