Ocula Conversation Jess Johnson: Worlds Within Worlds Geometric patterns, anthropomorphic characters, architectural spatial environments, and relics of the ancient world appear throughout Jess Johnson's artworks.Johnson's solo art-ventures began in drawing, but her long-term collaborative relationship with animator Simon Ward brings her drawings to life in videos and virtual reality. The animator has...
Ocula Conversation Melati Suryodarmo: Performance Art as Trigger In 2012, Melati Suryodarmo opened Studio Plesungan in her native Surakarta, also known as Solo, the historic royal capital of the Mataram Empire of Java in Indonesia. Suryodarmo had returned to Indonesia from Germany, where she studied Butoh and choreography with Butoh dancer and choreographer Anzu Furukawa, time-based media with avantgarde...
Ocula Report Lagos Biennial 2019: Stories from Africa’s most Populous City 15 Nov 2019 : Jareh Das for Ocula Under the direction of Folakunle Oshun, the second edition of the Lagos Biennial (26 October–23 November 2019) includes works by over 40 Lagos-based and international artists, architects, and collectives. Curated by architect Tosin Oshinowo, curator and producer Oyindamola Fakeye, and assistant curator of photography at the Art Institute of...
Ocula Insight | Video Hans Hartung and Art Informel at Mazzoleni London (1 October 2019-18 January 2020) presents key works by the French-German painter while highlighting his connection with artists active in Paris during the 50s and 60s. In this video, writer and historian Alan Montgomery discusses Hartung's practice and its legacy.Born in Leipzig in 1904, Hans...
Emily Hartley-Skudder's second solo project at Jonathan Smart Gallery is called Lollygagger. Are we to gag on the lolly here, on the sweetest of still-life painting almost overwhelmed by a kitsch framing sublime (alongside the nostalgia for old fashioned confectionary suggested by titles like Ka-Bluey and Gobstopper)?
No, let's not. Let's enjoy the conflation of cosmetic, rubber, plastic and chrome. Admire the rendering of objects domestic and often feminine. And relish the artful play between the fancifully small and the overblown potential of pump-action.
What is real here is Hartley-Skudder's ability with paint, combined with her penchant for interior décor, not simply domestic but increasingly of the bathroom and bedroom. Things feel lovingly artificial and cosmetic, while the droll humour of Lilac Low-Suds and Sparkling Duet is both delightful and absolutely engaging.
The gag is deliberate and the look lolly. However, the attitude and the practice is totally and wonderfully committed. The gallery as showroom is complete - porcelain, plastic and taps. A New Look! Gentle on Hands and Everything They Wash - fresh and re-configured from the Gus Fisher Gallery's re-opening group exhibition in April, We're Not Too Big To Care, enlivens the back space. It's all about orange elephant-head bathroom-ware from China. Life is replete.
JS
