Arting Around the Centre
With little notice we launch into our first show. At first Triennials and Biennials were to be the show’s main focus but this impossible subject just spans out in front of you like a myriad of webs the more you look at it. One gets entangled asking questions like why do they exist? Is there any structure to them - possibly, occasionally? A few answers were thrown up, but mostly I’ve had to leave it until perhaps someone archives the ultimate history of biennials (a task equal to the Minotaur’s Labyrinth?) Yet since there’s hardly a derth of arts events to cover in London, ever, quickly we moved on…
Arting Around’s co-host Jo Melvin must be to her students one of those remarkable teachers, the kind that encourage and nurture and hence the kind that one remembers all one’s life. Between teaching MA art at Chelsea, Slade amongst other places, she works on a PHD has a family and frequently gives talks on art around London. I first met her just before her talk on Dennis Oppenheim at the MOT gallery, she specialises in particular in 70’s performance art and looked to me like a wild genius with an honest smile.
So for this first show we have some shows Jo has deemed worth covering, in addition to a live recording of Zeena Parkins at the Tate, playing not only her electric harp as if it were a violin (handheld string pulled across harp string) but also a bowl of water and plastic sheet. She was set inside an immense triad of transparent screens, stretched across rather rudimentary frames, and played her set in a hologram dress, while stills from the film “Loneliness and the Modern Pentatholon” were projected onto the screens. Her performance was far better than the film itself, which we had sat through beforehand.
One thing this research has thrown up about Triennial/Biennials and which I’ll share with you now, is that it’s the best excuse for a shake up at an otherwise often turgid institution as well as its accompanying rather regular art scene.
New blood, new views, new publicity, new audience.
Are the webs of the Biennial not dissimilar to food chain webs?