The Summer Show

For this second show at Apartment the organisers wanted to show a variety of work from international artists alongside those based in Manchester. The Summer Show presents the work of artists based in Toronto, Cardiff, London and Manchester.

Lisa Penny

Lisa Penny is a London based practitioner who uses found kitsch objects both as components of photographs and sculptural assemblages. In Apartment Lisa Penny has installed a series of photographs entitled ‘Hierarchy’. Each photo shows similar elements in different configurations suggesting complex narratives that are further enriched by the photos location. The photos present household figurines in domestic scenes the photos then displayed within similar domestic scenes act as a precursor for what is to come as Lisa has installed a collection of found ornaments on the balcony.
The figurines nestle within the potted plants and are connected with black wool, which winds its way through the objects and the foliage. The work suggests an innocent’s world of play and theatrical positioning offer complex readings; the familiar is made strange with the use of ubiquitous china cats, dogs and statuettes bound and suspended as if caught in the midst of an epic ambiguous drama.

John Tiney

Our location is questioned with John Tiney’s ‘I Love Art Me’ this hand drawn poster adopts the red heart signifier of love popularised in the ‘I Heart New York’ logo. With this piece Tiney is gently parodying north-south divide and its irrelevance to an international audience. He also sent a letter to Hilary and Paul with a cheque for twenty-two pounds to install a fruit bowl with strict instructions to replenish its depleting stock if the visitors as invited to help themselves.

Anne-Marie Kennedy

The first experience of the space is filled with the soundtrack from Anne-Marie Kennedy’s video ‘Steve the horse’. The haunting Brazilian folk song is the auditory backdrop to the activities of an average man apparently returning to an empty home. As he sits and reads the paper he appears restless and gradually wanders aimlessly round his small living room as we watch the man appears to canter then gallop around the lounge mimicking a horse.

This absurd but touching piece raises questions of contemporary living and encourages the consideration of the growing population of singletons and the apparent disaffected male in a post-feminist era. The video is especially effective shown in a living space as the activity shown occurs in a living room; we the audience are potential conspirators in the piece the work suggests that perhaps we too could cantor around this living room or perhaps suggests that perhaps the resident does

Zac Ingham and Cath Corlett

The kitchen is where Zac Ingham; the artist in residence shows his work. Zac and collaborator Cath Corlett went to the Pennines with an industrial strimmer and cut a fifteen-foot circle into the side of a hill. This piece visible on a clear day with binoculars from the flat’s kitchen window locates the exhibition space in the north of England and asks the viewer to consider the location of the building in which we stand to the surrounding countryside. Something that whilst in the centre of a city we seldom do.

Julie Campbell

Julie Campbell is a resident of Lamport Court where Apartment is situated. Her response to the space is informed by her own experience of living in a flat identical in layout to Apartment; her project involved working directly on to the walls over a period of weeks allowing the artist time to consider each piece and its interaction with the space. Drawn, painted and etched imagery is augmented by ambiguous text fragments that evoke strange poetic scenarios.

The work is located around the flat, the living room is the main focus. However as the viewer departs on the back of the front door two delicately drawn poppies and the sentence; ‘she felt she would be reborn tomorrow, for sure’ are placed; effectively leaving a thought for the day with the audience as they leave the space. The work is delicately executed, the fragmentary elements especially successful inferring a fractured interior world. Some pieces are potentially missed offering the chance to miss key elements of the work; this adds to the complexity and atmosphere of the work and confirms the fragmentary nature of the artists work.

Matt Jones

The work shown in the relatively public rooms is in contrast with the conventionally more private spaces. Matt Jones’s video work ‘Yellow’ is shown on a monitor and placed on the bed; arms dangle back and forth repetitively as a pneumatic soundtrack pulsates; jarring the viewer. The TV sheds a yellow glow onto the white duvet. This work made in response to the artist’s brother dangling his arms from their childhood top bunk is perfectly suited for the bedroom.
Matt Jones’s second video ‘Rubber Dam’ is placed in a cupboard in the bathroom with already present clothes stuffed around the monitor. The video is placed directly opposite the viewer as they sit on the toilet. The uncomfortable noise and image of disembodied black rubber gloves writhing as if endlessly washing hands suggest a disturbing dubious narrative that is an unsettling component of the collection of work located in these most private of rooms.
For this second show the space is effectively split, into public subtle interventions that offer a quizzical glance at contemporary life happening in the kitchen, hall, living room and balcony and a scatological undercurrent existing in the bedroom and bathroom.

The Above is a still from Matt Jones' video.

Ilona Staples

‘Licked’ is a work by Ilona Staples a Canadian artist who has licked every page of a pornographic magazine it has then been suspended on a long chain. This outrageous task confronts the ubiquitous nature of pornography and the inability to avoid it. ‘Licked’ is also a contentious habitant of this gay mans bedroom where straight pornography is not a natural bedfellow.

Staples continues to work with visceral substances in ‘Piss Olympics’ her own urine fills five rubber rings that are formed into the Olympic symbol. Positioned near by the toilet the work takes on a meaning that would not ordinarily arise in a gallery space. The visitors may potentially urinate in the presence of the work which amusingly puts a competitive slant on the act of urinating especially topical as the inauguration of the Olympics 2004 will take place while the show is up.

Press