VOID

FLUE, Sarah Sparkes, installation, 2015

VOID

21st June - 11th July

Address: St John on Bethnal Green, 200 Cambridge Heath Rd, E2 9PA

 // ARTISTS //
Louise Beer
Jane Grisewood
Rebecca Huxley
Melanie King
Joshua Space
Sarah Sparkes

Lumen Studios present an exhibition exploring the representation of black holes, voids and portals.

Opening Party: SOLSTICE, 21st June 2016, 6pm
With talk from Chris Welch, Professor of Space Engineering at the International Space University in Strasbourg, France, where he is also Director of Masters Programs. Chris will be speaking about the representation of black holes and voids in space physics and science fiction.

We'll also be screening Sarah Sparkes film, Time You Need and DJ set by CAETVS

Opening Times:

Saturday 25 June and Sunday 26 June, 1-5pm
Saturday 2nd July and Sunday 3 July, 1-5pm


Closing Party: FIRST THURSDAY, 7 July 2016, 6pm

Look Mum No Computer Modular Synth Set
http://zibrazibrazibra.com/look-mum-no-computer/

Sarah Sparkes will present a series of works exploring infinities, the void and it's intrusion into the domestic and everyday. FLUE was originally created for a hollowed out space, once a fireplace, for Other Rooms exhibition in Basement Arts Project Space, Leeds. For VOID exhibition, the artists has rebuilt the work within a dark recess below a cupboard in the Belfry of St John's.

Sarah will also be screening her film Time You Need (winner of the MERU Art*Science award 2015) on the VOID opening night, which explores the potential for consciousness to time-travel within the material limits of the human body. Using the symbolism of the portal and black hole, as they are conceptualised in both science, science fiction and the artists own work, the film presents a montage of narratives and documentation of performances and installations, which together with sonic and visual disruptions, create a liminal experience for the spectator. The proposition is that one may find, herein, the time one needs.

Jane Grisewood's Black on Black series explores darkness, blackness – the void – through different black paints on black paper. She will also be exhibiting Black Hole photographs, a typology of voids found in numerous locations around the world.  Grisewood, born and educated in New Zealand, worked as an editor/publisher in London and New York before studying fine art. She was awarded her PhD in 2010 at Central Saint Martins, UAL where she teaches experimental drawing, and has artist books in many collections, including Tate, V&A, MoMA, MACBA, Brooklyn Museum and Yale. Working across media, she investigates time and transience through the line, repetition and durational processes, where drawing is key. Recent work is inspired by boundaries between earth-bound and cosmic temporalities, invisible and visible, black holes and cosmic web.

Melanie King's current research considers how invisible forces are represented in the field of both art and science. Melanie will present a series of experimental films exploring the bubble and its' relationship to cosmological theories such as the multiverse and inflation theory.  Melanie will be showing a series of cameraless photography prints, directing light onto photosensitive paper to create void-like impressions.

Other Rooms

FLUE My first work of 2015

I was excited to be asked by artist curators Patrick Morrissey and Hanz Hancock to take part in the exhibition Other Rooms at Basement Art Projects in Leeds.
After a site visit, I decided to make a new work for the hole in the chimney breast where a fireplace or stove was once located.  All the works in the show had to have their own light source and this was the only illumination in this very atmospheric space. My work FLUE used a mixed material construction to create a portal-like space suggesting a possibility to travel over space via a this infinite tunnel of pulsating lights.  The red lights twinkling could also be seen as the coals in fireplace.
Holes acting as conduits in and out of  the domestic space, such as chimneys, drains and electrics  sockets, have been  associated with magical means of travel in science fiction and children's literature; they are also a common source of anxiety for those in a delusional mental state.

Other Rooms
Basement Arts Project
Address: 28 Burton Terrace, Beeston, West Yorkshire LS11 5JH
Saturation Point is a curatorial project by London based curators Patrick Morrissey & Hanz Hancock that looks at work by reductive, geometric and systems artists working in the UK. For the ‘Other Rooms’ exhibition in January 2015 BasementArtsProject welcomes them to Leeds to stage an exhibition that will look at the re-contextualisation of the art object outside of the white cube. Artists Charley Peters, Giulia Ricci, Sarah Sparkes, Ben Woodeson, John Workman, Andy Wicks, WalkerHill and Morrissey and Hancock themselves respond to the challenges presented when exhibiting artworks beyond the confines of the generally accepted environment.
www.saturationpoint.org.uk
www.basementartsproject.com
To be invited to the Preview Night for ‘Other Rooms’ or gain directions to BasementArtsProject please e-mail Bruce Davies at basementartsproject@gmail.com
Preview
Friday 16th January 2015 7.30 – 9.30pm
Exhibition Open (at other times by appointment)
Saturday 17th January 2015 2 – 4pm
Sunday 18th January 2015 2 – 4pm
Saturday 24th January 2015 2 – 4pm
Sunday 25th January 2015 2 – 4pm