Visual Art
ReViews
llTl-lOGR/V’HlC PRlNTS
ELLSWORTH KELLY - EDITIONS: 1972-2005 lngleby Gallery, Edinburgh, until 22 April .00.
As well as the recently opened Fred Sandback exhibition at the Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh is also currently home to another retrospective of a different veteran minimalist, Ellsworth Kelly. It is the fact that Kelly's work is concurrently showing at two prominent galleries, the Tate St Ives and the Serpentine, London, which recently prompted a reviewer to ask if minimalism was back in vogue. For those interested in testing the implications of such a question - however premature it may be - against the artwork itself, this modest collection of monochrome lithographs is a suitable starting point.
Most of the exhibit is dedicated to Kelly’s exploration of simple, individual coloured shapes printed upon pure white paper. It is this visual reticence and terse reduction of elements that has long epitomised Kelly’s practice. With the slight distortion of an intensely deep verrnillion square, or the bulging of the top of an insouciant yellow parallelogram, these shapes induce a number of involuntary associations. Very quickly it is apparent how these seemingly innocuous images flaunt the complexity and impossibility of fully comprehending an encounter with even the most fundamental of visual stimuli - however hackneyed making such a supposition might seem.
‘Black Curve' is evocative of an archway, its impenetrable darkness enticing you to imagine a depth which isn’t there; a depth which might be symbolic, imaginary, poetic or personal. Indeed it is the fact that your mind is actively trying to abstract this form, through various codes, into something else, which becomes stifling, frustrating and provocative as you pass through this exhibition. That you have to appeal to so many other external sources to try and come to terms with the work in front of you makes problematic any notions about the Untitled (Red), 2005 sovereignty of perception. (James Clegg)
FILM lNS'l‘ALlATlON HENRIK HAKANSSON The Modern Institute, Glasgow, until 29 Apr 000
Henrik Hakansson makes experimental work. lll lllt: nuieiititir ‘rirll‘w of fill: i. an artist-investigat()r. who collaborates closely ‘.‘.’llll thi: scientifir r )llllllllllll, t make systematic enquiries into the ‘.‘/()l'klll(}f} of Hit: natural .‘Jflll’f. to ill" i m t. '1 practice focused on playful research — the piece that made hit; llillllfr. y’t )lll .' i logical Optimized Nocturnal E(:S$l£lf;‘,l for lr'ogs'. wan an i;r:os,,<;tr:in r «,iifiiii- l f the gallery. in which amphibians were played techno music i l‘;t:'.'.’l“:lr a Hakansson made rock stars out of (lllfikaTfi.
More recently. Hakansson has turned away from li,iiotlii,-nin flit“ experimentation toward more stiaightfor‘nxairl ()f).‘;(:l".'£ll|’)ll. lllfi' l’lll lll'. « x illilil‘ ,tzri'; of cultural constructs With the r:oinp|e><itie<; of nature lfrllli’tlll‘i to fll‘.‘ tori,- l f‘:l"_ til the film ‘Aug. (3. 2004'. one short second}. north of footage l‘, aloxwi to 71 will I" over two minutes. and protected iii the grand ariaiiioiphir (.lllfrlllil‘.’,filit: foirria' The star of this micro-epic. a Digger Wasp. mop/er; iat a lizilllflllly’ nlo: pare r-ar ’l Wing-beat vmhlel into the frame. prefiguied by it; shadow. and flush-in for an extended moment.
This is not. though. a Simple record of a l)l|f,‘f flight Before the .l‘:.'.":l f,zll' enCOunter Hakansson's flllll. he must negotiate the lll‘:éill‘. it, .'.r'iiir,li it I', all if large protector, l()€l(l€(l‘.‘.’llliflflll(1()llflflllf‘:ff in multiple loop'. lilo/w, the eiitraii/ rt
to the gallery. humming and hu/zing to provide a ‘}f)tlllfllléii';f‘ to the h
flight of the wasp. This tecl'inological intrusion ties llgikztnmori'r, recent piar, w.- his past. exposuig the inelegant man-made apparatus (it'l' iired to ’ll’,lil€:,. and This exhibition, a follow-up to 2004’s popular Modern Women. features a number earlier record, the effortless. unthinking flight of an lli‘Wrfll, Jack l/lottrairw
of new acquisitions - of subjects chosen by Visitors to the gallery — and one impresswe new commission. That picture. an ambitious Oil painting of the composer Thea Musgrave by Victoria Crowe. exemplifies the exhibition‘s billing: high quality ponraits of estimable Scottish women.
The most effective images here. as is so often the case With portraiture, are those that gesture effectively beyond the subject to more general themes of mOrtality and its representation. lain Clark's viSion of broadcaster Muriel Gray takes advantage of the sitter's instantly recognisable image; by making the background colOur. a soft orange. the same as the dominant skin shade. Gray's famous and thoughtful face shimmers before the eye, in some senses hardly there at all. Chris Close's photo-ponrait of SoliCitor General Elish Angiolini shows a confident and friendly-looking woman looking straight at the camera. In the background an oddly lit. almost psychedelic interior corridor disappears towards an unseen vanishing mm. This inviSible moment, it seems. lies not far beyond the cheerful subiect. who looks the other way.
It is a shame then that the exhibition has been cursorin annotated (perhaps given the length of its Showmg there is time to change thisl. Disappointineg the labels do not include dates for the pictures. and the brief-as-can-be career descriptions of the subjects — ‘writer'. ‘businesswoman' — assume knowledge where information might be more appropriate. and intriguing. (RJ Thomson)
National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh, until 28 Aug .00
94 THE LIST 13—27 Apr 2006