Litsoc: cultural London on the cheap

Tuesday, February 28, 2006

:: liza lou @ white cube

Liza Lou
3 March – 8 April 2006

Private View Thursday 2 March 6-8pm
White Cube, 48 Hoxton Square, London N1 6PB

Liza Lou: Born Again film screening
Friday 3 March 7pm
Institute of Contemporary Arts, The Mall, London SW1Y 5AH
Tickets: £8, £7 Concs, £6 ICA Members
ICA Box office: 020 7930 3647 or www.ica.org.uk

White Cube is pleased to present the first UK solo exhibition by Los Angeles-based artist Liza Lou.

Combining visionary, conceptual and craft approaches, Lou makes mixed-media sculptures and room-size installations that are suggestive of a transcendental reality. Lou’s work often employs familiar, domestic forms, crafted from a variety of materials such as steel, wood, papier-mâché and fibreglass, which is then covered with tiny glass beads that are painstakingly applied, one at a time, with tweezers. Dazzling and opulent and constantly glistening with refracted light, her sculptures bristle with what Peter Schjeldahl has aptly described as ‘surreal excrescence’.

This exhibition, a meditation on the vulnerability of the human body and the architecture of confinement, will include several new figurative sculptures as well as two major sculptural installations. Security Fence (2005) is a large scale cage made up of four steel, chain link walls, topped by rings of barbed wire and Cell (2004-2006), as its name suggests, is a room based on the approximate dimensions of a death row prison cell, a kind of externalized map of the prisoner’s mind. Both Security Fence and Cell, like Lou’s immense earlier installations Kitchen (1991-1995) and Back Yard (1995-1999) are characterized by the absence of their real human subject. But whereas the absent subject in Kitchen and Back Yard could be imagined through the details and accessories carefully laid out to view, in Lou’s two new installations the human body is implied simply through the empty volume created by the surrounding architecture. Both Cell and Security Fence are monochromatic and employ iconic forms that make direct reference to Minimalist art in its use of repetition, formal perfection and materiality. In contrast to this, the organic form of a gnarled tree trunk, Scaffold (2005-2006), its surface covered with shimmering golden beads, juts directly out from the wall.

Lou’s work has an immediate ‘shock’ content that works on different levels: first, an acknowledgement of the work’s sheer aesthetic impact and secondly the slower comprehension of the labour that underlies its construction. But whereas in Lou’s earlier works the startling clarity of the image is often a counterpoint to the lengthy process of its realization, for the execution of Cell, Lou further slowed down the process by using beads of the smallest variety with their holes all facing up in an exacting hour-by-hour approach in order to ‘use time as an art material’.

Concluding this body of work are three male figures in states of anguish. In The Seer (2005-2006), a man becomes the means of turning his body back in on himself. Bent over double, his body becomes an instrument of impending self-mutilation, the surface of his body covered with silver-lined beads, placed with the exactitude and precision of a surgeon. In Homeostasis (2005-2006) a naked man stands prostrate with his hands up against the wall in an act of surrender. In this work, the dissolution between inside and outside is explored as the ornate surface of Lou’s cell-like material ‘covers’ the form while exposing the systems of the body, both corporeal and esoteric. In The Vessel (2005-2006), Christ, the universal symbol of torture and agony holds up a broken log over his shoulders. This figure is beheaded, and bejewelled, with its neck carved out, becoming a vessel into which the world deposits its pain and suffering.

Lou has had numerous solo exhibitions internationally, including Museum Kunst Palast, Düsseldorf, Henie Onstad Kunstsenter, Oslo and Fondació Joan Miró, Barcelona. She was a 2002 recipient of the MacArthur Foundation Fellowship.

Liza Lou’s film Born Again (2004), in which the artist tells the compelling and traumatic story of her Pentecostal upbringing in Minnesota, will be screened at 52 Hoxton Square from 3 - 25 March courtesy of Penny Govett and Mick Kerr.

Liza Lou will be discussing her work following a screening of her film at the ICA, The Mall, London on Friday 3 March at 7pm. Tickets are available from the ICA box office (+ 44 (0) 20 7930 3647).

A fully illustrated catalogue, with a text by Jeanette Winterson and an interview with Tim Marlow, will accompany the exhibition.

White Cube is open Tuesday to Saturday, 10.00am to 6.00pm. For further information please contact Honey Luard or Susannah Hyman on + 44 (0) 20 7930 5373

Posted at 22:01 by AlF

Monday, February 13, 2006

:: room for pudding

company celebrate their launch by hosting a night of live entertainment performed by some lovely and fantastically talented, up-coming people. COME SUPPORT US AND HAVE A FAB NIGHT AT THE SAME TIME!

16th Feb 8-1.30am

JACKS@LONDON BRIDGE

Crucifix Lane (off bermondsey street, see map attached)

Nearest tube - London Bridge.

A Variety of live music, stand-up comedy and a special appearance by the kitten club www.thekittenclub.com with DJs playing into the night.

Mingle with London's newest performers, get information on furture gig dates and performance opportunities, develop new material ideas and book your slot at the next event.... if all else fails enjoy a night out til 1am with a lively group of like minded people.

£8 on the door, £5 on the guest list - email roomforpudding@hotmail.co.uk for guest list inclusion.

The line up includes:

Bands:

Lewis and Avery -celebrated their launch last week, featuring Gez and Andrea Lewis

The Seed - they're nice people

Telophase - good old northerners including a liverpudlian

My Stupid Hair- ska band featuring the famous hair of Tom Clutterbuck

Solos

Antony Shepherd - ahh how chilled

Simon Lawrence - of Servant Of Two Masters fame for those who came saw it.

Comedy

Tom Clutterbuck

Angela Sorrenson

Howard Oatley

Faye Woollard

Kev and Lisa - they dont need surnames.. they are fab middlesex uni people

Jim Khanna

AND ALSO SURPRISES!!!!!!!

PLUS A SPECIAL APPEARANCE BY THE KITTENS!!!

Put your name on the guest list now!

Stop me from using further exclamation marks!

See you there!

:: note to self

Fruits of the Womb Productions in association with The Camberley Theatre present

NOTE TO SELF - Directed by Nina Lemon

What if you could write a letter to yourself 5, 20 or 50 years ago? What advice would you give?Would your advice shape your decisions? Would you want it to? Fruits of the Womb have invited people from all different walks of life to take the Note to Self challenge. This is their story.

In the Studio at The Camberley Theatre

13th – 16th February 2006 at 8pm

21st – 23rd February 2006 Schools' matinees

Tickets - £6

Xpress Theatre Members and School Groups - £3

Friends 2 for 1 offerBox Office: 01276 707600

The Camberley Theatre, Knoll Road, Camberley. Surrey GU15 3SY

1st March 2006 Guildhall Theatre Royal Bury St. Edmunds Special Performances for community groups.

Posted at 03:07 by AlF

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

:: blackbird

EXCLUSIVE WRITERS' OFFER

TO SEE OUTSTANDING NEW PLAY IN THE WEST END 2 FOR 1 TICKETS (£25) FOR SATURDAY 11 FEB, 2.30PM PERFORMANCE ONLY This offer is non-transferable and is only available to writers PHONE 0870 950 0920 (10am-6pm) AND QUOTE 'WRITER' TO BOOK.

:: karl's updates

Madness and your Civilisation page opens.
KI at santacon 2005: A question of faith page opens.
Stage Manager req.
They also have a myspace account! Network!

Lots of videos online: Visit the site.

:: international bush

£6 each, 2 for £10.

Monday 13 February 8pm Ÿ AUSTRALIA

Mt. Ragged

by Reg Cribb | directed by Daniel Schlusser

Trapped by the curse of Mt. Ragged , an ageing poet stows away in the suburbs of Sydney beneath a cloud of black cockatoos, until an unwelcome visitor comes along and unearths a dark secret.

Wednesday 15 February 8pm Ÿ ICELAND
Surf

by Jón Atli Jónasson | directed by Will Kerley

‘When you’re out at sea it’s hard to keep secrets. Even from yourself.’

An extraordinary tale based on Jón Atli Jónasson’s real life experiences as a crew member on an Icelandic fishing trawler.

Thursday 16 February 8pm Ÿ NORTHERN IRELAND
Pumpgirl

by Abbie Spallen | directed by Mike Bradwell

Borderlands and badlands: we're in the North but only just. Pumpgirl is an explosive tale of drink, dirty love and country music set on the wrong side of a fluctuating exchange rate.

Friday 17 February 8pm Ÿ JAPAN

Trance

by Shoji Kokami | directed by Paul Miller

In an accidental meeting, three friends from school reunite. The stories that they tell each other soon spiral into such delusions that one believes they’re the emperor. There’s a psychiatrist, a freelance writer and a drag artist, but which of them is telling the truth?

It was good... however we felt a little disappointed by the faux promises of sexual escapadery! The new show is going to open soon, I hear they won't be giving up their key and locker gimmick anytime soon.

WESTMINSTER LITSOC