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Woman in Divorce Battle on Tour 2004
Cees Krijnen
It may sound saccharine, but Cees Krijnen makes art for his mother Greta Blok. Since her divorce 15 years ago, her ex-husband has herassed her emotionally and financially so, to enrich her life, Krijnen arranges for useful or luxurious things to be made. With the help of the Cartier Foundation, he created a gold-plated lawn sprinkler set with a diamond; with the New York label UP&CO, he produced a gold leather battle suit that has an 'Ambassador of Divorced Woman of the Netherlands' insignia. For Studio 1.1, which is a dildo shop as well as a gallery, Krijnen designed a set of dildos painted with blue skies and fluffy, Tiepolo-like clouds.
The performative elements of his project are the most interesting, though. A video shows him being assessed for the Prix de Rome; when the judges visited his studio, he introduced them to his mother as though they were prospective partners. It's great to see artists like Pistoletto waver under such scrutiny. Krijnen's clever project has the capacity to run and run in unpredictable directions; his Prix de Rome prize money, for instance, paid for his mother's new central heating system.
Sally O'Reilly
March 3-10 2004 Issue
©Copyright Time Out 2004
in order of appearance
Keran James
Hollywood is often dismissed as being superficial or irrelevant, but Keran James produces thoughtful explorations of the way that movie make-believe bleeds into real life. In 1999, on an Oxfordshire hillside, he made a mock-up of the Hollywood sign. The first three letters cut diagonally through the gallery; the flimsy wooden shapes have unpainted backs supported by cross-beams but, squeeze through to the other side, and you are in another world - trapped by the painted facades. Projected large is 'Cast List' (sic), a credit sequence that applauds actors from Klaus Kinski to Tobey Maguire and lasts the length of a regular film. Are their transient achievements important or trivial? Playing on two monitors are reflections in TV screens; the images - a gay bar, a hotel room - are blurred, the soundtracks muffled. You can also see your own reflection - indistinctly. Does being on screen make you significant or does it blur and muffle you?
A film of the back seat in a taxi parodies the use of back-projection in movies. You catch only glimpses of the passengers, though; mainly you see rain falling on a motorway. The background takes precedence - there are no glamourous movie stars - which is tragic, because we know the kind of scenes referred to and relish their distance from reality. The movie world can't simply be disregarded; it is entangled in our lives.
Jen Ogilvie
Aug 27-Sep 3 2003 Issue
©Copyright Time Out 2003