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7/11/2011

Susie MacMurray

Agnew's Gallery, London

Agnew’s is delighted to announce the first ever solo show of artist Susie MacMurray on display at the gallery from 9 November – 2 December, which coincides with her inclusion in the Victoria and Albert Museum’s exhibition The Power of Making. With many of her previous works being site-specific installations, this exhibition presents a unique opportunity to see a variety of her new drawings, sculptures and installations in one location.

For this show MacMurray continues her artistic alchemy, reforming the banal – hairnets, balloons, wires and cling film – into the graceful, ephemeral and opulent. In this way her work is grounded in Dada and Surrealist traditions and although many of her works are, on first inspection, pretty in appearance, they harbour ambiguous and sinister undertones. Her use of materials is provocative and perturbing, at once luxuriant and frugal, tactile and brittle. A bridal gown is ironically constructed out of thousands of household gloves in a kind of cautionary tale about domestic reality. Each glove is turned inside out to reveal its pale downy interior, like flayed skin, they are testament to the vulnerability of humankind. At the other end of the spectrum, household clingfilm is tightly moulded and wrapped into shining, silken cocoons.

Though disparate in their appearance, each work in this exhibition is linked by its evocation of the body or the bodily, and it is this visceral quality which is alternately seductive and repulsive. In Oracle rubber dairy hose appears to grow out of the wall like veins or hair. In Maiden proximity to the body is literal – delicate loops of real hair are tipped with fish hooks. What all of the works in this show seem to point to is bodily trauma and they do so in a repetitive and obsessive way like licking a wound, comparable to Louise Bourgeois.

Susie MacMurray
Susie MacMurray is a Manchester-based artist whose work encompasses drawing, sculpture and architectural installations. A former professional classical musician, she retrained as an artist, graduating with an MA in Fine Art in 2001. She now has an international exhibition profile and shows regularly in the USA and Europe as well as across the UK. Her work is currently on show at the Victoria & Albert Museum’s The Power of Making and has previously been exhibited at the Royal Academy, London, Manchester Art Gallery, Museum of Art and Design, New York, and the Museum of Architecture & Design, Los Angeles. Working in installation and sculpture she has also gained a reputation for site-specific interventions in historic spaces including Pallant House in Chichester, Attingham Park in Shropshire and Kedlestone Hall in Derbyshire.

Agnew’s
Agnew’s is one of the world’s leading international art galleries. In addition to dealing in Old Master paintings, British paintings and watercolours, the gallery also represent contemporary artists.

The firm was founded in 1817 and from its premise in the West End carries on a business in works of art with clients throughout Britain, United States, Europe, Australia and the Far East.

Private view: 8th November, 2011

Agnew's Gallery
35 Albemarle Street, London
Opening: Monday – Friday 10am – 5.30pm, Saturday by appointment.
Free admin

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