Fifth edition. The exhibition is consistently a barometer of contemporary art practice, shining a spotlight on the hottest talents of the year. It showcases works by 55 of the most promising artists emerging from UK art schools.
2014 Selectors: Marvin Gaye Chetwynd, Enrico David and Goshka Macuga.
The ICA is delighted to welcome
back
Bloomberg New Contemporaries
to its galleries for the 4
th
year
running.
Marking its 65th anniversary, selectors Marvin Gaye Chetwynd, Enrico David and Goshka
Macuga have chosen works by
55
of
the most promising artists emerging from UK art schools from
1,400 submissions.
Previous New Contemporaries include
Jake & Dinos Chapman
, Tacita Dean,
Mona Hatoum, Damien Hirst, David Hockney and Mike Nelson
as well as more recent emerging
artists including Ed Atkins, Peles Empire, Nathaniel Mellors, Haroon Mirza and Laure Prouvost.
The Bloomberg New Contemporaries for
2014 are:
Lucy Bee
ch
, Dinah Berger, Louise Bradley, Jesc
Bunyard, Matt Copson, Racheal Crowther, Yi Dai, Tajinder Dhami, Bee Flowers, Alice Gauthier,
Marco Godoy, Victoria Grenier, Stacey Guthrie, Alice Hartley, Katie Hayward, Ed Hill, Yussef Hu,
Matthew Humphreys, Henry Hu
ssey, Marie Jacotey
-
Voyatzis, Lucy Joyce, Melissa Kime, Xiao
-
Yang
Li, Inga Lineviciute, Andrea Medjesi
-
Jones, Jonathan Meira,
MKLK,
Ebrel Moore, Emily Motto, Emely
Neu, Laura O'Neill, Lydia Ourahmane, Athena Papadopoulos, Catherine Parsonage, Imran Perrett
a,
Miroslav Pomichal
,
Charles Richardson, Simon Senn, Xin Shen, Will Sheridan Jr., Mustafa Sidki,
David Cyrus Smith, Marilia Stagkouraki, Jane Stobart,
Camille Summers
-
Valli, John Thole, Ian
Tricker,
Milou van der Maaden
,
Tess Vaughan, Adam Wallace, Deborah Westmancoat, Jos
ep
h
Whitmore, Frances Williams, Ben Zawalich
and
Adam Zoltowski.
This year printmaking, moving image and performance
occupy much of the final selection
as well as
an interest in modes of production and
materiality.
Certain artists
explore
themes linked to
current
affairs
(
Marco Godoy
, Melissa Kime, Milou van der Maaden
)
, human behaviour (Simon Senn, Lucy
Beech,
Stacey Guthrie
)
,
language (Matt Copson, Alice Hartley
, Imran Perretta
), desire (
Yi Dai,
Katie
Hayward, Racheal Crowther, Tajinder Dhami)
and the body
(
Bee Flowers, Yussef Hu, MKLK, Adam
Wallace
, Xiao-Yang Li).
Marco Godoy’s work ‘Claiming the Echo’ explores the aftermath of the financial crisis in Spain and
depicts a choir singing
choral arrangements of
political
protest slogans in Spanish.
Working with mixed media,
Melissa
Kime
playfully
alludes to
the economic crisis with ‘
Technicolour
Joseph and The Amazing City Bankers
'
whilst
Milou van der Maaden
investigates
the legacy of
Dutch
post
-
colonial activity in Africa in her film ‘From A Head To A Head’.
Simon Senn
’s films deal with human behaviour and patterns of interaction. His explorations of group
dynamics and individual responses take place in contexts defined by the artist, including
an artist’s
talk, a friend’s bedroom and a South African housing project. Through his deliberately candid filming
technique and other interventions Senn reveals and heightens existing tensions within a given social
setting. His film‘
Just Let Go’
sets up
the intriguing proposition of dealing with the current global
financial crisis through the creation of filmed cathartic experiences that aim to
release
anxiety.
Lucy Beech’s
unsettling
film ‘Cannibals’ is centred around the act of eating and it isn’t
clear to the
viewer whether the footage is real or staged,
heightening its ambiguity.
Stacey Guthrie’s film ‘
The Splendid Life of Hildegard Ramsbottom
’ weaves wit and poetry with potent
and comic results.
Matt Copson’s practice deals with language and
the construction of narrative. Taking the form of
installations, performances and discrete objects his works simultaneously draw heavily from
contemporary British culture and more ancient forms of storytelling. Through the persona of the ‘fox’
and his relationship to others, a complex, often troubled worldview is created.
‘We’re All Very Disappointed’ by Alice Hartley is a large scale screen
print which is inspired by the
artist’s own internal voice and serves as a platform for thoughts and ideas that are
never articulated.
Imran Perretta
draws on his Bangladeshi heritage in his
affecting
work ‘Devotion’ which incorporates
a prayer mat, newspaper clipping and tape recording.
Yi Dai’s works appear to be abstract in nature, but on closer inspection reveal that highly charged
materials such as the artist’s own hair, broken mirror and stockings are also used in the process of
making. This provocative and seductive materiality adds
another layer of meaning and interpretation
to the forms that the artist employs in this series of works.
Katie Hayward's body of work stems from her curiosity into individual desires. Her exquisite drawings
and inflatable sculptures deal with the notio
n of desired stature and her relationship to architecture,
forming the basis for works that attempt to reach exaggerated and unrealistic heights.
Racheal Crowther
’s
provocative installation ‘How 2 Dress’ is an assemblage of a photograph printed
onto silk habotai with
an
office fan placed underneath.
Over
-
head
suspended grapes dipped in pink
latex drip onto the floor
, to explore ideas of desire and decay.
Tajinder Dhami
explores and
speculates on what constitutes an erotic dream for a computer in h
is
five minute video ‘
Electric
Dream: Will Synthetic Intelligences Dream of Electric Sheep’.
Bee Flowers
weaves art nouveau iconography into her delicate sculpture ‘Flow: B
ody II’ whilst
Yussef
Hu
’s work ‘Ax’ is a durational performance work in which the artist juices oranges. Adam Wallace’s
painting takes apart the anatomy in a collage of form and colour.
MKLK
’s
work ‘Man
E
ater’ is a
hypnotic live performance of the artist
wearing a costume made from VHS tape extracted from hard
-
core porn films.
Xiao
-
Yang Li is fascinated by representations of human and bestial qualities in antique art, particularly
sculptural objects which embody a mix of human and animal forms from the Me
sopotamian and
Ancient Greek periods. Her paintings
are an attempt to understand the power of myth and its
relationship to the medium of paint. Using colour and form Li aims to convey a sense of the magical,
and the power of painting to imbue both human a
nd animal forms with mythical qualities.
Complementing the exhibition is a public programme of talks and live events that bring together
differing viewpoints to discuss contemporary modes of production. The Friday Salons, a regular series
in ICA programmi
ng, provide a platform for professional artistic development to young artists and
students. Panel discussions and artists talks accompany this, drawing on the issues raised in the
exhibition as well as addressing broader themes around contemporary practice
and culture.
Bloomberg
New Contemporaries is the leading UK organisation supporting emergent art practice from
British Art Schools. Since 1949 New Contemporaries has consistently provided a critical platform for
new and recent fine art graduates
primarily by means of an annual, nationally touring exhibition.
Image: Charles Richardson, Rehearsal (2014), HD video, 12 minutes. Courtesy the artist.
Press contact:
Naomi Crowther Tel: 020 7766 1407 Email: naomi.crowther@ica.org.uk
Institute of Contemporary Arts ICA
The Mall, London, SW1Y 5AH
Gallery opening hours: Tues-Sun 11am–6pm, except Thurs, 11am–9pm. Closed Mon.
Day Membership priced at £1 now applies during gallery opening hours Wed-Sun, 11am-6pm, until 9pm on Thursdays. No Day Membership will be charged on Tuesdays.
Ticket prices for day time films, talks, music events and other performances will include Day