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1/4/2004

Steve McQueen

Thomas Dane Gallery, London

The Directors of Thomas Dane are pleased to inaugurate their new gallery in Duke Street with works by British artist, Steve McQueen.

Under the title Into This World, McQueen brings together two pieces: Illuminer, 2001, a 15-minute video projection, and the slide projection and sound work 7th November, 2001.

The words ''Into This World...'' begin Not I, the play by Samuel Beckett that was performed in the seventies by Beckett's muse, the British actress Billie Whitelaw. During a recent conversation with Steve McQueen, Whitelaw hammered at these words again and again, recalling the intensity and sheer physicality of the performance.

Though not conceived in direct response to Beckett's work, these two pieces use some of the playwright's favourite theatrical devices: a disconcerting resonance within an extreme economy of means, a suspension of time and logic, a physical struggle required of both the viewer and the performer.

Since his first video works of the early 1990s, Steve McQueen has explored various and unexpected ways of representation. Born in London in 1969, McQueen graduated from Goldsmith's College in 1993 before studying at Tisch School of the Arts in New York University. In 1999 he was awarded the Turner Prize and in 2002 was awarded an OBE. McQueen lives and works in Amsterdam.

Voice - both as sound and bearer of meaning and as language - as both elocution and abstraction, have been McQueen's prime interests in recent years. Into This World, the artist's title for the presentation together of Illuminer, 2001, and 7th November, 2001, sets up a very literal yet enigmatic point of entry into the two works.

''Into this world...'' are the opening words of Samuel Beckett's Not I, performed in the seventies by Beckett's muse, the British actress Billie Whitelaw. During a recent conversation with Steve McQueen, Whitelaw hammered at these words again and again, recalling the intensity and sheer physicality of the performance.

Though not conceived in direct relation to Beckett's work, these two pieces relate to some of the playwright's favourite theatrical devices: a disconcerting resonance within an extreme economy of means, a suspension of time and logic, and a physical struggle demanded of both the viewer and the performer.

In Illuminer, a 15-minute video projection, the cold glow of an off-camera television lightens an initially empty bedroom. A vibrating dark silhouette - the artist - brutally enters the set and stands out against the bed sheets like a retinal imprint long after the eyes are closed. Then follows a gradual state of semiconsciousness, disrupted by the lyrical blurring and sharpening of the image. The sound of the television and the military broadcast add to the hypnotic effect, and elevate the mundane setting to pictorial transcendence and abstraction.

Billie Whitelaw recalls a similar disintegration while performing Not I and ''stripped away anything physical - clothes, limbs, flesh until (she) was left with (her) voice, a voice, just voice...''

The voice is again the overwhelming feature in 7th November, a single slide projection and sound installation which combines absolute visual stillness with an uninterrupted flow of narrative. Random, mental connections between image and sound begin to appear as the poignant confession unfolds, gradually taking the shape of an automatic yet vehement performance.

The Gallery, Thomas Dane's first permanent space in the West End of London, will present solo and group exhibitions by several generations of British and international artists, working in a wide variety of media.

The exhibition is open Wednesday to Friday 11am to 6pm. Saturdays from 11am to 4pm and otherwise by appointment.

Thomas Dane Limited
11 Duke Street St James's London SW1Y 6BN

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