Bathers
dal 28/6/2005 al 23/7/2005
Segnalato da
28/6/2005
Bathers
Temple Bar Gallery & Studios, Dublin
Group Show: Gary Coyle, A K Dolven, Justine Pearsall, Michael John Whelan. The title calls to mind a genre beloved of numerous European artists throughout the 19th century and well into the 20th century. The perspective taken by each of the artists further subverts the traditional stereotype, by stretching it to the point of irony.
Group Show: Gary Coyle, A K Dolven, Justine Pearsall, Michael John Whelan
The summer show at Temple Bar Gallery and Studios strikes a seasonal note.
The title intentionally calls to mind a genre beloved of numerous European
artists throughout the nineteenth century and well into the twentieth
century. While the seductive, corpulent, figures depicted by Courbet,
Cézanne and a plethora of others may have provided the vehicle for formal
and technical innovation, the typical depiction of subject (most often the
female nude) as 'object' (usually of the male gaze) fell out of fashion
with modernism. Nonetheless, the trope has become a well established point
of reference for contemporary artists many of whom have produced memorable
variations on the theme as for instance the staged photographic portraits by
Rineke Dijkstra, whose adolescent bathers gaze out so directly at the
viewer that they deflect us back to ourselves, or, the crowded beach
scenes of Italian photographer Massimo Vitali where the masses at leisure
may almost be taken as a present day reworking of Seurat's Bathers at
Asnieres.
The perspective taken by each of the four artists in this group exhibition
further subverts the traditional stereotype, either by stretching it to the
point of irony, as with the hybrid, static but beautifully sculptural form
that is the focus of London-based Norwegian artist A K Dolven's film
Between the Morning and the handbag (Courtesy - Wilkinson Gallery, London,
carlier/gebauer, Berlin) or, quite literally turning it on its head;
UK-based artist Justine Pearsall's Clip Test presents the body upside down
and in multiples as an active and playful presence capable of its own
artistry with complex configurations drawn by the synchronised swimmers
under and over water.
The bathers are a subtle but animating element in Dublin artist, now living
in Berlin, MJ Whelan's New Day which references landscape as well as local
knowledge in a video piece where sea, sky and rock dominate. The gradual
appearance of the bather into and out of a fixed frame is intermittent but
essential. Their movements are slow, deliberate, even ungainly. One figure
raises his arms, in shock maybe, as his midriff meets the water, a clue that
this piece has been shot in cool northern climes and quite close to home;
Dubiners and Joyceans will recognise the location as the famous 40 foot 'a
glorious place in the morning'.
The bather is evident only by his absence in the photograph Lovely Water no
1534, September 26th 2002 by Dublin artist Gary Coyle. In this case the
artist is the bather and the daily log that will accompany the image for the
duration of the show gives some idea of the scope and continuity of his
project. Since 1999 this has involved him documenting in photographs & words
his daily swim in the sea at the 40 foot in Sandycove, Co. Dublin. To date
he has swum over 1500 times & has taken some 4,200 photographs. Coyle's
practice, active and ever-expanding, is at some remove from those early
inert figures of which the Impressionists and their successors were so fond
but his work has precedence in the philosophy of Beuys and the walks and
photographs of Richard Long.
As a parallel event to this exhibition Temple Bar Gallery and Studios, in
partnership with Temple Bar Properties, will screen the Irish Premiere of
Watermarks a new documentary directed and produced by Yaron Zilberman.
Watermarks uncovers the story of the Women Swimmers of the Jewish sports
club Hakoah, Vienna in the 1930's. Zilberman's carefully crafted film is a
celebration of achievement and resilience. It takes the form of
conversations with the remarkable women of the Hakoah club intercut with
archive footage, newsreels and images raided from dusty family albums.
Watermarks will be shown in one screening, 10.15pm Thursday 30th June, in
Meeting House Square, Temple Bar. The screening is a free, unseated public
event. For further information or to request images for press please contact
Claire Power or in her absence Noel Kelly, t. 671 0073, email
claire@templebargallery.com
Temple Bar
5 - 9 Temple Bar
Dublin