Anna Barham
Jason Dungan
Iain Hales
Elliott Dodd
Steffen Levring
Brighid Lowe
Sophie Michael
Luke McCreadie
Fabian Peake
Florence Peake
Roy Voss
Eleanor Wright
Maria Zahle
Phyllida Barlow
The exhibition explores the processes an artist navigates in the act of making and prioritises such moments over any completed object or final outcome. Opening exhibition of a new hub for contemporary art.
Switch, selected by internationally renowned artist Phyllida Barlow, is the opening
exhibition at Baltic 39, a new hub for contemporary art located on High Bridge in
the heart of Newcastle upon Tyne.
Switch builds upon What do artists do?, a time-based project organised by Barlow in
2008 that examined the notion of change in artistic practice and the role of the
exhibition. The exhibition at BALTIC 39 explores further the processes an artist
navigates in the act of making and prioritises such moments over any completed
object or final outcome. The disparate practices presented, spanning performance,
sculpture, drawing, photography and film-making, will be shown, and often made or
modified, in a setting that demands the re-consideration of an artwork's centre.
The exhibition also provides a stage to investigate the relationship between the
work and its audience; when should an audience see an artwork, what is it that the
audience should experience and how does an audience modify the processes of making?
Rather than simply locating a studio situation within the gallery, the exhibition
aims to offer its participants, both artists and audience members, a common arena in
which to share, test and understand the performative complexities of artistic
production.
The exhibition will culminate in a weekend of performances and events, details of
which will be announced soon.
Exhibiting artists:
Anna Barham. Born in 1974, Barham graduated from the Slade School of Fine Art in 2001. Her work
spans a variety of media including sculpture, performance, video and drawing. For
SWITCH, Barham presents a new video work that will be revised and updated during the
course of the exhibition.
Jason Dungan. Born in 1978, Dungan graduated from the Slade School of Fine Art in 2003. For SWITCH
he will present an evolving and silent projection of webcam videos. Originally
conceived as an online YouTube stream, the work has been adapted for the purposes of
this show.
Iain Hales. Born in 1977, Hales graduated from the Edinburgh College of Art in 2005 and from the
Slade School of Fine Art in 2009. Using disparate materials, Hales will present The
Sacred and Profane Love Machine 2012, a floor-based composition of sculptural
elements which will be adapted and regrouped during the course of the exhibition.
Elliott Dodd and Steffen Levring. Born 1978 and 1982 respectively, Dodd and Levring graduated from the Slade School of
Fine Art in 2002. They are especially interested in the intensity of sound. For the
opening night of SWITCH, and again during the exhibition's closing weekend, they
will flood the gallery in low frequency sound to create an 'extreme base heavy
physical sensation'.
Brighid Lowe. Born in 1965, Lowe teaches at the Slade School of Fine Art. For SWITCH she will
remake Evidence 1999-2012, a floor-based installation that exists as an archive of
invitation cards to several thousand private views around the world.
Sophie Michael. Born 1985, Michael works in both film and photography. She is currently studying at
the Royal Academy Schools after graduating from the Slade School of Fine Art in
2008. For SWITCH she presents a double photographic image, Pink Wall/Blue Wall 2011.
A new 16mm film will be made during the course of the exhibition to be presented
later.
Luke McCreadie. Born in 1985, McCreadie graduated from the Slade School of Fine Art in 2008 and
2011. He works with film and sculpture, spanning and combining a range of different
media. For SWITCH, McCreadie presents a projected screen-based work entitled Does
the Object Stare Back? 2012. He will also realise a collaborative performance for
the opening of the exhibition and again during its closing weekend.
Fabian Peake. Born in 1942, Peake is an artist and writer. For SWITCH, Peake has constructed a
large wall-based work which incorporates both image and text. The work is in part a
document of its own making, composed of images of Peake moving through the space
during its creation as he was periodically caught on camera.
Florence Peake. Born in 1973, Peake has an MA in Contemporary Performance Making from Brunel
University. Her work and performances are of an interdisciplinary nature, often
involving painting, drawing, sculpture as well as found objects. For SWITCH, Peake
presents STUPID STUPID 2012, a sound-based work and will stage a collaborative dance
performance in the gallery later on in the exhibition period.
Roy Voss. Born in 1960, Voss graduated from Maidstone College of Art in 1983 and Goldsmiths
College in 1992. For SWITCH he presents Love in Another Country 2012, a two-part
sculpture which takes the form of a lighthouse presented on a circular table-like
form. These are separated, prompting dialogue between the two gallery spaces.
Eleanor Wright. Born in 1984, Wright graduated from Chelsea College of Art and Design in 2007 and
from the Slade School of Fine Art in 2010. For SWITCH she presents PROW 2012, a
combination of floor-based sculptures and panels that loosely reference both the
arch of the Gateshead Millennium Bridge as well as the jewellery of Zaha Hadid.
Maria Zahle. Born in 1979, Zahle graduated from the Slade School of Fine Art in 2005 and the
Royal Academy Schools in 2009. For SWITCH, Zahle will create a series of wall-based
'stripe' works that will be painted directly to the walls of the gallery. The
paintings will appear in the space in different places and at different times over
the course of the exhibition.
Opening Thursday 5 April
Baltic 39
31 - 39 High Bridge, Newcastle upon Tyne
Wednesday - Sunday 12.00 - 18.00
Admission free