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8/6/2007

Mat Collishaw and Anthony Goicolea

Haunch of Venison, Zurich

Two solo shows

In their first exhibition with Haunch of Venison Zürich, British artist Mat Collishaw (born 1961) and Cuban-American artist Anthony Goicolea (born 1971) explore the rich psychological possibilities inherent in myth-making. Combining the ancient strategies of allegory and fable with modern superstition and urban myth, the artists seek to expose the desires and anxieties that underlie contemporary existence. The resulting drawings, photographs and sculptural installations are at once disturbing and bewitching, revealing the darker side of human nature. For example, in Collishaw's treatment of the myth of Ganymede, projected onto a screen of smoke, the abduction of a child acquires a disquieting contemporary resonance.

Mat Collishaw (born 1966)
A key theme within Mat Collishaw's work is the use of photography and installations to create contemporary equivalents for the art of the past. In a series of new works made for the exhibition Collishaw has re-imagined the myths of Leda, Ganymede and Romulus and Remus, repositioning them as narratives with contemporary relevance, whilst referencing historic treatments such as those by Rubens. Collishaw is also fascinated by the poetic and symbolic potential of the fantastic, as explored in his series of images of scenes from Shakespeare's 'A Midsummer Night's Dream'. Collishaw's work explores the ambiguous relationship between representation and reality, often using display strategies which make this disjunction apparent.

Collishaw is a key figure in the important generation of British artists who emerged from Goldsmith's College in the late 1980s. He participated in Freeze in 1988 and since his first solo exhibition in 1990 he has exhibited widely internationally. His work is in important museum collections including Tate, London and Centre Pompidou, Paris, and can be seen at this year’s Venice Biennale in a two-person exhibition curated by James Putnam. Collishaw lives and works in London.

Anthony Goicolea (born 1971)
Based in Brooklyn, Anthony Goicolea constructs new mythic narratives redolent with symbolic suggestion. In his large-scale photographs, lone or disconnected figures move mysteriously and with dubious motives through bleak, often unsettling landscapes. The imagery in these psychologically-charged compositions draws on a range of references from the Gothic literature of Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein' to the hooded adolescents of contemporary films such as 'The Blair Witch Project' and 'Donnie Darko'. In their haunting depictions of a natural world gone awry, Goicolea's drawings delve even deeper into the realm of the fantastical. Ethereal figures and animals populate topsy-turvy landscapes across which telegraph poles stretch interminably. Goicolea renders these intensely personal visions in mixed media, their many layers suggesting the terrors that lie beneath the controlled and ordered surface of the conscious mind.

Goicolea's work is held in important public collections such as the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Guggenheim Museum of Art and The Museum of Modern Art in New York. He has also exhibited widely in Europe and Asia, notably at the Groninger Museum in the Netherlands and the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia in Madrid, Spain. Goicolea lives and works in New York.

Image: Mat Collishaw, Leda, 2006 Marble, mirror, video projector and player 200 x 200 x 60cm © Mat Collishaw 2007

Haunch of Venison
Lessingstrasse 5 - Zurich

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