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13/3/2012

Baptist Coelho and Nadia Kaabi-Linke

Pump House Gallery, London

Delfina Foundation, in partnership with Pump House Gallery and The Creative India Foundation, are delighted to announce an exhibition of new work by Baptist Coelho and Nadia Kaabi-Linke, curated in collaboration with George Unsworth.

Baptist Coelho (Mumbai, India) and Nadia Kaabi- Linke (born in Tunisia, lives and works in Berlin) were awarded 12 week residencies at Delfina Foundation. During their stay they were invited to respond to the environment surrounding the Pump House Gallery and to explore its social and physical landscape through engaging with the people in the local borough of Wandsworth. This research served as the starting point for new work presented as part of this exhibition. During their residencies, Coelho and Kaabi-Linke investigated how we communicate individual and historic experiences of social conflict. The resulting sculptures and installations have been developed through close personal encounters with individual participants. Coelho's work engages in our perception of the military and events specific to World War II, whilst Kaabi-Linke explores the marks and scars of domestic abuse. The enormous breadth of these themes allows for reflection on the ways in which we approach and understand psychological experiences.

Through the exploration of the history and geography of Battersea Park, Baptist Coelho has developed work related to the park's significance during World War II. In particular, Coelho produced work at the specific sites where bombs fell, utilising both the physical sites as well as the incident report forms that were published and stored within local archives. Coelho explores the role of the park as a collective resource made available to the public through the provision of allotments, and its function as a support structure for the war campaign. This history has informed a series of performative acts in the park during which Coelho would interact with members of the public whilst dressed as a British soldier. These interactions evolved into a series of installations where Coelho draws on conflicting representations of the soldier as both an individual as well as a symbol of force and authority, to gather responses, recollections and ephemera that comprise his artworks.

Nadia Kaabi-Linke will premiere the first works from her ongoing project Impunities. During the residency, Kaabi-Linke worked in close collaboration with several shelter organisations to make visible acts of physical and psychological domestic violence. Impunities presents a series of glass panes that have suspended within them the impressions of scars obtained through acts of domestic abuse, a form of violence commonly hidden behind a wall of silence, and often unreported to the authorities. Kaabi- Linke has used forensic processes to present these physical and emotional scars, creating an archive of latent crimes. Social States reflects the depth of engagement and exploration in the practices of these two international artists during their residencies. Their contemporary and international approach to social engagement continues to develop and translate complex scenarios and historical events, as well as transforming private and personal perceptions of society. The exhibition is supported by Arts Council England and Sula Wines.

Baptist Coelho (b. 1977, India) frequently merges personal research with collaborations from various cultures, geographies and histories. His work begins to take the form of human-shaped media- landscapes which often contend with history, the environment, conflict, emotion and randomness. As part of his practice, Coelho incorporates installation, video, sound, photography, found objects, site- specific works and public-art projects. He lives and works in Mumbai, India Solo Exhibitions include Grand Palais, Bern (2009); Project 88, Mumbai (2009); Visual Arts Gallery, Delhi (2009) and BIAD, Birmingham (2006). His work has been exhibited at galleries and institutions, including Contemporary Art Centre, Lithuania (2011-12); Zacheta National Art Gallery, Poland (2011); Gwangju Museum of Art, South Korea (2010) and Devi Art Foundation, India (2008). Nadia Kaabi-Linke was born in 1978 in Tunis to a Ukrainian mother and Tunisian father. Her installations, objects and pictorial works are embedded in urban contexts, intertwined with memory and geographically and politically constructed identities. Kaabi-Linke is represented by Green Cardamom, London and Lawrie Shabibi Dubai.

She held her first major solo show Tatort at Galerie Christian Hosp, Berlin in 2010. She has participated in international group exhibitions which include Drawn from Life, Green Cardamom (2009 – 10) and Abbot Hall Art Gallery, Kendall, UK (2011); 9th Sharjah Biennial (2009); El arte contemporáneo en el Magrreb: dos orillas, at Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid (2011); The Future of a Promise: the first Pan- Arab contemporary art exhibition at the 54th Venice Biennial, Venice (2011). In 2009 she was awarded the Jury Prize by the Alexandria Biennale. In 2011, she was a recipient of the Abraaj Capital Art Prize. Delfina Foundation is an independent, non-profit foundation dedicated to facilitating artistic exchange and developing creative practice through residencies, partnerships and public programming, with a special focus on international collaborations with the Greater Middle East & North Africa. Delfina Foundation works through a constantly evolving network of partners. This first-ever collaboration with Creative India Foundation and Pump House Gallery saw the first Indian artist-in- residence at Delfina Foundation, alongside an artist from the Greater Middle East and a British curator, creating international connections between creative practitioners. In 2013, Delfina Foundation will expand into the building next door in Catherine Place SW1, doubling the number of residencies as well as the size of their exhibition space.

The Pump House Gallery is a public contemporary visual arts space on the lakeside in Battersea Park, South London. The gallery is owned, managed and funded by Wandsworth Council and plays a leading role in the cultural life of the borough. It is the highest profile public visual arts space in Wandsworth, attracting over 30,000 visitors a year. Collaborative partnerships are central to Pump House Gallery’s future curatorial vision: to create opportunities for artists to explore new modes of practice and enquiry, engage with social and civic spaces, extend the cultural experience of audiences and create catalytic sites for exchange, dialogue and debate.

The Creative India Foundation was founded in August 2010 to promote awareness of Indian art and culture and enhance its appreciation throughout the world. As its first initiative, The Creative India Foundation has undertaken the task of enhancing the presence of Indian sculptors globally. Although India has one of the world’s oldest sculptural traditions, opportunities for contemporary public display and exhibitions of outdoor sculpture are limited. The Creative India Foundation has been creating opportunities for Indian sculptors to explore and push their creative horizons internationally as part of residency programs, exhibitions, and sculpture festivals. This project is The Creative India Foundation’s first reciprocal exchange with the UK and it will enable an Indian artist and a British curator to engage in a cross-cultural context, thus enabling The Creative India Foundation to re-invest this experience into local networks, as well as its long-term plan for a residency programme and sculpture park in India.

Image: Baptist Coelho “Why is he here?” 2011-12 Performance Photo: Miranda Sharp Courtesy the artist and Delfina Foundation

Press Contacts: Kristina McLean at Sutton PR Kristina@suttonpr.com +44 (0) 207 183 3577

Laura Eldret at Pump House Gallery info@pumphousegallery.org.uk +44 (0) 208 871 7572

Artist tour and talk: 14 March, 2012 at 18:00, followed by an opening reception at 18:30 until 20:30 Monthly Do at PHG: 18 March 11:00-15:00 led by one of the exhibiting artists Baptist Coelho The Monthly Do is an opportunity for families and individuals of all ages to drop-in, see the show and get hands on with some art making. Once a month, through the year, contemporary artists set the scene with activities, from print making to music making, to get you creative

Opening Reception: Wednesday, 14 March 18:00 – 20:30

Pump House Gallery Battersea Park, London Opening Times: Wednesday, Thursday, Friday 11am - 5pm. Saturday and Sunday 11am - 4pm. Closed Monday and Tuesday and during exhibition installations Admission free

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