Samuel Dowd
dal 6/2/2009 al 11/4/2009
Segnalato da
6/2/2009
Samuel Dowd
Kornhauschen, Aschaffenburg
Of Forces Unseen, Of Sight Ascending. The exhibition comprises of a two part sculptural installation - "Room-sets" - designed specifically for the gallery's distinctive display-case architecture. The work draws on ideological notions of the artist as seen during the British and North American Arts and Crafts Movement.
Kornhäuschen is pleased to present the first solo exhibition by
London based artist Samuel Dowd in Germany. The exhibition comprises
of a two part sculptural installation – ‘room-sets’ designed
specifically for the gallery’s distinctive display-case architecture.
The work draws on ideological notions of the artist as seen during
the British and North American Arts and Crafts Movement. The mid-late
nineteenth century saw the rise of interior design as a distinct
practice. John Ruskin’s treatise on ideal form and composition in
painting and architecture and his belief that the creative individual
should be a heroic worker informed the birth of the Arts and Crafts
Movement, an ideologically-led modern aesthetic movement. William
Morris and his successors promoted this fusion of the arts and crafts
- actively employing a vision of living where art, design and
architecture expressed a complete harmony, utility, and simplicity to
the good of society.
The exhibition’s uninhabited interiors, viewed from without, are
staged collections of objects and furnishings – woodcut-print
screens, display-tables, sculptural seats, and light constellations
that employ the language of ideal environments. Vacant sets, they are
a backdrop for invisible subjects and potential action – the absence
of which evoke a melancholic force unseen.
Furthermore, the artist proposes that the unseen forces of history
shape such compositions - just as Ruskin believed the divine forces
of nature shaped the landscape to its most advantageous aspect.
Ruskin cites Dante’s ‘vision of paradise’ as affirmation of his
theory that amid mountain scenery creative pre-eminence is most
likely to be fostered. His lament is that the practical and poetical
ideal society is not to be found among the alpine landscape of his
time – the creation of which was to be attempted across the European
continent in the 20th Century, with results more akin to Dante’s
darker visions. For Dowd this quest for a utopian horizontality is
refracted to become both mountain gloom and glory.
Samuel Dowd trained at Chelsea College of Art and Design and
subsequently at Wimbledon College of Art, London, in Fine Art,
Sculpture. In 2007 he graduated with distinction in MA Art: Visual
Performance from Dartington College of Arts, Devon. He is currently
based in London.
Dowd has exhibited extensively in the UK and internationally. His
solo career runs alongside a long-standing collaborative practice
with the artist-led collective SpRoUt, which he established in 2003.
Recent exhibitions/events include Manifesto Marathon at The
Serpentine Gallery, London; Salon of The Revolution at the Mestrovic
Pavillion, Zagreb, Croatia; Guestroom’s Reading Room at the ICA,
London; Beyond the Pale Yellow Amusement Arcade at Campbell Works,
London and The Space Between, at the Towner Gallery, Eastbourne. In
2008 he was selected for Lost Horizons, a £25,000 commission with the
Towner Gallery and co-led SpRoUt’s most ambitious project to-date -
Under Construction: Staging the Future, at the SC gallery in Zagreb.
He has received awards from the British Council, Arts Council
England, The Henry Moore Foundation, Artists Networks and the
European Cultural Fund. His work has been reviewed and published in
(among others) The Guardian, A-N Magazine, Kultureflash and
Artsadmin’s DIY 3: 2005.
Opening Saturday 7 February 2009 / 6pm
Kornhauschen
Webergasse am Schloss - Aschaffenburg
Free admission