Field Work
The Niland Gallery Galway.
18 August – 10 September 2011
Colm Clarke & Tonya McMullan // Alissa Kleist & Ruaidhrí Lennon // Fiona Larkin // Duncan Ross
Curated by Charlotte Bosanquet.
Cultural Fieldwork
Field Work was conceived to forge links between a creative network of curators, artists and writers between Belfast, Galway and Dublin. The premise of the exhibition was a challenge, involving pressures such as the available timeframe, resources, and the parameters of producing an exhibition which had such boundaries to adhere to. An integral part of the project, was for each of the participants to become immersed in their surroundings, by relocating to Galway for the duration of production and development of artworks for the exhibition. In order to maximize this opportunity and encounter Galway, its community and gain an understanding of the contemporary art scene, members of Engage Art Studios and locally based artists generously assented the participants to stay with them over a period of one week. In this setting, the objective of staying with local practitioners aspired to influence the development of new forms of artistic practice with an emphasis on place, context and local identity. Insight into the milieu of Galway-based cultural and social environments increased the potential for deeper understanding throughout the process of research.
Traditionally, field work is defined as site-specific research conducted to assemble data pertaining to studies, usually with a scientific bearing. This project related to cultural field work, where the artists took inspiration from tradition, history and social structures through the artistic domain. In Phenomenology of Perception, the French philosopher Maurice Merleau-Ponty stated “We must therefore rediscover, after the natural world, the social world, not as an object or sum of objects, but as a permanent field or dimension of existence”, neatly illustrating the humanistic approach taken by the artists whilst examining the workings of culture, and exploring the historical division between nature and society. By emphasizing the development of a sense of place in the natural, social and built environment, it accentuated the impact on human ecology throughout the period of creative development. The aim to cultivate theoretical, discursive and artistic responses throughout this process culminated in critically aware, sustainable work with integral qualities that remained true to the initial brief.
The modus operandi behind Field Work was influenced substantially by deliberately choosing to locate the project in Galway. Using the metaphor of the journey, participants in the exhibition alluded to physical, mental and conceptual elements in their artistic responses, articulated according to cultural predilection and evaluation, by taking their source, path and ultimate goal into account. Alongside the production of work, a vital component of the project was instigating the development of successful artistic networks. Through the coalescence of geographically diverse practitioners fostering an environment where the synergy created from working in partnership with individuals, collectives or institutions, resulted in mutually beneficial exchanges, and the laying of foundations for future collaborations, the benefits of establishing sustainable professional relationships was highlighted.
The challenge of arriving in a different location, with the pressure of engaging and responding to the surroundings was met with excitement, nervousness and determination by the artists participating in Field Work. The pressure of delivering an accomplished piece of work, thematically encapsulating links with Galway, over a four day period was a daunting prospect. An added clause was tendered to two pairs of artists, who were asked to work collaboratively, in contrast to their usual solo practices. Compromise and risk were discussed in relation to the nature of the project, yet as the process evolved, the necessity to be decisive became a significant feature in preparing work, and the outcome was seen as positive both in an individual and collaborative context. The research-based focus of the exhibition has led all of the artists to consider experimenting, and perhaps adopting a similar approach to future endeavors, testing the constraints of their practice by introducing a timeframe to complete work.
The evolution of Field Work has been challenging in a myriad of ways: given the tight four day deadline to create work, and the research-based process integral to the concept, it has been a highly pressured environment and has positioned the artists' outside of their comfort zones. In unity with the curatorial concept, the artists’ have undertaken various strategies to respond to the space, both within the gallery setting and off-site, using tangible and ephemeral methodologies to manifest their work. There is a deliberate strategy to create a relationship with Galway by engaging and enhancing the viewers experience in unexpected ways, through interventions, performance and documentary evidence. The complexity and integrated layers of meaning in the artworks can be explored through the forged links with Galway, whether in a permanent and physical manner or in a deliberately transient or historical capacity.
This exhibition contains a diverse body of work featuring pieces that extend beyond the confines of the gallery and the duration of the exhibition. Works with an annual incarnation, or dual function between aesthetic merit and practicality, negotiate the traditional boundaries that dictate exhibition structure. The differing artistic sensibilities encompassed in Field Work are triumphant in responding to the curatorial concept, and open a discourse on how to traverse the challenges, limitations and unexpected outcomes borne of working on an experimental, process-based exhibition.
There is a cohesion between the artworks and factors at play that are central to the exhibition. A strong dialogical aesthetic emerges from the assemblage of multidisciplinary responses, encouraging discourse that supports each autonomous artwork, and also when experiencing the culminative effect of the pieces in synchrony. Each artist has created work that considers the implications of the project, responding in succinct, visually stimulating and thought provoking pieces. Their methodologies differ, however they are united in contextualising these particular artworks thematically, through concepts of temporality, the resonance of their location, and on the processes involved in developing work that has evolved from the theoretical to practical manifestations within such a condensed timeframe.
Rowan Sexton is an independent curator based in Dublin. She has previously worked in IMMA, the National Gallery and the Hugh Lane.
