Why the long face?
A Horse walks into a Bar, Castlefield Gallery.
Chiz Turnross’s work in Windowlene and white-wash, Untitled (2010), on Castlefield Gallery’s exterior windows is a busy tableau of wings, teeth, legs and scratches where the subjects are as equivocal as some of the themes explored inside. A Horse walks into a Bar is a group show of nine established and emergent artists that hopes to reflect ‘our increasingly uneasy relationship with the natural world’.
This uneasiness prevails first in Mark Wallinger’s black-and-white photographic print, The Full English (1993). The image depicts the unconvincing wearing of a horse costume, with the back half stood up the horse looks like an arched cat defending its territory. At night, in bushes behind terraced houses, the contrast between subject and setting adds to the awkward and voyeuristic feel of the piece.
A more pronounced tension between humour and meaning is evident in Corey Arnold’s Swans are Evil (2003). In the print the photographer sticks up his middle finger at two swans. Immature angst finds little audience in the indifferent birds. The comic approach of the first half of the exhibition is summarised in one visitor-book entry reading simply ‘Neigh!’ However A Horse walks into a Bar’s punch line turns out to be rather more contemplative.
Ever-sinister sculptures by Maddi Nicholson adorn the gallery’s double-height atrium space. Sixty simple wooden bird-boxes pepper the wall, each features a small model or two standing proudly on their roof. Penthouse apartments available for rent, good views, interesting neighbours (2008), alludes to ideas of ritual and mythology in communities. One male plastic robed figure stands with his walking stick; his head has been replaced with that of a pig. On an adjacent bird-box a goat with a doll’s head stands on top of a plastic slice of pie. A freak show of human and animal forms reminiscent of the work of the Sid (the bad kid) in Toy Story (1995), Nicholson’s work references our personal relationships with the natural world built through child’s play and collective, iconoclastic perceptions of animals entrenched through ritual, folklore and culture.
These perceptions are explored through Dan Staincliffe’s innovative approach to recording the fauna we share our everyday space with. His site-specific project, Fauna Automata (2010), sees the artist’s mechanical structures (comprised of pine, brick, string and disposable cameras) installed in urban spaces, where they allow wild animals to trigger their own photographs. Four of these rough, camouflaged machines have been produced for the exhibition and are presented alongside images they have captured of Castlefield’s faunal denizens. Photographs of rats and pigeons triggering the machines by taking bait speak of the nature of survival of our cities’ more illusive residents.
Whereas Staincliffe’s work reveals an unknown or unappreciated relationship with the natural world, Richard Billingham’s Leopard (Zoo series) (2007) offers a gripping critique of established norms in humankind’s control of nature. The single-shot video projection is a sad and powerful recording of an overweight leopard continually pacing its zoo enclosure.
Environmentalist concerns move to activism in the work of the Ultimate Holding Company. The collective have permanently tattooed designs of 100 of Britain’s endangered species onto 100 volunteers, who are now life-long ambassadors for their respective creatures. A large black-and-white portrait of one of the freshly inked ambassadors powerfully communicates the permanence of the project and alludes to the tragedy unfolding everyday in the fate of thousands of Earth’s endangered species. ext Inked (2009-2010) is the sort of powerful mix of art, activism, design and culture that will reverberate and leave a lasting, tangible legacy.
Our idea of nature has long been associated with human well-being and improvement. Since the Garden of Eden, proceeding parkscapes have married perceived natural environments with human betterment. A Horse walks into a Bar succeeds in asking not how nature can better us, but how we must better our relationship with the natural.
A Horse walks into a Bar runs until August 8 2010 and features Corey Arnold, Richard Billingham, Andrew Bracey, Lorraine Burrell, Maddi Nicholson, Dan Staincliffe, Chiz Turnross, UHC and Mark Wallinger.
Monday, 28 June 2010
Detail from Splash, 2008.