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The success of good installation hinges on the tenuous and often
uneasy relationships between the artwork (and, hence, the artist),
the physical area it occupies, and the viewer. Activating and redefining
that space, for both the body and the mind of the visitor, must
be the overriding intention. Two exhibitions held recently at The
Physics Room, arcanum, by Fiona Gunn and Attached,
by Frances Joseph (both part of the ongoing 3x2 Series) proved to
be succinct examples of what works and what doesn't in one of the
least perimetered fields of contemporary practice.
Gunn's work stylishly illustrated the point that installation doesn't
have to reach out and bite you to be interactive. Entering a darkened
room, drawn in by the sporadic whirring of a cast, suspended chair,
arcanum engaged both physically and psychologically. This
was work that invaded both your personal space and the corridors
of your mind, which continued to turn over the possibilities long
after leaving.
The written material supplied outside Gunn's recondite room included
a delicate piece of aphorism by Clarice Lispector: "But if I wait
for understanding to accept things, the act of surrender will never
take place". And to enter was to surrender, to commit oneself, at
least for a moment, to a world in which you had no bearings or control.
A chair was provided, but it was one in which even the most athletic
or determined visitor could never sit. The windows were snugly buffeted,
and admitted only the dimmest of lights. Comfortable reason was
turned on its head and the traditional rules did not apply.
Such a surrender is, necessarily, an unsettling experience and Gunn's
room reverberated with a mysteriousness that bordered on the sinister.
The graunching mechanism that powered the chair's sudden, shuddering
rotations only added to the surreal atmosphere, completing each
stage to face in a different direction, but always operating from
the same fixed axis. The windows were stuffed with what appeared
to be pillow innards, gently but firmly corseted into place by diagonally
crossing threads. These served the purpose of rendering the windows
useless, and of filtering a strange and unearthly light into the
room, but they also brought to mind the wakeless nights of an insomniac,
pillow after pillow fending away the light and always the noise
of the chair, like the lurching inconsistency of a ticking clock
in the darkness.
The Physics Room's name is conducive to wordplay, and Gunn made
reference to several possibilities here, the plain school chair
alluding to both the ceaseless boredom of a university lecture and
the physical logistics of suspending a chair from the ceiling. Gunn's
work isn't couch-potato stuff, it seeks to involve you and make
you work - promoting the kind of sweat-inducing mental adventure
that surrealists like Magritte dreamed up when they went in search
of the jamais vu, the 'never before seen' in the most banal of everyday
objects.
Perhaps it was just because Gunn's cryptic understatement demanded
such complete attention and participation that the work in the next
room appeared to be well, a little low-impact. Lazy is a mean word
to use about anyone, especially a new kid in town, but it seemed
to me that the multi-coloured jumble that made up Attached
suffered from a lack of cohesion and impetus all too amply suggested
by the limp assortment of clothing with which Joseph had covered
the gallery's floor. If lazy is too cruel, perhaps half-hearted
is a better description. The premise was nice, based on a kind of
homesick smuggling of treasured possessions across the Tasman, but
it didn't translate visually, and suffered by being too near such
a strong work as Gunn's. If arcanum was active, attached was passive,
and it produced minimal energy for the viewer to return.
Linking the diversely sourced materials with the famous patchwork
quilt of the Canterbury Plains, attached also made reference to
the stubbornly human insistence upon clinging to material possessions
in an attempt to somehow slow the passage of time. Ultimately, despite
the presence of the ubiquitous Michaelangelo Creation of Adam T
shirt and the flannel sheets in a pattern familiar to anyone who
has ever been on a school camp in New Zealand, this was a personal
experience. For the artist, I mean, as the fabrics she selected
were either originally worn by her, used in costumes she designed,
or associated with particular events or people in her life. Of course,
it was possible to make your own connections, but the overall impression
was less one of fond recollection than mild irritation at what appeared
to be little short of self-indulgence.
Unlike the complete absorption created by arcanum, Joseph's
work was vague and unfocused. Sure, you 'got' it (in fact, it was
all earnestly spelled out for you), but the impact was limited,
and it didn't really engage. Gunn's work succeeded predominantly
because the artist remained present in spirit, the installation
was alive around you, you were a part of it and, at any moment that
door could have slammed shut. With Attached, however, the
artist had already left the building, the life was gone, and the
trail was cold.
Felicity Milburn
01 June 1997
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