THE DINNER
Fiona Gunn and Cris Cree Brown
December 5, 2001 - January 2002
A collaboration between Christchurch based, (and real life partners)
artist Fiona Gunn and composer Chris Cree Brown, The Dinner provides
an intriguing link between their individual practices. Gunn's beautifully
austere and deceptively simple works have always drawn on their
surrounding space and architecture to create evocative and meditative
environments, while Brown works across the realms of composition
to be performed, and soundscapes which envelop and contain the listener.
The Dinner transforms the stark white gallery into the setting
for an elaborate dining situation. Described by the artists as "an
attempt to celebrate the ordinary", The Dinner presents a beautifully
dressed antique table and chairs, ready and waiting for the meal
to be served, and (in a wry reference to the realities of actual
dining situations) complete with high-chair and child's toy. However,
the usually vibrant atmosphere of a dinner party is diffused; firstly
by wrapping the table, chairs and settings in more than 10 kilometers
of cotton, and by the addition of reverberation to the accompanying
sounds of the guests. Although human presence is alluded to, they
appear as ghostings or traces, allowing us to bring our own memories
and experiences to the scenario.
The artists would like to thank Wilburn Antiques for their support
of this project.
Reviews & Essays
The
Dinner - Fiona Gunn and Chris Cree Brown
Essay by Emma Bugden
in The Physics
Room Annual 2001
ISBN 0-9582359-1-0
In
praise of the dinner
The Press, 2001 Dec. 12, p. 36
Dunbar, Anna.
The Dinner, an art collaboration by composer Chris Cree Brown and
sculptor Fiona Gunn.
Making a Meal of it
The Listener, Jan 14, p.53
Sally Blundell
about The Dinner
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