Marcus Coates: "Transformation" Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, Japan

Transformation Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo 29 October 2010 - 30 January 2011 AES F, Matthew Barney, Simon Birch, Francesco Clemente, Marcus Coates, Jan Fabre, Gabríela Friðriksdóttir, Naoki Ishikawa, Bharti Kher, Lee Bul. Motohiko Odani, Junya Oikawa. Jagannath Panda, Patricia Piccinini, Shahzia Sikander, Sputniko!, Jana Sterbak, Sarah Sze, Masakatsu Takagi, Tunga, Apichatpong Weerasethakul To live is to change. We change daily as our cells regenerate and we learn new things, as times change and we encounter new environments, and as we give play to our imagination. Under the theme "transformation," this exhibition explores the boundary between humans and non-humans. In all ages and countries, countless images and artworks have been created on the theme of transformation. Japan, in particular, is brimming with rich images on this theme, from the legends of old to the manga and anime characters of today. So, why "transformation" now? With to the spread of the Internet, the development of the global economy, advances in technology, and so on, the traditional forms "humans" take have started to become blurred, and a diversity greater than anything seen before has begun to emerge. At this exhibition, a variety of images of things that traverse the human and non-human - including animals, machines, imaginary creatures and bodies with different genetic compositions - will be unveiled through paintings, sculptures, video, archives and symposiums. Together, the "transforming" forms presented express as a single omen our hopes, dreams and fears. The artworks, created by 21 individual artists and groups from 15 countries over a period stretching from the 1980s through to the present, will demonstrate the possibilities and meanings of change today. What is Tokyo Art Meeting? Tokyo Art Meeting presents a range of possibilities for new art by facilitating encounters between various genres of expression, mainly in the field of contemporary art but also including design, architecture and other specialist fields. Under the theme "transformation," the first meeting sees art encounter anthropology. Also, in cooperation with Tokyo University of the Arts, a range of displays, performances and symposiums will be held as part of Tokyo Geidai Trans Week with the aim of helping nurture future generations. Image: Marcus Coates still image from Toge Rice Ritual, 2006 HD Single Channel Video (MC0017)

Miles Thurlow: "DEADPAN", The Royal Standard, Liverpool, UK

DEADPAN The Royal Standard, Liverpool, UK Liverpool Biennial 2010 28 October -28 November http://www.the-royal-standard.com Amidst a ridiculous tableau of minuscule beasts, repetitive streaks and a gargantuan lobster, DEADPAN presents several newly commissioned works produced especially for the exhibition. From sloppy seconds to flying willies, aside institutional critique and the highly crafted sleek, DEADPAN expands The Royal Standards exhibition spaces, overflowing with large-scale sculptural works, drawing, installation, animation and performance alongside the inaugural presentation of work within The Royal Standard's Sculpture Garden; brought together for DEADPAN along with key works borrowed from collections including The Black Room, a seminal 7 piece installation by Jamie Shovlin, presented here for the first time on British soil. With a good glug of irony and a sarcastic nod, DEADPAN gives a kick up the arse to the utter mess of an art world at a point of over saturation by questioning strategies used by artists to make new work. Considering mimicry and the referential alongside the blatancy of homage, DEADPAN presents with barefaced cheek a pastichised viewpoint of art with lampooning consequences; providing a glimpse into the dirty world of satire within contemporary art today.  David Sherry Jamie Shovlin Jess Flood-Paddock Jock Mooney Josephine Flynn Laura Ford Laurina Paperina Miles Thurlow Noel Clueit Toby Huddlestone The Royal Standard Unit 3, Vauxhall Business Centre 131 Vauxhall Rd Liverpool L3 6BN

Workplace Gallery at The Manchester Contemporary , UK - 28-31 October 2010

Workplace Gallery is pleased to announce our participation at The Manchester Contemporary Booth 2 The Manchester Contemporary Spinningfields, Manchester, UK http://www.themanchestercontemporary.co.uk/ 28-31 October 2010 Arcade, Bureau, Ceri Hand Gallery, David Risley Gallery, Faye Fleming & Partner, Man & Eve, Mermaid & Monster, Nettie Horn, Seventeen, The International 3, Workplace Gallery, WORKS|PROJECTS, and Emin International For a full list of available works please contact info@workplacegallery.co.uk image: Mike Pratt Bombay-Badboy pII, 2010 (detail) crystacal, wood, enamel paint, foam, wire, wool fabric and parcel tape 159 x 65 x 106 cm (MP0120) Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery

Eric Bainbridge: "Facon, Plads og Kulør", Rundetårn, Copenhagen

Facon, Plads & Kulør (Shape, Space and Colour) RUNDETAARN, Copenhagen, Denmark 9 October -21 November http://www.rundetaarn.dk/ A large floor show featuring 26 artists, exploring the boundaries between painting and photography, design, sculpture and installations - an exhibition focusing on the work of Ib Braase: "From my younger sister's room". Parked art If visitors get the impression they are standing in a basement car park when they enter the "Shape, Space and Colour" exhibition, they are not far off the mark. Long neon tubes cast a sharp light over the exhibited works, standing side-by-side, as if Rundetaarn's huge exhibition hall was the most decorative car park in Europe. "We wanted to show how clean and beautiful the over 900 m² room can look when it is used matter-of-factly, without excuses, without interruptions to overview and false temporary walls. We wanted it to be a floorshow with the best works - with artists who can and dare to use all kinds of materials", explain Hans E. Madsen and Torgny Wilcke, the two artists behind the exhibition. Taking inspiration from Ib Braase's work, 'From my younger sister's room', which occupies 4.24 m² of floor space, all participants in the exhibition were asked to create a work of similar size - about the size of a car. "We picture the works being positioned like cars in a car park, where some are parked perfectly, and others hastily, roughly, badly, or terribly", say the organisers. Boundaries Apart from Ib Brasse's work (1979), the 26 floor works in 'Shape, Space and Colour' were created and intended for the exhibition, and contemporary works from 2010. The works feature a variety of materials and expressions, and explore the boundaries between painting and photography, sculpture, design and installation. "The boundaries between the traditional forms have not disappeared, but the ideas behind sculpture, painting, photography and installation art have been influenced. Rather than throwing out these concepts, we choose to actively engage with the boundaries of these forms and work with them", explain the two organisers. They raise Eric Barnbridge as an example of an artist whose sculptures can be mounted on the wall, flat, or built directly without shape, and composed in a way reminiscent of the painting method, with the room serving as the artist's canvas. Everday objects - a means to reflection Another thing the works have in common is the exhibitors' choice of materials, which are both classic, and drawn from everyday surroundings. Cupboard doors made from cheap veneer, plastic bowls, wigs, and chair legs have been put in a context which gives the objects new form and meaning. The title, 'Shape, Space and Colour', hints at this idea of everyday objects being adopted by the art works as a means to encourage reflection about the reality we are living in, here and now. Third exhibition on the same theme 'Shape, Space and Colour' is one of a series of exhibitions, such as 'Wham, Fact & Value, ETC.', 'Fabrikken besøger Illums Bolighus' and 'VÆGTILVÆG' with a focus on paintings and directly executed works.   Artists: Ib Braase (From my younger sister's room) Eric Bainbridge (GB), Thomas Bang, Claus Bjerre og Ditte Hammerstrøm, Maiken Bent, Monika Brandmeier (DE), Claus Egemose, Jesper Fabricius, Kim Grønborg, Peter Holm, Søren Jensen, Pablo Lambias, Axel Lieber (DE), Hans E Madsen, Bjørn Poulsen, Jesper Rasmussen, Finn Reinbothe, Torgny Wilcke, Lone Høyer Hansen, Ellen Hyllemose, Marianne Jørgensen, Karin Lind, Tove Storch, Charlotte Thrane (DK/GB), A-Kassen. Image: Eric Bainbridge New Modernist No.3, 2006 Teak, Melamine 249 x 245.5 x 130 cm 98 1/8 x 96 5/8 x 51 1/8 in (EB0011)

Catherine Bertola: "Thought for the Week" Scion - Beacon Art Project

Artwork of the Month Series Scion, Beacon Art Project Somerset, England 27 October 2010 Contemporary Art at Barrington Court Barrington Court, Nr Ilminster, Somerset TA19 0NQ Scion is the title of a series of activities developed by Beacon and the National Trust that will deliver a programme of contemporary art at Barrington Court over the course of sixteen months culminating in a major exhibition in 2011. Beacon Art Project is based in Lincolnshire and commissions and presents artwork by national and international artists within unusual, non-gallery settings, emphasising the importance of the context in which we experience art. This project is supported by Trust New Art, a programme to connect more people to National Trust places through contemporary art and craft. The National Trust is working in partnership with Arts Council England. Arts Council England and the National Trust believe that placing high-quality and innovative contemporary art within historic settings can inspire artists and audiences and encourage new ways of looking at the work and the world. As the partnership develops, a wide programme of events, projects and products will be developed to make contemporary arts and crafts an integral part of the National Trust's daily offer to visitors, building new audiences and providing career opportunities to both emerging and established artists. Artwork of the Month Series Each month an existing artwork is installed at Barrington Court. The artworks are not new commissions, but are selected on the basis of their fit to the building and to the curatorial remit of Scion. The artist is invited to give a lunchtime talk about the work and a question and answer session follows. Everyone is welcome to attend these talks for which free entry can be gained through presentation of the downloadable voucher (see below). Scroll down to see details of previous Artworks of the Month. Thought for the Week Is an ongoing series of embroideries, each containing a text derived from emails the artist receives every week from a life coaching website. Image: Catherine Bertola Thought for the week (Don't be a prisoner..), 2008 Linen, cotton thread, wadding, mdf, card, brass tacks, glue 23cm diameter (CB0055) Photographer: Colin Davison

Paul Merrick: "The New Domestic Landscape", Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art

The New Domestic Landscape National Gallery for Contemporary Art Sunderland, England 01 - 30 October 2010 http://www.ngca.co.uk "In the 1970s more people than usual were searching for an ideology or an aesthetic which would transform the world... Parts of the 1970s are very much with us. More than 30 years on, 1970s style and design still divides and confuses. It can seem antiquated or contemporary, extravagant or impoverished, embarrassing or enviable. It is reviled and it is revived. It is celebrated and written off." Andy Beckett, London Review of Books, 19 August 2010 "If you never change your mind, why have one?" Edward de Bono Work by: Christopher Cox, (Denver) Dan Ziglam and Elliot Brook (Newcastle) Fantome (North-East England) Kyouei Design, (Toyko) Max Lamb (London) Clarita Lulic (Newcastle) Paul Merrick (Newcastle) Martin Ruiz de Azua (Barcelona) Ronja Svaneborg (Copenhagen) Laila Maia Baria (London) Does the temper of our times demand more contradiction and complexity than ever from "the stuff that surrounds you", as Wallpaper* magazine calls our domestic consumer items? In 1972 the Museum of Modern Art staged a seminal exhibition entitled "The New Domestic Landscape" which revealed a new spirit in design, of exuberance and contradiction. The 'New Domestic Landscape' of 2010 is, if anything, even more complex and contradictory. The exhibition brings together a range of international artists and designers who create objects that might resemble conventional furniture in either form or function, but whose real aims are to challenge our established ways of life or our conventional habits of mind. All of the works are intended to be enjoyed in - or endured in - a domestic environment. 'The New Domestic Landscape' is part of the Design Event North East festival which is supported by the Arts Council, England and Northern Rock Foundation.  The festival takes place from 21-31 October 2010 throughout the North East region and the theme this year is Conversation.  There will be a range of exhibitions and events covering all aspects of design from product design to graphics, fashion and architecture.  For more information please visit www.design-event.co.uk. Image: Paul Merrick Untitled (Chair), 2009 Sterling board, ply wood, aluminium, gloss paint 81 x 48 x 56 cm (PME0082)

Workplace Gallery: FIAC 2010 "Tuileries Gardens & Cinéphémère Projects"

Tuileries Gardens at FIAC Louvre, Paris 21 - 24 October 2010 Darren Banks Palace Band-Wagon : Mobile Cinema, 2010 http://www.fiac.com/tuileries.html Palace Band-Wagon  refers both to Darren Banks' interest in the decline of VHS and to the Ghanian "mobile cinemas" of the 1980's where local artists were commissioned to make promotional posters for the films without necessarily having seen them beforehand. Transforming a 1970 Cadillac Eldorado into a mobile cinema, Palace Band-Wagon presents a continuous show-reel of Banks' archive of Palace Pictures VHS. The public are invited to watch the video show-reel and add to the Palace Band-Wagon archive of promotional film posters. For the fifth consecutive year, in collaboration with the Musée du Louvre, FIAC presents a program of outdoor projects in the Jardin des Tuileries. The growing interest for this annual event among galleries and artists - together with the exceptional beauty of the site - has enabled us to us to bring together over twenty seven projects, including sculptures, installations and ephemeral creations, deployed in the garden's fountains, basins, lawns, alleys and groves. Jennifer Allora & Guillermo Calzadilla, Carl Andre, Darren Banks, Mark Dion, Mounir Fatmi, Otto Freundlich, Bruno Giroconli, Subodh Gupta, Thomas Houseago, Rodolphe Huguet, Rolf Julius, Yayoi Kusama, Guillaume Leblon, Jean-François Leroy, Markus Lupertz, Justin Matherly, Jonathan Meese, Richard Nonas, Not Vital, Bernard Pagès, Jean Prouvé, Ugo Rondinone, Assan Smati, Franz West, Virginie Yassef. Cinéphémère at FIAC Tuileries Gardens, Louvre, Paris 21 - 24 October 2010 Darren Banks Found Installation 1.14.33 - 1.14.37, 2009 Marcus Coates Follow The Voice, 2009 (10 min 45) Matt Stokes the Gainsborough Packet, 2008, (8 min 56) http://www.fiac.com/cinephemere.html Hosted by the Louvre Museum and in collaboration with the Ricard Foundation, FIAC will present Cinéphémère in the context of the programme of outdoor projects presented in the Tuileries Gardens. Cinéphèmère is a fully equipped 14 seat cinema installed in a especially redesigned container.  Between 5 and 10 artist's films of a maximum duration of 30 minutes will be screened every day during FIAC. Screenings will take place hourly from 13.00 until 18.00, and will present one or two films depending on their respective duration. A hostess will be present during opening hours to enable members of the public to make advance reservations for screenings Adel Abidin, Boris Achour, Pilar Albarracín, Kader Attia, Darren Banks, Irit Batsry, Louidgi Beltrame, Patrick Bernatchez, Pauline Boudry et Renate Lorenz, Robert Breer, Elina Brotherus, Mircea Cantor, Lu Chunsheng, Marcus Coates, Omer Fast, Michael Fliri, Aurélien Froment, Elika Hedayat, Ryan Gander, Dora Garcia, Aneta Grzeszykowska, Ali Kazma, David Lamelas, Christian Lebrat, Chikara Matsumoto, Christina McPhee, Ra di Martino, Ariane Michel, Robert Morris,  Anca Munteanu Rimnic, John Pilson, Bettina Pousttchi, Moussa Sarr, Matt Stokes, Marie Voignier, Clemens von Wedemeyer, Martin Walde, Jessica Warboys, Sun Xun, Tobias Zielony.

Workplace Gallery at FIAC - Cour Carrée du Louvre, Paris - 21-24 October 2010

Workplace Gallery is pleased to announce its participation in FIAC, LaFayette Sector at Cour Carrée du Louvre, Paris. We will be showing new work by Marcus Coates and Darren Banks Images: (Left) Marcus Coates The Spinach Eulithis Mellinata (Fabricius, 1787), 2010 Silver Gelatin Print, 21 x 27.9 cm (Right) Darren Banks Where Everything Is, 2010, mixed media FIAC Booth F29 LaFayette Sector Cour Carrée du Louvre, Rue de Rivoli, 75001, Paris France www.fiac.com

Fade Away, 2010, Darren Banks

Laura Lancaster - Preview: Friday 15th October, 6-9pm

Laura Lancaster You are a Movement 16th October - 13th November 2010 Tuesday - Saturday, 11am - 5pm (or by appointment) Preview: Friday 15th October, 6 - 9pm Workplace Gallery is pleased to present You are a Movement our second solo exhibition of work by Laura Lancaster. This exhibition of Lancaster's new work consists of a series of large-scale oil paintings alongside collage, works on paper, and film installation. Located firmly within a tradition of figurative painting and portraiture Lancaster's subject matter consists of images sourced from an archive of found anonymous photographs and family albums bought at charity shops, car boot sales and flea markets. Lancaster transposes these forgotten, lost or discarded moments of strangers' lives into vivid, fluid impressions that, through their painterly application, thwart any definitive understanding of their context or history. With an immediate and adept handling of paint, Lancaster's figures bleed into their surrounding scenes, moving towards an abstraction and ambiguity that divorces the subjects within her works from their specific identity and individuality, enabling their significance to relocate to a place of collective memory and experience that resonates with our own. These new works by Lancaster signify a substantial shift in the development of her practice in terms of scale, physicality, and in her rejection of sentimentality, embracing a dynamic and vigorous ambivalence as a strategy towards an objective and searching investigation into both painting and humanity. Laura Lancaster was born in Hartlepool in 1979 and graduated from Fine Art at Northumbria University in 2001. Her work has been exhibited in a number of high profile exhibitions internationally. Recent exhibitions include: Ego Documents. The Autobiographical in Contemporary Art, Kunstmuseum Bern, Switzerland; 'Mediations' Voyage Sentimental, Poznan Biennial, Poland; Paintings From England & America, Crisp, London; Dawning Of An Aspect, Green On Red Gallery, Dublin; Secret Exhibition, Ma2 Gallery, Tokyo; Behind, Monitor, Rome; Micro Narratives, Musee d'Art Moderne, Saint-Etienne; Past as Present, York Art Gallery; Formal Dining, Hales Gallery, London; Giardino Luoghi Della Piccola Realta, Palazzo Della Arte Napoli; Local Stories, Museum of Modern Art Oxford; Blue Star Red Wedge, Glasgow International; When I Lived in Modern Times, Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, Sunderland. Laura Lancaster lives and works in Newcastle upon Tyne, UK. You are a Movement runs concurrently with Laura Lancaster's first major museum solo exhibition at The Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle (until 30th January 2011). Workplace Gallery was founded by artists Paul Moss and Miles Thurlow; based in Gateshead UK, Workplace Gallery represents a portfolio of emerging and established artists through the gallery programme, curatorial projects and international art fairs. Workplace Gallery opened in 2005 at 34 Ellison Street, Gateshead - part of Trinity Square Shopping Centre particularly noted for its iconic Brutalist car park designed by architect Rodney Gordon for the Owen Luder Partnership, which featured as a key location in Mike Hodges 1971 cult British gangster film Get Carter starring Michael Caine. Since the original gallery was demolished in 2008 as part of the planned regeneration of Gateshead Town Centre, Workplace Gallery has relocated to The Old Post Office in Gateshead; a listed 19th Century red brick building built upon the site where the important British artist, engraver and naturalist Thomas Bewick (1753-1828) lived and died. The next exhibition at Workplace Gallery will be a solo exhibition of new work by Cecilia Stenbom opening on 19th November 2010. To celebrate the opening of You are a Movement please join us afterwards at Central Bar in Gateshead. Kindly supported by:

Marcus Coates: "Implicit Sound" Fundacio Joan Miro, Barcelona

MARCUS COATES DAWN CHORUS 08.10.10 - 05.12.10 Implicit Sound Espai 13 Fundació Joan Miró http://www.fundaciomiro-bcn.org/ The Fundació Joan Miró presents Implicit Sound, the second cycle of exhibitions for Espai 13 curated by multidisciplinary artist TRES. The title of the project not only stresses its connection with the previous Espai 13 cycle, Explicit Silence, but also reflects visual artists' growing interest in using sound in their work. The five participants in this project are all eminently visual artists who use sound in an implicit fashion, i.e. by including sound in their work though not necessarily as the main component. Their preference for installations suggests a form of art without any limitations in terms of expressive resources, where the transformation of space tends to be a central aspect. Implicit Sound is not therefore in essence a cycle on sound, and even less so one on sound art. It is a visual arts cycle that aims to express our interest in a form of sound hidden or contained in pieces by certain visual artists without ever playing a major role. The cycle follows in the same vein as Explicit Silence in that it refers to sound as a concept closely linked to silence, either by its nature as "tacit" or "understood", the discreet way it is approached or the specific meaning artists give it. Current trends in contemporary art show a clear interest in sound and music. With Implicit Sound, Espai 13 at the Fundació Joan Miró is keen to reflect this general interest and add a fresh touch which we think defines a certain trend in up-and-coming contemporary art. TRES MARCUS COATES (London, 1969) Marcus Coates is one of the most original artists to come out of the United Kingdom in recent years -an eccentric Englishman of the kind we thought had become extinct. Through his films and performances, Coates takes audiences on a dark journey full of humour to explore the true power of the imagination and the relationships between nature and culture, as well as questioning the role of artists in society. Coates examines the limits between human and animal through a kind of experimentation that lets him turn into an animal himself. Thanks to his interest in ornithology, zoology and anthropology, he has honed a series of skills to break free of his own human condition and explore the world through the mind and body of animals by literally taking on their own skin. In his films he often plays the role of a shaman to access a 'lower world' inhabited by birds and mammals, whose spirits he communicates with to try and understand the nature of certain difficult problems of interest to the audience, in whose name he acts. Through this power of becoming something or someone else, he tries ultimately to reveal the role of the artist as an interpretive force in society. Coates's videos take us far away from our anthropocentric perspective and back to a time before untrammelled industrialisation and the destruction of habitats to stress our species' arrogance in our disrespect for the environment. Coates's interest in both the magical and the rational suggests that the gap between belief and knowledge might not be that great. image: Marcus Coates Dawn Chorus, 2007 (still) 14 Channel HD Video Installation 18 min Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery

Matt Stokes: Art on the Underground "The Stratford Gaff: A Serio-Comick-Bombastick-Operatick Interlude"

Art On The Underground A new film for Stratford Station The Stratford Gaff: A Serio-Comick-Bombastick-Operatick Interlude Matt Stokes art.tfl.gov.uk Artist Matt Stokes has drawn together a diverse group of local performers to create a spectacular film installation for Stratford Underground station. The Stratford Gaff: A Serio-Comick-Bombastick-Operatick Interlude, with acts ranging from an opera singer to a beatbox artist, draws on the area's rich history of popular entertainment, theatre and cinema. The film is a contemporary take on the Victorian 'Penny Gaffs', temporary theatres that were abundant in the East End at this time. For a penny, audiences were entertained by quick-fire performances including comic songs, dances, music, acrobatics and short plays. Theatrical playbills and portraits announce the show in the station. On the three screens the players perform their acts, accompanied by a 'house band'. Mirroring the busy life of the station, each show lasts only a few minutes and offers regular visitors a chance to see a different performance on every journey. Stokes began his project by researching Stratford's history. Popular entertainment has been significant here since the nineteenth century, when rapid industrialisation led to an increased population and a growing demand for affordable entertainment such as the 'Penny Gaffs'. These were soon followed by licensed theatres, including the Theatre Royal in 1884, which still exists to this day. Supported by the National Lottery through Arts Council England Image: Matt Stokes The Stratford Gaff: A Serio-Comick-Bombastick-Operatick-Interlude, 2010 Production photographs of Victoria Elizabeth Day, Murray Melvin, Dizzle Kid, Sovra Newman, Mangal Singh and Bhanu Kanthagnany Photography: Nadia Bettega Supported by the National Lottery through Arts Council England Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery, UK.

Peter J. Evans: "Render10" Curtis Mayfield House (former Globe Gallery), Newcastle, UK

RENDER 10 Peter J. Evans Thomas Gray Oliver Marchant Dave McNicol John O'Shea Travis Roush Joey Scully Davy Smith Abraham Thomas Opening: September 23rd, 2010, 7PM Exhibition: 24 - 27 September 2010, 12PM - 7PM Curtis Mayfield House (former Globe Gallery) Carliol Square East Pilgrim Street Newcastle upon Tyne United Kingdom NE1 6UF Free admission http://dm.ncl.ac.uk/render10/ Culture Lab, Newcastle University announces an exhibition of featuring creative digital media works from the Culture Lab research community. RENDER 10 presents the forward-looking scenarios of contemporary audiovisual experimenters from the Digital Media Masters of Research course, as well as members of the Culture Lab research community. Focusing on live media, performance, expanded reality, interactive video and sound installation, the exhibition comprises a range of new projects addressing technology and media with a critical, empirical and often playful approach. RENDER 10 is a student-led exhibition hosted and supported and organized by Digital Media at Culture Lab (Newcastle University). We strive to create opportunities for public engagement with and accessibility of research at the cusp of contemporary technological and creative practice. RENDER 10 is the second in an annual series of temporary exhibition environments created by staff and students of Culture Lab. Digital technologies are extensions not only of our physicality but also of our imagination, continuously reshaping our relationships with the outside world, addressing. With the works on display RENDER 10, now intimate technologies of our present and future everyday are to be seen at their most creative, inventive, and often critical. This years' exhibition includes works specifically focused to issues of memory, materiality, time, as well as the limits and delimitations of human activity and possibility. Culture Lab is a unique research infrastructure providing an environment for academics and practitioners working beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries. Culture Lab promotes socially and economically valuable synergies with artists, creative industries, cultural and scientific institutions and the development of innovative research with digital tools. image: Peter J. Evans Für Immer, 2010 Birch ply, ash, oak, steel, drawing table, blackboard paint, chalk, felt, transmission belts, pulleys, stepper motors, stepper drivers, power supply, solenoid, custom spring, breadboard, Arduino, steel cable gland, switch, cabling, screws and glue. (PJE0076) Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery With thanks to Logotech Display Solutions, Dr J.H.Evans, Tim Knapen, Kyle McDonald, Tom Schofield, Joey Scully, & Robert E. Taylor

Laura Lancaster: "New Work" Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle, UK

Laura Lancaster Solo Exhibition Preview 23rd September 6pm - 8pm 24 September 2010 - 30 January 2011 Laing Art Gallery New Bridge Street Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 8AG www.twmuseums.org.uk/laing For her first UK museum solo exhibition Laura Lancaster presents an ambitious new body of work including an installation comprising of 144 watercolour paintings and a series of new oil paintings and collages. image: Laura Lancaster Untitled, 2010 Oil on board 51.5 x 61 cm, 20 1/4 x 24 1/8 in (LL0385) Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery

Marcus Coates: "Journey to the Lower World" Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool Biennial, UK

Journey to the Lower World Walker Art Gallery National Museums Liverpool William Brown Street Liverpool L3 8EL 17 September - 28 November 2010 Journey to the Lower World, screening at the Walker Art Gallery, is a recent purchase made through the Contemporary Art Society's Acquisitions Scheme. Taking place within the gallery amongst the Walker Collection, this artists' talk/performance will mark the screening of the work and its' introduction in to the internationally reknowned collection. This work originates from Further Up in the Air, a residency programme for artists in Liverpool's Sheil Park estate in 2003. In the film, residents from Linosa Close, a tower block awaiting demolition, watch with a mixture of anxiety, faith and good humour as Coates performs a shamanic ritual. Dressed in a deer skin and uttering eerie, animalistic grunts, he attempts to answer the emotive question put to him by his audience: "Do we have a protector for this site? What is it?" Journey to the Lower World will be on display at the Walker Art Gallery during the Liverpool Biennial (17 Sept to 28 November 2010). image: Marcus Coates Journey to the Lower World (Rooftop Preparation), 2004 Archival Inkjet Print 115 x 163 cms 45.31 x 64.22 inches (MC0009) Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery

Joe Clark: "New Contemporaries 2010" A Foundation, Liverpool Biennial, UK

New Contemporaries 2010 sponsored by Bloomberg A Foundation 67 Greenland Street Liverpool L1 OBY 18 September - 13 November 2010 Selectors: Gabriel Kuri, Mark Leckey and Dawn Mellor. Featuring: Greta Alfaro, Holly Antrum, Caline Aoun, Johann Arens, Ed Atkins, Nick Bailey, Nathan Barlex, Melis van den Berg, Alice Browne, Amir Chasson, Joe Clark, Matthew Coombes, Patrick Coyle, Keren Dee, Sophie Eagle, Claas Gutsch, Guy Haddon-Grant, Jessica Harris, Rowena Harris, Emma Hart, Darren Harvey-Regan, Raphael Hefti, Ian Homerston, Chris Shaw Hughes, Rowena Hughes, Vasileios Kantas, Krister Klassman, Sam Knowles, Alec Kronacker, Agnieszka Kucharko, Dan Lichtman, Agata Madejska, Russell Maurice, Ella McCartney, Nick Mobbs, Murray O’Grady, Chloe Ostmo, Siôn Parkinson, Peles Empire, Laure Prouvost, Kristian de la Riva, Kiwoun Shin, Theodoros Stamatogiannis, Sue Tarbitten, Edward Thomasson, Naomi Uchida, Mark Walker, Pablo Wendel, Joel Wyllie. New Contemporaries is proud to announce it will return to A Foundation, Liverpool, this autumn. Opening on the 18 September and featuring the work of 49 artists across a range of media, the exhibition provides a unique opportunity to engage with new practice and ideas from across the UK. Established in 1949, New Contemporaries is an important and highly regarded annual initiative that gives art students and recent graduates essential support and recognition at a crucial stage in their development through a high-profile exhibition. Participants are selected by a panel comprised of influential arts figures, predominantly artists - often who have themselves previously been a part of New Contemporaries - and through a rigorous process that is open, fair and democratic. “Since the Liverpool Biennial began in the year 2000, New Contemporaries has always launched at the A Foundation. This year, 2010, we are delighted to be continuing this tradition with such a vibrant and vital selection of artists who all remind us how visual art can be.” — Rebecca Heald, Director, New Contemporaries Exhibition continues its tour to the ICA, Institute of Contemporary Arts, London, 26 November 2010 – 16 January 2011 image: Joe Clark Somewhere in West Virginia, 2009 Interactive Installation: Custom Electronics in Console Housing, Micro-Controller (Arduino), Computer, Data-Projector, Projection Screen, Firewire Camera, Wood, Buckets, Hose, Pond Pump, Black Velvet and Angle-Poise Lamp. 1.5 x 1.5m (JCL0075) Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery

Matt Stokes: "Voice Hand Hammer Fire" Works Projects, Bristol, UK.

Voice Hand Hammer Fire 18 September - 23rd October 2010 Works Projects Sydney Row Bristol BS1 6UU Matt Stokes constructs investigations into alternative movements and informal social groupings that often bind together audiences from disparate or unexpected backgrounds. Music subcultures have been central to the development of his recent projects, which have focused on their ability to shape lifestyle, beliefs, and create collective identity. Stokes' works begin with research and a process of immersing himself into the social structures of the scene he is working with, which result in films, installations and event-based works that hold collaboration and shared authorship at the centre of both their structure and philosophy. For Independent State, produced by Foreground in Frome, Somerset last summer, Stokes was commissioned to create a work that would be made directly with members of the local community to be inserted into the town's Carnival. Stokes worked with the thriving local punk/hardcore music scene to conceive of a sculpture which would pay homage to the energy and self-image of a genre that might be thought of as a surprising cultural output for a small Somerset town. To realize the ideas of the fans and bands Stokes identified a distinctly separate group with which to collaborate. He recruited local blacksmiths and metalworkers to actualise the idiosyncratic design - an organic growth of conjoined icosahedrons welded from steel-plate, and bound together with steel rope forged by the blacksmiths and artist. The work was initiated during a weekend-long Forge-in Festival at which visitors could watch the blacksmiths at work, alongside the clamor of the live performances by local hardcore bands. Drawing on Frome's heritage of skilled metal-working, the resulting crystalline form was put on public display for a single evening - paraded in the Carnival procession on a trailer towed by a black Mitsubishi Warrior pick-up truck to a hardcore soundtrack, and escorted by musicians and fans of the genre, creating a caustic rupture between the majorettes and kooky, decorated floats. Presenting the work for the first time within a gallery environment, the exhibition at works projects provides another opportunity to see one of Stokes most unique projects - an abstract sculptural symbol for the rhizomic nature of collaborative creativity. image: Matt Stokes Voice | Hand | Hammer | Fire, 2009 Courtesy of the Artist and Workplace Gallery, UK MS0043

Catherine Bertola & Matt Stokes: "New Prints from Northern Print" Northern Print, Newcastle, UK

New Prints from Northern Print…

Catherine Bertola I Cullinan Richards I Rachel Gross I James Hutchinson I Matt Stokes 
Contemporary prints on paper created at Northern Print over the last 12 months


9th September - 4th November


http://www.northernprint.org.uk

image:

Catherine Bertola

Blue Babylonica

2009

Screen printed wallpaper

Commission for National Museum of Wales, Cardiff

CB0058

Courtesy of the artist and Workplace Gallery, UK

Richard Rigg - Preview: Friday 10th September, 6-9pm

Richard Rigg Holography 11th September - 9th October 2010                        Tuesday - Saturday, 11am - 5pm (or by appointment) Preview: Friday 10th September, 6 - 9pm Workplace Gallery is pleased to present Holography our first solo exhibition of work by Richard Rigg. Richard Rigg's sculptures reproduce and manipulate everyday objects, transforming them into reflexive propositions and theoretical paradoxes. Employing culturally resonant objects that signify the foundations of our civilization through drawing upon the histories of science, mathematics and literature, Rigg pitches reason against itself, elegantly and iconoclastically undermining our own rational basis, yet suggesting an ulterior route. Rigg's reductive, minimal works open up potential meanings and ontological possibilities. Attempts to pin the works down into an exact reading are thwarted through their elliptical conceptualism. In this work there is a direct meeting of it's beginning, with its end. In this new body of work Rigg explores ideas of time and place, challenging us to consider something that exists just beyond our perception, at the very edge of possibilities. I forgot what was said when we were outside, stood empty, now without those words I fell back, consists of two full size telegraph poles stood upright in the stairwell of the gallery, the telephone line hanging loosely between them becoming the memorial of a brief excerpt of conversation between the artist and an anonymous but significant other. The title of the work taken from the disjointed notes scribbled down by the artist during the call in an attempt to remember. Latent Morning is a semi-folded mirror image replica of one the original sash windows in the attic space of The Old Post Office, Workplace Gallery's late 19th century location. Installed against the wall and floor, and out of sight of the original the new window becomes a distant echo of its subject. Referencing a shaft of light projected on a wall opposite, Latent Morning evokes a sense of quiet ennui, reminiscent of those occasional still moments of heightened perception before thought and responsibilities have come to mind. Some rest on 6 occasions (February View) is a line of three identical double backed ash chairs that describe the impossible position of six seats taking the place of three. The hybrid form is based on the simple functional designs of Danish designer Børge Mogensen and his contemporaries, an inverted play on the rationality of the functionalist aesthetics they commonly held. This attempt to refer to an interpretation of an aspect of experience and the problems associated with it is evident in The Fort was there before it was built, a cyanotype print of the shadow of a complex mathematical non-alternating amphichiral knot with 15 crossings, impossible to fathom when rendered in its two dimensions. In a group of 3 works Rigg has coerced the gallery building to be complicit in a deception. Wall Hanging is a negative cast of a Victorian coat hook set into the gallery wall, in a deadpan parody of the use of the void in 20th century abstract sculpture Wall Hanging implies the hanging of the gallery on the work playfully elevating the status of the architecture surrounding the to the work itself. This One, The Next, and The One After That is a drip of water released precisely every minute from a handmade quartz clock with a suspended water tank mechanism, installed in the ceiling above. The Broken Appearance of the Floor consists of two oars improbably poised in the position of rowing connoting the absence of both rowing boat and oarsman, the blades seemingly dipped into the floor, as they propel nothing, no-where. This sense of poetic absence is also present in Cloth arranged to look like a Jacket (Self Portrait) the title descriptively candid of an anti-heroic sculptural strategy to depict a jacket left where dropped on the floor, the imagistic isolation of this reproduction and admission of materiality and process enabling the work to gain metaphorical weight through its surrogacy for the real thing. In The Gate Black two identical tables instantly reminiscent of school furniture occupy the same space with one the 'right' way up and the other on its side. A wax tablet held together with a broken arrow adjoins the tables the work exploring the origin and evolution of things by connecting objects both linguistically and formally. Through the isolation and manipulation of everyday objects, faithfully reproduced or dissected, Rigg' collapses and conflates function through reductive and apophatic logic, eliciting poetic meaning by the implication of latent usage or absence. Richard Rigg was born in Penrith, Cumbria in 1980 and graduated from Newcastle University in 2005. Earlier in 2010 Workplace Gallery staged Ballade op.23 (without words) a performance in which a classical pianist played a Chopin recital using Rigg's 2007 work Piano, a piano entirely tuned to Middle C. Rigg is currently showing in Cage Mix: Sculpture & Sound at Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead. Other recent and previous exhibitions include The Glass Delusion at The National Glass Centre, Sunderland, Suns Neither Rise Nor Set at Royal College of Art, London, Morphic Resonance at PSL, Leeds, Explum 09 in Murica, Spain, TOMORROW THE FUTURE at Fishmarket Gallery, Northampton, Draw a Line, Follow it at Allenheads Contemporary Arts, King Fisher's Tales at Union Gallery, London, Traumaqueen in Athens, Greece, Moved at Workplace Gallery, Gateshead, Textual Healing at Embassy Gallery, Edinburgh, Formal Dining at Hales Gallery, London, and Everything Must Go Part 1 at Workplace Gallery, Gateshead. In 2009 Workplace Gallery presented Rigg's work at Zoo Art Fair, London where he was also selected to show Two Writing Desks, False Drawer 2009 as a solo work in the curated section. He lives and works in Newcastle. Workplace is a hybrid contemporary art organisation founded and directed by artists Paul Moss and Miles Thurlow. Based in Gateshead UK, Workplace Gallery represents a portfolio of emerging and established artists through the gallery programme, curatorial projects and international art fairs. Workplace Gallery opened in 2005 at 34 Ellison Street, Gateshead - part of Trinity Square Shopping Centre particularly noted for its iconic Brutalist car park designed by architect Rodney Gordon for the Owen Luder Partnership, which featured as a key location in Mike Hodges 1971 cult British gangster film Get Carter starring Michael Caine. Since the original gallery was demolished in 2008 as part of the planned regeneration of Gateshead Town Centre, Workplace Gallery has relocated to The Old Post Office in Gateshead; a listed 19th Century red brick building built upon the site of the house that the important British artist, engraver and naturalist Thomas Bewick (1753-1828) lived and died. The next exhibition at Workplace Gallery will be a solo exhibition of new work by Laura Lancaster opening on 15th October 2010. To celebrate the opening of Holography please join us afterwards at Central Bar in Gateshead. Kindly supported by:

Marcus Coates: "Questions & Answers" Kate MacGarry Gallery, London, UK

Compound Lenses, 2010, prescription glasses, insulation tape.Image courtesy Milton Keynes Gallery.

3 September - 10 October 2010

Private view Thursday 2 September 2010, 18.00 - 20.00

Marcus Coates is renowned for his shamanic performances, where a community or an individual is invited to ask difficult questions pertaining to their own predicament, from the deeply personal to the broadly political. Coates summons answers by communing with an animal kingdom that is part imagined, part scientifically observed. In costume and literally entranced, he relates the nature of this host of species and their attendant attributes; and from these narratives he extracts analogies, identifies thought patterns and discerns clues to a wider understanding.

For his first exhibition at the gallery, Coates has absented himself from the gallery, displaying only the material peripherals of these performances. We are presented with the questions asked and answers offered, as well as the costumes and objects used to facilitate the exchange, displayed like anthropological artefacts of a strangely familiar culture. The questions and answers are translated and transcribed during each performance, the handwriting indicating a sense of urgency behind each social, political or personal problem addressed. The objects have been collected, adapted and reused over years, bridging the utilitarian and the symbolic, the everyday and the mythical. Several pairs of glasses bound together become a mask and a mode of seeing beyond the immediate; lemon juice produces a soured, contorted face, which, in some shamanic traditions, increases the chance of admittance to the grotesque realm of the spirits.

Participants in these performances may or may not believe in Coates’s abilities as a transcendental shaman – the point is not so much the validity of his claims, but the discussion they elicit. With such pressing issues as anorexia and war on participants’ agendas, it can be the naïve outsider who asks the obvious, but useful, questions. And it is Coates’s recourse to the world of animals that demarcates an alternative space, enabling the demystification of social relations, imaginative speculation on causes and the dramatic resolution of enduring problems.

MARCUS COATES born 1968 in London, lives and works in London.

 

Upcoming and current exhibitions include Skills Exchange: Urban Transformation and the Politics of Care, a project for the Process Room at the Serpentine Gallery, London, 2011; Tokyo Art Meeting Transformation, Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (October 2010 - January 2011) and new acquisitions at Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. Recent solo exhibitions include Psychopomp, Milton Keynes Gallery, 2010, Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo and Kunsthalle Zurich (both 2009) and screenings at Whitechapel Gallery, London, 2007. Coates's work was also included in The Beauty of Distance - Songs of Survival in a Precarious Age, 17th Biennale of Sydney, 2010; Altermodern, Tate Triennial, 2008, and British Art Show 6, 2005.