Kevin Malcolm : HEAVY DAYS
fredag 24. mai 2013 kl. 19:00 på HOLODECK
HEAVY DAYS
Kevin Malcolm
Opening: Friday May 24rd, 19:00
Open: May 24rd – 26th, 12-5 pm as part of OSLO GALLERY WEEKEND
Heavy Days presents new sculptural and collage works which approach concrete through its use in construction, and develop an exploration of its materiality in relation to the human body.
A slump test measures the workability of concrete; its malleability when wet is directly related to its strength and integrity when set. Simultaneously, a slump test is a diagnostic tool in the evaluation of leg and back pain disorders; flexibility is assessed to determine neural tension and spinal damage. Neither test is conclusive, only suggestive of the likelihood that failure will occur.
A new series of collages activate the appropriative tradition as a mirror of content, namely a repurposing of space, both within image culture and the built environment. A photograph of a figurative sculpture built into a wall in Salvador Dali’s garden lays atop a newsprint page from an advertising brochure using images of DIY concrete work to impart a rugged authenticity to jeans.
Unsurprisingly the form, the content and the intent are embedded in the material. Indeed, the material is the content. Concrete is inescapably present but into which mold should it be poured or from which form cast? Can it bind an aggregate of our desires? It is mute and yet we would have it speak. What realistic expectations can we have of cement, sand and water?
Kevin Malcolm (Glasgow, 1979) is a Scottish artist based in Copenhagen. His work deals with the tensions between image and source, highlighting the role of photography in the experience of space, place and history. Encompassing sculpture, photography, collage and works which fall somewhere between these definitions, his practice questions the construction and display of visual information and how it figures in our relationship to the built environment.