Murray Edwards Female Art in Cambridge

This fine collection of female art is apparently the biggest in Europe, which is shocking 'cos it's still quite small. Too small! We need more female art and support for it in our museums, galleries and culture. Here are some brilliant examples of female artists work. If you're into feminism and art, I strongly advise you visit this website: http://www.guerillagirls.com/ with whom I agree and support.

Rose Garrard - Madonna Cascade 1992

Evelyn Williams - All night through 1942

Maggi Hambling  - Gulf Women Prepare for War 1986

Monica Sjoo - Earth is our Mother

Whitechapel 2010

Claire Barclay : Shadow Spans

An interesting installation. Playing with space and negative space. The doorways and holes in the structures.

The chapman Brothers, with some moe grousome images. This time, childrens books defaced.

Tate Britain: New Collection

The Tate B hasn't changed it's perminant collection for ages, but now they have. Here are some of my fav. new pieces dragged from the cold, dark cellars and into the light of the public eye once more;

Ben Nicholson '1939'

 

This piece struck me, very smooth and human form like.

Nuam Gabo ' Construction: Stone with a collar' 1933

 

Sarah Lucas 'Bunny'

 

I love this piece and the way it's been photographed, it almost looks real. So sexual, disturbing and erotic.

Rachel Whiteread 'Untitled (Black Bath)' 1996

Fiona Banner 'Top Gun' 1994

Richard Hamilton 'The citizen' 1981

Helen Chadwick 'Enfleshings I' 1989

Michael Craig Martin 'An Oak Tree' 1973

Q. To begin with, could you describe this work?
A. Yes, of course. What I've done is change a glass of water into a full-grown oak tree without altering the accidents of the glass of water.
Q. The accidents?
A. Yes. The colour, feel, weight, size ...
Q. Do you mean that the glass of water is a symbol of an oak tree?
A. No. It's not a symbol. I've changed the physical substance of the glass of water into that of an oak tree.
Q. It looks like a glass of water.
A. Of course it does. I didn't change its appearance. But it's not a glass of water, it's an oak tree.
Q. Can you prove what you've claimed to have done?
A. Well, yes and no. I claim to have maintained the physical form of the glass of water and, as you can see, I have. However, as one normally looks for evidence of physical change in terms of altered form, no such proof exists.
Q. Haven't you simply called this glass of water an oak tree?
A. Absolutely not. It is not a glass of water anymore. I have changed its actual substance. It would no longer be accurate to call it a glass of water. One could call it anything one wished but that would not alter the fact that it is an oak tree.
Q. Isn't this just a case of the emperor's new clothes?
A. No. With the emperor's new clothes people claimed to see something that wasn't there because they felt they should. I would be very surprised if anyone told me they saw an oak tree.
Q. Was it difficult to effect the change?
A. No effort at all. But it took me years of work before I realised I could do it.
Q. When precisely did the glass of water become an oak tree?
A. When I put the water in the glass.
Q. Does this happen every time you fill a glass with water?
A. No, of course not. Only when I intend to change it into an oak tree.
Q. Then intention causes the change?
A. I would say it precipitates the change.
Q. You don't know how you do it?
A. It contradicts what I feel I know about cause and effect.
Q. It seems to me that you are claiming to have worked a miracle. Isn't that the case?
A. I'm flattered that you think so.
Q. But aren't you the only person who can do something like this?
A. How could I know?
Q. Could you teach others to do it?
A. No, it's not something one can teach.
Q. Do you consider that changing the glass of water into an oak tree constitutes an art work?
A. Yes.
Q. What precisely is the art work? The glass of water?
A. There is no glass of water anymore.
Q. The process of change?
A. There is no process involved in the change.
Q. The oak tree?
A. Yes. The oak tree.
Q. But the oak tree only exists in the mind.
A. No. The actual oak tree is physically present but in the form of the glass of water. As the glass of water was a particular glass of water, the oak tree is also a particular oak tree. To conceive the category 'oak tree' or to picture a particular oak tree is not to understand and experience what appears to be a glass of water as an oak tree. Just as it is imperceivable it also inconceivable.
Q. Did the particular oak tree exist somewhere else before it took the form of a glass of water?
A. No. This particular oak tree did not exist previously. I should also point out that it does not and will not ever have any other form than that of a glass of water.
Q. How long will it continue to be an oak tree?
A. Until I change it.

A thought provoking piece. It bugged me all day.

Naum Gabo 'Model for Constructed torso' 1917

Eric Gill 'Ecstasy' 1910

Stanley Spencer 'Double Nude Portrait: The Artist and his Second Wife' 1937

(Obviously) Francis Bacon 'Three Studies for Figures at the Base of the Crucifixtion' 1944

Roger Hilton 'February 1954'

John Latham 'Belief System' 1959

Kenneth Armitage 'Diarchy' 1957

Keith Vaughan 'Theasus and the Minatare' 1950

(The great) Gilbert and George 'Red Morning Trouble' 1977

Tracey Emin 'Monument Valley' 1995

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Martin Creed at the Fruit Market gallery in Edinburgh

I had never been to Edinburgh before and I was struck by the culture and beauty of the place and this gallery was a great example of the amazing FREE art galleries they had there.

 Having been a fan of Martin Creed for a while, it was great to walk in and find one of the greats of conceptual art just there, for everyone to see. A highlight was definatly the musical stairs.

Very sequential, ordered and controlled.
 The opposite of chaos.

Although defined often as conceptual art, Creed claims to aim to connect emotionally with people. I can really see this, the work was light hearted and visually stimulating.

“

To me it’s emotional. Aye. To me that’s the starting point. I mean, I do it because I want to make something. I think that’s a desire, you know, or a need. I think that I recognise that I want to make something, and so I try to make something. But then you get to thinking about it and that’s where the problems start because you can’t help thinking about it, wondering whether it’s good or bad. But to me it’s emotional more than anything else.

”

This is what I mean by playful I suppose. Fun and interesting, reminded me of cartoon cactii from when I was a child.

He also uses found or already existing materials rather than making or adding to the stuff that fills the world.

Though I suppose the work does remind me of collections, the odd impluse that humans have to make sence of the world.

Louise Bourgeois

Louise bourgeois has been one of my favorite artists for a while now, she died last year at 98 and has really effected my work.
Here are a few the most influential pieces in my opinion.

The Destruction of the Father 1974

This piece is about Bourgeois' father and her relationship with him. She uses a very autobiographical approach to her work. This is covered in latex and lit with a red glow.
I think it's like a liar or tomb, a confined space; perhaps like being a child in a house ruled by a father, having no control and being forced into this space.
It's so bodily and sexual, I find it kind of terrifying. I hate to say it, but pretty Freudian. Perhaps that's too obvious though.
Apparently, it is about a dream in which the children of the household turn around and attack the father, dismembering him. It's very aggressive, that's for sure.

Le Regard 1966

 I find this piece almost as shocking. It's so odd and brown. Like an alien egg. Or a punctured pregnant belly. The things inside are like tiny eggs. Like a snake's egg or something similarly alien.















This carries on that sexual feeling. On obviously phallic object, it reminds me of ancient fertility stones. I went to Pompeii once and they had these outside their houses, stone penis' as a fertility charm. This is different though, I can imagine the marble being smooth and soft; almost human.

Sleep II 1967

End of Softness 1967

 

Give or Take (How do you feel this morning?) 1990

Janus Fleuri 1968

 This is so sexual and exciting. I love the way she's created these phallic objects; so masculine, the rule the fucking world, and then she's slumped them. I can imagine them hanging lifelessly, it's feels satisfying it a very odd way. I absolutely love this.

Arch of Hysteria 1993

"The subject of pain is the business I am in"

This piece is very potent I think. The Arch is like that of orgasm and of pain. Those two expressions and experiences I think are very closely linked, each on the other side of the knife edge.

Bourgeois thought at one point that she could not conceive children. I wonder if this piece is about that conviction (which turned out to be false), about the pain of not being able to conceive from the pleasure of sex.





 

 

  This piece is pretty incredible. That lack of a head, that elongated neck. Like a stuffed toy.

Fragile Godess 2002

Female Godess 2002

Maman 2000

"The Spider is an ode to my mother. She was my best friend. Like a spider, my mother was a weaver. My family was in the business of tapestry restoration, and my mother was in charge of the workshop. Like spiders, my mother was very clever. Spiders are friendly presences that eat mosquitoes. We know that mosquitoes spread diseases and are therefore unwanted. So, spiders are helpful and protective, just like my mother."

Rachel Whiteread at the Tate B

These are a few sneaky shots from the Rachel Whiteread drawing exhibition that's on at the Tate B at the moment.

I've always really liked Whiteread's sculptures, she's from a generation of female artists who seem to be wuite obsessed with the fact that they're female (not saying I don't love that raw, body art of women in the past 20 years, I do love it, and I use it too) but it's refreshing to see a woman making andrigious art.

These forms are so bold and linear, so empty but full of a really exciting promise.

 These drawings really reflected her style, and it's so obvious that she's a sculpture. She's managed that thing in drawing where it's three dimensional, through and through.

Embankment 2005

House 1993

Ghost 1990