Highlight #6: Sound, time, and music in visual art

New exhibitions in Japan, U.K., and Croatia

JAPAN, Fukuoka <SILENT VOICE>

11 December 2014 ~ 24 March 2015_Fukuoka Asian Art Museum

The Fukuoka Asian Art Museum is holding a group exhibition titled Silent Voice. The exhibition puts the question to the viewers, "How do you react to sorrow or anger? Do you speak out or hold it in silently?" The show comes to define reactions as variant on the situation.
Communication and understanding are necessary interactions in contemporary society. A voice is the most common and accessible tool for this, but it can be stifled by social conditions and environment. Oppression by the government, female suppression in a male dominant society, children vulnerable to the system, and entire classes of the neglected.

It’s difficult to inspire change when people are not allowed their own voice.
Featuring the works of FX Harsono, Tseng Yu-Chin and Nalini Malani, the exhibition casts a spotlight on disconnected social dialogue by lending an ear to those unspoken voices. Each of the artworks focuses on their context and reality, allowing not just voices to speak, but silence as well.
11 December 2014~24 March 2015_Fukuoka Asian Art Museum

Tseng Yu-Chin <I Despise Presumptions>

2004 Digital slide projection, video Collection: Fukuoka Asian Art Museum
Nalini Malani <Cassandra's Gift 4: Childhood Fears>

2009 Digital pigment prints on archival Hahnemuhle bamboo paper 44.5×66.1 cm Collection: Fukuoka Asian Art Museum
FX Harsono <Voice without a Voice/Sign>

1993-1994 Silkscreen on canvas, wood stool, and stamp 143.5×95.5 cm Collection: Fukuoka Asian Art Museum

ENGLAND, London <CHRISTIAN MARCLAY>

28 January ~ 12 April 2015_White Cube Bermondsey

Christian Marclay returns to London for a major solo exhibition. Born in California in 1955, Marclay has made it his life’s work to fuse fine art with audio, exploring the relationships between image, sound, noise, photography, video and film.
Marclay won the Golden Lion while representing the American Pavilion at the 2011 Venice Biennale. The winning piece, The Clock (2010), is a 24-hour compilation of time-related scenes from films. The work was previously exhibited in one of the museums in Seoul.
The London exhibition includes new paintings as well as works on paper and video installations. Combining comic book strip imagery with the dripping, pouring and splashing noises associated with gestural abstraction, the new series of work ironically bridges the gap between art movements as distinct as Pop Art and Abstract Expressionism.

Marclay’s method also reflects a combination of painting overlaid with screen printing.
Satellite programming includes concerts with the London Sinfonietta and performances by contemporary sound artists in the exhibition space. Both newly commissioned compositions and improvised sessions in reaction to his visual installations will be recorded live.
28 January~12 April 2015_White Cube Bermondsey

Christian Marclay 2014 Courtesy White Cube
Christian Marclay 2014 Courtesy White Cube

CROATIA, Zagreb <DEIMANTAS NARKEVICIUS: DA CAPO>

10 January ~ 20 February 2015_Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb

Lithuanian artist and film maker Deimantas Narkevičius’s solo exhibition opens in Zagreb, Croatia. Born in 1964 in Utena, Narkevičius originally trained as a sculptor but has built his oeuvre in film and video. He focuses on history with a contemporary and subjective point of view. Serving as his primary material, history has helped the artistunderstand physical and psychological phenomena through carefully selected moments. By creating filmic historical reversal, Narkevicius ironically points to repetitive scenes in history.

The exhibition title, Da Capo, is an Italian expression derivedfrom the language of music and opera. It refers to the part of a composition that is repeated from the beginning. Narkevičius uses the term in its original meaning, but also provides an added hint to the looped motion of video.
The exhibition brings together several major pieces that gained him international recognition. It also presents sculptures from his early career, along with recent sound installations. The exhibition highlight is that of his most recent audio work <Sad Songs of War>, presented in Croatia for the first time. Narkevičiuslives and works in Vilnius, Lithuania.
■ with ARTINPOST

<Holy War (Sveti rat)>

1996
<His-story (Njegova priča)>

1998
<The Dud Effect (Učinak neuspjeha)>

2008
<The Head (Glava)>

2007
<Disappearance of a Tribe (Nestanak plemena)>

2005