YOU Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Aurélien Froment, Jeppe Hein, Július Koller, Rivane Neuenschwander
As the inaugural exhibition of MOSTYN’s new programme of exhibitions, ‘YOU’ addresses, and dialogues with, the time in which it takes place. It brings together works by five international artists that invite or require the viewer’s involvement, aiming to create close relationships with the audience.
‘YOU’ will engage the viewer in ways that they may not be accustomed to in relation to their experience of artworks and exhibitions to date. As it responds to the visitor, and is subject to perpetual change and re-order in accordance to their activity, it will challenge conventional codes of behaviour in the context of a gallery space.
KEITH ARNATT AND 'YOU' During the 1960s and 1970s Arnatt asserted his position as one of the UK’s leading conceptual artists. His works from this period rigorously question the object of art, including its production and perception, as well as the position of the artist, and the artist as subject for work. Arnatt’s wide use of photography during this time was more prominent throughout his later work. This shift in approach reflected Arnatt’s growing interest in the camera as tool for art making and its ability to not only document, but also affect a subject’s perception and behaviour.
The exhibition marks a return to MOSTYN for the work of Keith Arnatt, who previously exhibited at the gallery in 1989. Focusing exclusively on his later practice, this selection of works highlights Arnatt’s vivid ability to reveal the beauty, poetry and humour in seemingly mundane aspects of everyday life as well as revealing profound layers of relationship in the communication between people.
GALLERY 6:Uprisings - Alek O. Housed in the upper level of MOSTYN, Gallery 6 is dedicated to presenting the work of young and emerging artists, all of whom are yet to have a solo exhibition in an institutional setting, either nationally or internationally.
The Gallery 6 space and its associated programme, entitled ‘Uprisings’, provide the opportunity for an artist to work under professional conditions, and to present their work to a larger audience. For the audience too, Gallery 6 will provide a platform for discovery. It will bring to MOSTYN a diverse range of artists, at the very forefront of contemporary art practice, from both home and away. The appearance of the gallery space itself, including its set-up and gallery signage, will be distinct from the other gallery spaces at MOSTYN, giving the look and feel of a space that has its own identity – a gallery within a gallery. Four ‘Uprisings’ will occur each year.
Born in 1981 in Buenos Aires, Alek O. lived in Milan before moving to London where she currently lives and works. The works she produces – often utilising ready-made objects and adopting traditional methods of art making such as painting, drawing and embroidery – are infused with a personal narrative that she transports to the context of the exhibition space and to the viewing public. Her work transforms objects she has found or been given, objects from her personal domain or those that belong to her friends or family. She changes their appearance and form in such a way that they appear to recall specific periods of art history, namely Minimalism and Arte Povera. With this process of transformation, she also chronicles the former history of that object, her friendship with others, the migration of her own family, or the memories she has of a particular person, all of which are imprinted by way of her work, placing questions of perception and representation both within the field of art and the world at large.
