COMMA
A dynamic new series of monthly commissions
Ian Kiaer and Dorothy Cross
December 15, 2009 – January 16, 2010
Bloomberg SPACE
50 Finsbury Square
London EC2A 1HD
Ian Kiaer has been commissioned to create a new body of work which meets the dominance of the vertiginous front gallery at Bloomberg SPACE with a gesture of frailty. From everyday found or discarded objects and materials Kiaer creates installations that recall architectural models, painterly compositions and run down domestic spaces. His work draws on differing modes of abstraction and narration through an emphasis on the quality of presence. Transient and precarious, Kiaer’s interventions present meticulously composed spaces that open and unfold fragmented narratives.
For his COMMA commission, Kiaer questions the confident and corporate tone of the gallery through an arrangement of works that both embrace the scale of the space while also undermining it by conveying a sense of instability, informality and precariousness. He will install a triple high gridded aluminium frame and a body of smaller melancholic works based around the motif of Alexander Dumas’ The Black Tulip.
This commission demonstrates his acute sense of composition and a sensibility for the narrative potential of objects and materials, developed through his interest in the research of Utopian thinkers, philosophers, architects and artists whose common concern has been the resistance and critique of dominant ideologies while providing possible alternatives for thought.
COMMA 16 Dorothy Cross
For her COMMA commission at Bloomberg SPACE, Cross has brought together video and sculpture to represent the notion of the pearl in terms of both accepted monetary and aesthetic value but also to explore its creation and formation in nature.
The central work* for the commission Pearl Bones documents Cross’ trip, several months ago, to a pearl farm in Tahiti where she worked with a pearl farmer to insert five finger-tip bones into five black-lipped oysters in the hope that the animals will create pearl around the irritant. If the animals accept them it will take up to two years for a pearl to form as the oysters incrementally secrete nacre to coat and create a natural reliquary around the bone.
This ongoing interest in mapping a particular animal’s accumulated wealth of symbolic associations is further underpinned in the exhibition by the presentation of a shark skin. In a small darkened room in the rear gallery Cross will hang the grey, shriveled skin of a lone shark, gilded inside with 21carat yellow gold. Elsewhere in the gallery a small video projection will show a pair of hands overflowing with hundreds of swarming Hermit crabs crawling out in a continuous flow.
* All materials used in this exhibition have been ethically sourced.
About Bloomberg SPACE
Bloomberg SPACE is a gallery based at Bloomberg’s European headquarters in London and is dedicated to commissioning and exhibiting contemporary art. It welcomes visitors six days a week and admission is free.
COMMA continues with commissions including:
28 January – 20 February 2010
COMMA 17 Bernd Behr
COMMA 18 Charlotte Moth
Bloomberg SPACE, 50 Finsbury Square, London EC2A 1HD
Open: Monday to Saturday 11am – 6pm
Thursday 7 January till 9pm
Closed: 25-28 December & 1 January
Admission Free
Nearest stations: Moorgate & Liverpool Street
W www.bloombergspace.com
E gallery@bloomberg.net
T + 44 20 7330 7959
