FaB 4!

Art-goers of all tastes have until June 11^th 2017 to catch dozens of visual arts exhibitions plus performance, music, film and talks as part of Bath’s annual Fringe Arts [FAB]. The Visual Arts part of the festival sees twenty-eight curated exhibitions in a range of venues and locations across the city, some worth visiting for their surprising venue alone; visitors have much to explore! I have been to several Fringe Arts Bath years and always attempted to write about too much of it in the past. I am of mixed opinions on what I saw this time around, even from some of what I have chosen here, but if you don't have time to see it all then you won't do badly by sticking to my FaB four!

 

In no particular order:

Robert Good 'A Defensive Manoeuvre' exhibited in 'The Obsessive
Compulsive Practice at FaB 2

Robert Good as part of The Obsessive Compulsive Practice, FaB 2, 94 Walcot Street

Should it be troubling that my favourite exhibition in the Fringe should focus on obsessive behaviours and compulsive repetitions or tedious practices of the need and making of art? There were several artists whose work I found interesting in this exhibition, Abigail Simmonds, Lucinda Burgess to name a few. Though the piece, ‘A Defensive Manoeuvre’ by Robert Good stood out for me. Lest alone because I work in a bookshop! Or maybe it is because I work in a bookshop that this works place within a show about obsession, collecting and ‘a sense of order’ really drew me in. At first it made me smile, like a highly organised Arman, the work safely houses ninety copies of the same book, each has been collected and arrange into its own neat bespoke box/vitrine. The wit of then reading that these are copies of Charles Rycroft’s ‘Anxiety and Neurosis’, mass-produced as Pelican books, adds to the seemingly compulsive orderliness of how they are arranged. The fact that they are second-hand, worn, read, used; each one we imagine may have belonged to a different person at some time who bought the book either out of interest or because perhaps they themselves were in a state of some anxiety. Maybe some copies were well read, whilst others not so. Those subtle differences and traces of use make them individual and aesthetically pleasing as it is loaded with meaning. Presented here, as a set, that anxiety becomes a collective one rather than a private one and possibly alluding to the bigger concerns that we still have as a nation in addressing, speaking about issues surrounding mental health.  Pardon the pun, but maybe I am reading too much into this piece –though it did get me thinking and for that it was one of my personal highlights.

http://www.fringeartsbath.co.uk/obsessive/



Ally McGinn 'Broken Skin'

The Bath Open Art Prize at 44AD Artspace

Small but perfectly formed, there is a lot to see in this relatively small space that features a great variety of work. Some of my personal favourites include; Nina Gronw-Lewis, Ally McGinn (pictured), McFarland and Singer. http://www.fringeartsbath.co.uk/bathopen/

 

Embodied Cartographies at Walcot Chapel

“Walking . . . is how the body measures itself against the earth.” -Rebecca Solnit, Wanderlust: A History of Walking Embodied Cartographies is ‘An inter-disciplinary series of events and exhibition focusing on walking as praxis, mark-making, language, performance, choreography, philosophy, wayfinding...’

The Walcot Chapel hosts a lot of great exhibitions and is worth a visit during anyone’s time on a visit to Bath. A few of the pieces in Embodied Cartographies I had the pleasure of seeing before in other exhibitions but it was still good to see some of those familiar pieces in a new context and alongside some new ones, such as, Lydia Halcrow (pictured). In selection of artists and concept, this should be a great exhibition; though I feel slightly weary that it should happen in a year that has seen so many similar exhibitions to explore weathered and alternative ways of mapping and documenting and being in the landscape. Maybe I have seen too much but am still waiting and hoping for an exhibition in the future that seeks to shift the balance away from this very muted, geological, meteorological look on the natural world.   

http://www.fringeartsbath.co.uk/cartographies/

 

Lydia Halcrow 'The Black Ground: walking the Taw and Torridge estuaries',
exhibited in 'Embodied Cartographies' at the Walcot Chapel.

The Building at Fab 1, 15 New Bond Street

One of my favourite things about FaB is being allowed access to spaces that we as the public would not normally have access to. In a former shop space in the centre of the city are five floors and a basement hosting six individual art exhibitions. The lowest-level being particularly atmospheric as you descend into a subterranean brick built cellar with curved arches, low-lighting and damp, dank conditions. It is an exciting place to see art in, ignites the imagination, it is unusual and fitting of what a fringe festival should represent; the hidden, the inaccessible made accessible. What if the walls could talk? What was this space used for? How old is it? There is an installation in this space (below) as part of 'Dreaming in Full' which transforms the cellar at New Bond Street into a fairytale-like living quarters complete with mushrooms, teasels and folk art style furniture. It is a bit too over-the-top, twee, too theatrical and staged for my taste; I think I would like to see work that responded to the space so you could appreciate and see it as it is. One solid, strong projection, lighting or sound could add intrigue to this space without turning it into something else. 

There is a lot of potential in the spaces and buildings used in the Fringe, I am sometimes surprised that the context of being in Bath, with its history aren’t responded to more. Being a visitor it is sometimes more overwhelming and distracting to be exploring floor after floor of these shops than it is looking at the work within it which cannot always compete with the space it finds itself in.

Installation at FaB 1, 15 New Bond Street

FaB is on until June 11^th where you can all make your own mind on all this and much, much more! http://www.fringeartsbath.co.uk/ 

FAB 14

If there was a Fringe Arts Taunton then I guess it’d be called FAT?  Probably just as well that we have FAB instead, Fringe Arts Bath festival of free visual arts, performance and film ran in the city from 24^th May until 8^th June 2014. This was my first visit.

Art everywhere! Just not maybe where you would expect.

A lingering thought in my attitude towards ‘art’ is beginning to take root; I’m becoming less interested in the art on the walls, in the windows and on plinths and pedestals, instead  I’m noticing the places, the stains of human remnants and decay in which all this stuff is being exhibited. To this extent some of the best things I saw in FAB were the empty, unused buildings and spaces that housed the work. Open to the public for the first time it may seem harsh but walking in a former empty shop on New Bond Street where portraits, drawings, photos and canvases were on display as part of the Fab Open felt all too safe and familiar. There was nothing particularly different or challenging, the work was ok but incredibly dull. The winner of which is bizarrely hidden around the corner instead of being on prominent display. Such was the beginning of what seemed some weird curatorial decisions (or lack of) in Bath Fringe.  

The glimmer of hope came when I headed reluctantly at first, downstairs into the basement, away from the ‘acceptability’ of the Fab Open into the ‘Cellar of Curiosity’ where all those deemed ‘unworthy’ of being shown in the prominence of a Bath shop window front are given creative freedom to be exposed in all their, uh, glory. This space could have been curated but instead it looked as if it was left to whatever a group of the artists felt-like which is a shame because it could have been something more thought provoking than the slightly disturbed mess that it was. Still, I enjoyed exploring this dank, dark, dripping, naturally aged, rotting pit of a space infinitely more than any of the art upstairs. The contrast between Bath’s historic yellow stone buildings, the spa and tourist facade compared to the grungy, unseen reality of urban detritus I was facing was nothing short of brilliant. Whilst most of the art, in my opinion, was only slightly better than what you may see at a weak student exhibition, I was glad to see it there none-the-less. If artists hadn’t decided to exhibit and take the ingenuity to use these spaces then people like me would never get to see them and I still see the value in making art and need for expression even if sometimes the results are pretty morose or lacking in quality (I include my own successes and failures in this sentiment).

In the Cellar of Curiosities on New Bond Street where the cellar itself was the curiosity.

The Octagon. Stunning venue as part of Fringe Arts Bath.  

FAB8 at Octagon had some interesting work in it but felt loosely connected in the way of any theme. It is a fantastic space and I have seen it used for some great exhibitions, namely 'Wunderkammer' from the Bo Lee Gallery in 2011

 http://somersetartworksblog.blogspot.co.uk/2011/09/curiouser-and-curiouser.htmler-and-curiouser.html

On the whole Bath Fringe wasn’t good or bad, some of the work was interesting but let-down, I feel by a lack of continuity in how the work was presented within venues and between venues. 'Research Matters', an exhibition of performance writing in FAB1 and 'Building Volumes' at Bath Artists Studios being more organised in having the same labels and context for everyone’s work. In a festival of many small exhibitions, 'Photo< >Paint' explored the links between the practices of painting and photography working well as an overall show. However, there were more opportunities that I noticed where it felt work was ‘plonked’ in any available space instead of being placed with reason/intention that left me drawn-to and feeling more pernickety about the quality of work and its presentation than normal. I am critical because I think it matters and am conscious that it remains difficult for a lot of art to be taken seriously and, in turn valued.  I do not think we do ourselves any favours by being complacent in how we present it be it at student level or professional.

 I was left unsure of the identity of the FAB. On one hand it seems to be in favour of being a bit grungy, anti-establishment and celebration of amateur or emerging art whereas on the other it seems like its trying to be an alternative showcase of contemporary art/artists in Bath and the South West? Either way it could be 'sharper', if I was an emerging curator or artist I would want to raise the bar higher and FAB had too many unfilled holes (conceptually as well as literally) or filled holes left unpainted, foam board cut sloppily and work hung/placed seemingly chaotically at times or in need of editing. The design and publicity is good, but the branding and identity of FAB venues is at times wooly and not helped by what, in my view was a really confusing website and street map. Regardless of the quality of the work itself it deserves to be presented properly and can sometimes make all the difference to how that work is seen.  Liverpool Biennial achieves this balance well, between having exciting abandoned spaces met with careful presentation and use of these spaces. Every piece seems it is placed intentionally in that space whether it’s in a white walled gallery or an old sorting-office shoot. Arguably they probably get more money than FAB do in employing help to make this possible, but equally have seen many volunteer led local exhibitions consistently deliver top-quality.

Installed piece by Helen Grant as part of 'Shaping Space' in FAB4 New Bond Street
Work which was installed or hung in relation to/in response to its context. Reminded me of Anna Barriball's work (just a thought).

Highlights from FAB 2014: Artist unknown found board upstairs in the FAB1 on Stall Street.  



What did work for me was alldaybreakfast’s ‘Holy Souls’ (pictured below) in the basement of what, I assume was a former shoe shop on Stall Street. This installation was site-specific and worked with the space using it to create an eerie filmic-like stage set in which the participant could explore and create their own narrative. Sound familiar? It felt very reminiscent of Mike Nelson’s ‘Coral Reef’ (which is the second time I’ve mentioned it on this blog in the last two weeks) where the viewer is disorientated and left to explore a labyrinth of uninhabited rooms. The narrative implied by the objects and lighting left in each of the spaces. In the case of ‘Holy Souls’ we move from a plastic lined waiting room, ala David Lynch into a sort of film noir office complete with lamp and typewriter. The mystery thickens....we follow clues, fragments room to room in what was an immersive and atmospheric experience.

Similarly, Resonance in FAB1 on Stall Street saw artists respond to the underground space of Bath, it's subterranean sounds and darkness to interesting affect. I am not implying that everything which is site-specific is more successful or interesting but it is dangerous to ignore the environment you're exhibiting in all together. Amongst these there were plenty of great ideas too, 'The Charity Shop Appreciation Society' by Rosemary Ashton and Peter Lloyd is sort of fun, sad and kitsch at the same time doing what it says on the tin, rehoming unwanted charity shop art, each piece for under a fiver http://charityshopart.com/. With more humour and a sense of innovative thinking in  Lee Neil's 'The Beards of Bath' a celebration of beards in the form of photographic portraits displayed in shop windows on Walcot street (it does make you spend more time looking in the shop windows there, which is a clever idea for increasing trade).

alldaybreakfast's 'Holy Souls' site specific installation as part of FAB2.

 Perhaps my expectations were too high, I have been harsh in my opinion of Bath Fringe baring in mind this is only covering the Visual arts side of what is also a music/performance based festival. It remains a festival full of good ideas, it's fun and has great potential to grow better. There are a few brilliant things I saw here art wise as I hope I mentioned, photography in 'Nocturne', a drawing machine, some excellent installations and printmaking (particularly at Bath Artists Studios). It is a shame that my overall impression was blighted by the overall feeling of it being a bit bitty, disorganised and lacking polish that drew me to being more excited at my day spent as an urban explorer rather than viewer of art (assuming there's a difference of course!), but I don't think that was what was intended. 

I continue to learn much from seeing art and no doubt will be back for more next year. Of course!

http://www.fringeartsbath.co.uk/