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RELOCATING ABSENCE

Curated by Elisa Tosoni, Cherie-Marie Veiderveld and Simon Reuben White

Exhibition Essay by Matthew MacKisack

Relocating Absenceis a group exhibition showcasing the work of thirteen internationally emerging artists. Through a variety of media, including sculpture, installation, video, photography and drawing, the exhibition offers a series of artistic interpretations of the theme, often playing with the constants of space and time. Absence, in fact, is essentially temporal – it is located where something was: it lies between the realms of Being (object) and Knowledge (perception, creation of a mental image).

Absence can be intended as a state of being, as a period of time, as a lack, or even desire, or as the inattention to present surroundings or occurrences. All these connotations are encountered in the exhibition, which, in fact, proposes an open-ended investigation of the concepts of belonging, displacement, repetition, visual and literary narrative, emotional and physical distance, as well as archive, memory and diary keeping.

The artists have created presence from absence, erased the pre-existent iconography of presence, drawn the viewers’ gaze to details that would otherwise have remained long unnoticed. These acts of relocating, of replacing, collecting or remembering what was there continue absence into the future: new tangible objects now substitute or relocate a previous absence, soon to leave room to new absences, in the viewer’s mind.

Relocating Absence runs from 18 April – 4 May 2008
PRIVATE VIEW Thursday, 17April, 6.30 - 10 pm
Exhibition Talk with the artists, curators and writer on Tuesday, 22 April, 6.30 pm. Free.
Opening hours: Thursday - Sunday 12 am - 5 pm

Elevator Gallery
Mother Studios, Queens Yard, White Post Lane,
Hackney Wick, London E9 5EN
www.elevatorgallery.co.uk
www.myspace.com/elevatorgallery

SILENT FILM COMEDY RETROSPECTIVE

The Silent Film Comedy Retrospective in this festival is curated by two UEL alumni - Kelly Robinson (Film History) and Ingrid Stigsdotter (Visual Theories) .

Birds eye

For further information, please visit www.birds-eye-view.co.uk

Past Events

AVA Showcase Alumni Private View, Drinks Reception

Thursday 31st May 2007 6-9pm, Knowledge Dock Reception, Docklands campus

The evening marked the launch of the new AVA Alumni Group – set up for all AVA graduates to give opportunities for networking, career development and socialising.

The event was well attended by alumni from across AVA from fashion to fine art and graphic design to photography.

staff and students

Oliver Needs, BA Fine Art 2005, said: “It was a great artevent and good to see all thetutors and artistsagain, everyone enjoying themselves too.”

Helen Carter, programme leader for Fashion and Marketing had fun with past students “this event was fantastic - we should have started it years ago and I really hope that it will be an on-going annual alumni event. It was fantastic to see all our ex-students in such diverse key positions within the industry, with great careers in front of them! It was a really enjoyable evening”

Alumni had the chance to catch up with each other and network as well as take a look round the exhibition. There was food and drink aplenty and the opportunity to mix with hundreds of UEL students and key partners from the arts, industry and government.

George Iacobescu CBE, CEO of Canary Wharf Group plc, joined leading art critic and curator Sacha Craddock to open the exhibition.

In his opening speech, Mr Iacobescu announced Canary Wharf Group's sponsorship of a new fund enabling selected graduating students from UEL’s School of Arts and Digital Industries to undertake inspirational research and study at sites of major artistic or architectural significance worldwide.

Mr Iacobescu said: “I’m extremely impressed by the work I have seen while touring this exhibition. It is clear that the University of East London well deserves its growing national and international reputation for excellence and creativity.

"I strongly believe that a society that does not take time to stop and reflect on its art, architecture and design is a society ill at ease with itself. I encourage all of you graduating students to treasure your talents and continue with your wonderful work."

Sacha Craddock, former art critic at the Guardian and currently curator of the Bloomberg Space, said: “What an amazing place! I’m madly impressed by the School of Architecture and Visual Arts here at UEL; the teaching, the facilities and the wide variety of student work. I’ve seen many an art school, and I have to say that this place has the feel of somewhere very vital and important.”

AVA alumni include many high profile figures in the arts including acclaimed film-makers Ken Russell and Peter Greenaway, ‘godfather of punk’ Ian Dury and leading contemporary artist Jake Chapman. UEL is highly rated for research, and Visiting Professors include Turner Prize winner Grayson Perry, Dr Jane Harris, Director of the Textile Futures Research Unit at the University of the Arts, London, and world-acclaimed sculptor Richard Wilson, FRA.