Shower Of Kunst

Critical Online Journal

The future

Futures 2012 is joyously mixed in its form and yet it is this distraction which when presented to us is hoped will overcome the obvious weaknesses of art without proper framing or even depth. On one wall sits the result of a routine investigation into the world outside of a window, Ed Miliano “began making a visual diary, painting one picture every day”, and to that end, judging by the quantity, he has succeeded. It is identified that the pictures when viewed together ‘create a collective… Read More »

At the Still Point

At the Still Point: Irish Women Artists working in FilmAideen Barry, Cecily Brennan, Anita Groener, Tracy Hanna, Jesse Jones, Niamh O’Malley, Aine Phillips & Vivienne Dick, Deborah SmithCurated by Josephine KelliherKilkenny Arts Festival9 – 18 August 2012Review by Darren Caffrey And I will show you something different from either Your shadow at morning striding behind you Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you: I will show you fear in a handful of dust i The Predicament of Man (2010), Jesse Jones, 3minutes Upon… Read More »

Another View of Helene

Another View of Helene Fiona Larkin 28th of April – 10th of June Butler Gallery, Kilkenny  Review by Darren Caffrey Gallery visitor in the corridor outside (Reviewers Own)There is no obvious danger but the question of who protects us looms large. Connection made through the use of artistic controls, Larkin offers herself to a force, perhaps even her very own deity. Yellows can be spotted everywhere, as miscellaneous shapes hidden within a book, as a mistaken mark set within a frame, in the photographs of… Read More »

The 7th Berlin Biennale

Biennale press pass, welcome packet, newspaper-cum-event guide complete with custom fonts and logo.     Initially, I had intended to write a review of the Biennale.  Although I did I find it difficult to consider the various permutations of this festival in a positive light, it was ultimately the decentralized and event-based character of it that led to my decision not to.  Perhaps, I should have committed to living in Berlin for 6 weeks.  I suppose the political trajectory, or rather intent, of head curator Artur… Read More »

Images: Glasgow International Festival of Visual Art

 Sacrilege by Jeremy Deller, Glasgow Green  Sacrilege by Jeremy Deller, Glasgow Green  Jeremy Deller  Spanner (Stretcher/Loiterer) by Nairy Baghramian, The Mitchell Library  Detail from Art Lending Library by Walker & Bromwich, The Mitchell Library  Art Lending Library by Walker & Bromwich, The Mitchell Library Installation view of What is there to do here, what is there to see? by Rob Kennedy, CCA  Installation view of What is there to do here, what is there to see? by Rob Kennedy, CCA    Detail from What is there to do here, what is… Read More »

Delusion is a Refuge, A Refuge Under Siege

Delusion is a Refuge, A Refuge Under SiegeOn March 11, 2012 an article written by Nicky Larkin, someone I’ve counted amongst my friends for the last few years, appeared in the Sunday Irish Independent. I was taken aback by the title: Israel is a Refuge, A Refuge Under Siege , and thought hopefully there must be more to it than that. See, Nicky received a generous film project award from the Arts Council for €32,400 to create a documentary called Forty Shade of Grey. It’s… Read More »

Santa Rita, I Hate Every Inch of You

Santa Rita, I Hate Every Inch of You February 6, 2012 by Jeb Purucker   Reblogged from Viewpoint Magazine Twenty-four hours into my incarceration in Santa Rita Jail, I found myself in yet another tactical conversation, dissecting the numerous failures that had led to the kettling and mass arrests of about 400 Occupy Oakland demonstrators. This is one of the few upsides of a mass arrest. After getting the rowdy activists off the streets, the police find themselves hosting a three-day strategy conference inside the… Read More »

Her art on my sleeve

What appeared to be a slew of papier mache chicken legs beckoned cheekily from the display window at Kevin Kavanagh Gallery. They were advertising The Human Race, Sonia Shiel’s first solo exhibition at the venue. It was hard to tell if the sight was something farcical or bizarrely fanciful. Regardless, it certainly begged for further investigation. As Shiel’s known for an aesthetic that can at times seem unfathomably loose and slapdash – think surrealist artist/director Michel Gondry’s cardboard news studio in Science of Sleep –… Read More »

REVIEW: Il Mistero delle Cattedrali

Wow-ta-fuck. Pictures were largely unobtainable and descriptions fall short; the works of Anselm Kiefer, on show at the newest of London’s Whitechapel ventures, appear as nothing less than awesome. In the end, it might come down to a simple fact of alchemy, a beauty that transports material into another dimension of realism, a feeling of creation. Oxidisation of copper and the impregnation of lead amounts to a captivation of the surface and the spirit, each work as a complete thing. Yes, there is a uniformity,… Read More »

In Response to +BILLION’s ‘TRUTHs’

In Response to TRUTHs (+BILLION-‘s new space for opinionated ‘TRUTH’)TRUTH 1. The Critic and/or/vs the Artist by James Merrigan 6 January 2012 By Darren Caffrey Access to the work of any art is a means of accessing the stones and balls and bits of everything which go to make it. Flesh included. Flesh and all life. I wonder as to the nature of any man, who when composing his story, precludes the very essence of his principle truth. Primary to the finding of form is… Read More »

#DubCon11 Best Review Award

Dublin Contemporary 2011 was a big ask. We are, in this country, often adrift of the curve, somewhere between a second thought and a small wish. In this respect, the whole conception from beginning to end was a true achievement in its ambition and also in its disregard for the rules of play. Let us not consider the politics surrounding the event as anything more than reality, no doubt one from which a lot will be learnt, and taken by those who must. What is… Read More »

REVIEW: 228 Lashes

“The important thing is no longer the storage but the display.”         – Paul Virilio Padraig Robinson’s 228 Lashes is a sparsely populated show in Galway’s 126 gallery. The fully lit neutrality of the white rectangle space draws the viewer in to scrutinise the pieces that comprise an installation ruled by a minimalist inclination. The paucity of works highlights the artist’s three choices: An illuminated retail style sign with a cryptic logo, the lowering of a single gallery light fixture to around… Read More »

REVIEW: Art in the Streets

This far reaching 5 month exhibition at The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA has been billed as “the first major U.S. museum exhibition on the history of graffiti and street art”. Interesting. It is a broad concept housed in a 40,000 square foot former police car warehouse renovated by famed California architect Frank Gehry. Installation view of Street Market. Courtesy Arrested Motion. The full list of artists range from former graffiti artists that have successfully crossed over to the commercial gallery scene (like Banksy and Barry… Read More »

#DubCon11 Best Review Award

The Shower of Kunst #DubCon11 Best Review Award Winner receives: Published review, €100 prize, award ceremony and celebration. Shower of Kunst is looking for the most informed, insightful, candid and accessible art review of Dublin Contemporary 2011. The recipient of The Shower of Kunst #DubCon11 Best Review Award will be distinguished for critical writing that conveys complex ideas in a manner that is grounded in scholarship yet appealing to a diverse range of audiences. All submissions should be in .doc or .odt format and should… Read More »

Supreme Fiction

Supreme Fiction Ian Burns Butler Gallery, Kilkenny August 6th – October 9th 2011 Review by Darren Caffrey The artist Ian Burns’ work, currently showing in Kilkenny’s Butler Gallery is a compendium of product and perception. A plastic shower basin is presented to us as an upright form allowing the plug hole to become a kind of spy hole. It is this type of revelation through the use of commonly recognisable objects which typifies the selection of works on show. Each piece a tableau of some… Read More »

Kilkenny Arts Festival 2011

Kilkenny Arts Festival 2011 – Visual Arts Programme David Beattie, Ann Craven, Maria McKinney, Nick Miller, Michael Thomas Murphy, Liam O’Callaghan and Jacco Olivier Curated by Josephine Kelliher 5th – 14th August 2011 By Darren Caffrey Despite not having had the opportunity to view all of the works in this year’s Kilkenny Arts Festival, there is still much to say and there is good reason to share. The short-term life span of festivals like this one creates two very explicit contexts into which art must… Read More »