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From: anon
Category: Exhibitions
Date: 08 March 2001
John Riddy Juan Cruz and Lois Weinberger Camden Arts Centre London 7th April-28th May Camden Arts Centre has long been the most innovative gallery in London and deservingly so even though other less interesting programmes seem to dominate the media led publicity hungry art world. The present show has brought together three international artists that some how manage to gel despite the evident failings in some of the individual work. In the main gallery John Riddy is showing a series of photographic works that are described in the gallery hand out as "Time and Space studies that compress images which extend the viewers expectations of photography. As usual this description is tosh and for the life of me this reviewer cannot fathom the interest in Riddys work.The point and shoot aspect leaves a lot to be desired and reveals so little of the world as to be worthless.Images of Rome and silent spaces sit side by side with no voice to connect them,if you use a potent tool like a camera surely the images should be a celebration of something worthwhile.Art photography like art video at the moment seems to show such a disregard for existing practices that somehow already fulfil the brief as outlined in the gallery leaflet.Riddy adds nothing to the debate and they sit there with less impact than bus shelter hoardings.Go outside look at the world you don,t need these photographs to interpret anything for you. Maybe I am missing it and a worthwhile response to this review might enlighten me. Juan Cruz is exhibiting a new work describing a journey that is fed into the gallery through two speakers placed at above head height.Hard to spend much time with this piece felt like getting into a car and pissing off away from the gallery. Lois Weinberger is an Austrian artist who is showing two works , one of these a video of a journey through a bramble patch that at first is engaging and lures you in as you revel in the subtle sounds of dry leaves and the play of the camera trying to work out if its above below or dragged through the hedge.It ultimately leaves you expectant but of course nothing happens, the journey was everything.Is this enough? not sure but it does have a small sense of poetry which is a relief and the antithesis of his painted map outside of the gallery where rural and urban names are placed alongside drawn lines.This map is white black and red and before long I feel that the local graffiti community will have added other layers to the map which might make the whole exercise worthwhile. Its a nice attempt by Camden to attempt to add to a debate its just a shame the artists didn,t join in. Anon
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