David Hall: End Piece... - Ambika P3

David Hall, still from Interruption Piece, from TV Interruptions (7 TV Pieces), 1971

David Hall: End Piece... is at Ambika P3 until 22 April.

David Hall was a pioneer of video art. His early TV interventions in the early 1970s may now seem technologically quaint but they also represent a radicalism in 'public art' that is unthinkable roday. In 1971 Hall made '10 'TV Interruptions' for Scottish Television which were broadcast unannounced in August and September of that year. A selection of these were later issued as 7 TV Pieces. These will be shown at the Ambika P3 exhibition. (See an excerpt from Tap Piece here and Interruption Piece ('Burning TV') here.)

The exhibition includes a major new work: 1001 TV Sets (End Piece) 1972-2012, which will mark the end of analogue TV in the UK as London switches to digital on 18 April. The piece is described as follows: 1001 cathode ray TV sets, of all ages and conditions... will be tuned to different analogue stations playing randomly in a cacophony of electronic signals, gradually reducing between April 4 and April 18, as the final analogue signals are broadcast from London's Crystal Palace. When transmission is turned off, the multiple sets will emit only terminal audio hiss and a visual sea of white noise. (From Ambika P3 website.)

David Hall, still from Tap Piece, from TV Interruptions (7 TV Pieces) 1971

David Hall, still from TV Shoot Out Piece, from TV Interruptions (7 TV Pieces) 1971

David Hall, 101 TV Sets, installation 1972-1975

The Open West 2012 - Gloucester Cathedral

Emma Critchley, Single Shared Breath, 2011, video installation

The Open West 2012 is currently installed in the glorious setting of Gloucester Cathedral where it is open to view until 31 March.

This, the 4th annual Open West competition, has been selected from an international submission, by organisers Lyn Cluer Coleman and Sarah Goodwin, together with artists Iain Andrews and Dan Chadwick. 90 works by 55 artists are on show. The cathedral is a formidable space in which to show contemporary art - however Lyn and Sarah have exercised great curatorial skill and sensitivity in their installation of the work which is  respectful of the architectural space but not overwhelmed by it.

A selection of works is illustrated below.

Aaron Distler, Between Here and Here, 2010, steam bent hardwood

Tina Hill, Excavating Babel, 2009, installation of over 2,000 books

Catherine Dormer, Shimmer (detail), 2011, digital print on silk

Ione Rucquoi, Ballet Shoe I, 2011, ballet shoe, gold plated acupuncture needles

Angela Conway, For One Removed, I, 2011, emulsion paint on paper, chalk, graphite

Jiho Won, Memory Pond, 2010, glass

Jackie Brough, Continuity, 2011, silk, organza, concrete

Kentaro Yamada, Hackney Sublime, 2011, broken glass window, perspex

Jonathan Wright, No Head for Heights, 2010 plastic, pewter, neon

HENRY/SEATON, Ante-Chamber: 187 Objects (detail), 2011, concrete and plaster

George Petrou, My Brother, 2010, video installation

David Teager-Portman, Other Side, 2010, concrete, canvas, boat, handmade bricks

Gilbert & George: London Pictures - White Cube

Gilbert & George, Schoolboy, 2011

Gilbert & George have, over recent years, been systematically stealing newspaper bill posters from newsagents - 3712 in total. Now 292 of these posters have been turned into the London Pictures, 72 of which are currently being exhibited at the 3 London White Cube galleries until 12 May. Grouped together by themes - yobs, schoolboys, stabbings, killers, paedos - they add up to a gruesome portrait of contemporary London life.

Read a profile of the artists by Nicholas Wroe, a news report about the exhibition and exhibition notice on the White Cube website.

Gilbert & George,  Sex & Money, 2011

Gilbert & George,  Knife Murder, 2011

Gilbert & George,  Paedo, 2011

Gilbert & George,  Cemetery, 2011

Gilbert & George,  City Money, 2011

Gilbert & George,  Kills Straight, 2011

Man Ray (Film & Music Night) - Xposed Club, 14 March

Poster by Mark Unsworth

On Wednesday 14 March, Xposed Club will present an evening of improvised music to accompany a selection of silent films in the Chapel of Francis Close Hall, at the University of Gloucestershire.

Peter Urpeth (piano) and Stuart Wilding (percussion) will create soundtracks for Man Ray's 1928 film L'Etoile De Mer (The Starfish) and Emak-Bakia (Leave Me Alone) from 1926, as well as Dimitri Kirsanoff's 1929 Brumes d’Automne (Autumn Mists). They will then be joined by the Cheltenham Improvisers Orchestra to accompany videos by Michael Basov.
Watch: L'Etoile de Mer, Emak-Bakia, Brumes d'Automne, and films by Michael Basov.

Kiki de Montparnasse in a still from Emak-Bakia by Man Ray (1926)

Kiki de Montparnasse in a still from L'etoile de Mer by Man Ray (1928)

Nadia Sibirskaia in a still from Brumes d'Automne by Dimitri Kirsanoff (1929)

Michael Basov, still from Rooks

Michael Basov, still from Digital Clepsydra

Michael Basov, still from Perforated Memory

Thomas Ruff - Gagosian Gallery

Thomas Ruff, nudes dr02, 2011

Astronomy and pornography are the twin preoccupations which, via the internet, supply the material for Thomas Ruff's two exhibitions at Gagosian Gallery: MA.R.S is at the Britannia Street gallery and Nudes is at Davies Street (both until 21 April). 

Ruff is a graduate of the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf, famous for the influential teaching of Bernd and Hilla Becher on a generation of photographers which includes Andreas Gursky, Thomas Struth, Candida Höfer as well as Ruff.

For the MA.R.S series Ruff has injected colour into black and white images of Mars, taken from the NASA web site; for Nudes he has taken images from internet pornography, enlarged them to monumental scale producing blurred and painterly images. 

Read Geoff Dyer's essay: Porn and the shadow side of paradise: ThomasRuff's Nudes. See also 2003 article in Tate Magazine and video of Ruff talking about his work in 2010.

Thomas Ruff, ma.r.s. 04_III, 2012

Thomas Ruff, ma.r.s. 01_III, 2012

Thomas Ruff, nudes ro04 (detail), 2011