Intersections: PhotoHastingsat St Andrew’s Mews
VICTORIA KINGHAM
This small but perfectly-formed exhibition, Here, Not There, in a positively unrestored house on the first floor of St Andrew’s Mews did much to promote the Mews (as now seems to be happening) as a mise-en-scène for exhibitions: an opportunity for artists to display their work with a nod, sometimes more than a nod, to the surroundings in which they are placed.
PhotoHastings are staging a whole series of short photographic shows in this venue, to change every two weeks. We previewed the current show in the last issue, and seeing the actual photographs in situ was a great pleasure. Of particular interest was the ECM room – who wouldn’t like to look at great photographs while listening to ECM artists? – Pat Metheny, Andy Sheppard, Anouar Brahem. The photographs were displayed checkered, interspersed with vinyl discs on which the labels advertised the show: HERE, NOT THERE 1-97, Cottrell/Willis, A Homage to ECM Records, and had a serial number made up from the dates of the exhibition. “How did you get the fabulous blurry watery effect?” I asked Derek Cottrell, and he told me about his Lensbaby.
Imogen Bloor’s pictures were displayed in a shabby front room setting – stripped down flaky plaster, standard small black Victorian fireplace, the usual thing – but somehow the room was convivial. Her late mother-in-law had been eccentric, bipolar, collected strange objects, placed them in odd juxtapositions, and this was Imogen’s homage to her. The pictures are of empty wall fittings, two-tone walls, random kitsch. Bloor’s photographs are very geometric – see her insta page for samples of ‘the quirks of everyday open spaces’ – but there is at the same time something reassuring about the sheer universality of rectangles and lines. I was fond of this room, and kept returning to it, imagining her mother-in-law madly positioning things. I have personally always obtained marvellous therapeutic currency from rearranging furniture and objets.
Dan Percy’s room was lined with pictures of old telephones, wires, redundant wall sockets, roof tiles, bricks from a house being renovated. There’s something disquieting about disused artefacts, and this installation had an eeriness which was probably not the effect of the artefacts themselves, but simply that of the act of photographing them. A pile of bricks standing in the corner of the room made portentous shadows on the wall. The photograph of them looked far more monumental than it ought. He himself looks relatively cheery.
He should. They all should. It was a great show; original, unique, fascinating. There are a couple more to come in the same series and a resident artist, Nicole Zaaroura, explores themes of protection, anchorage, armour, safety, and disguise in the Blue Door Gallery opposite. The next show, Mews 4, has more new and different photos to see in new and different surroundings. Highly recommended.
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