Sol Bailey Barker

London based artist represented by Galeria Impakto, Peru.  www.solbaileybarker.com

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Espacios Concretos Galeria IMPAKTO, Lima, Peru

El próximo miércoles 11 de octubre se inaugura, en la Galería Impakto, la exposición “Espacios Concretos”. Muestra de Annett Zinsmeister (Alemania, 1967), Sol Bailey Barker (Gran Bretaña, 1987), Gamaliel Rodríguez (Puerto Rico, 1980) y Augusto Ballardo (Perú, 1986); cuatro artistas que se mueven en la delgada frontera que existe entre arte y estructura.

Annett Zinsmeister crea paisajes arquitectónicos ficticios. En ocasiones, con una monumentalidad que nos recuerda a los edificios brutalistas y, en otras, con la opacidad propia de los lúgubres talleres industriales. Así, y a partir de la yuxtaposición de imágenes fotográficas, la artista diagrama mosaicos utópicos, surreales. Su obra ha formado parte de la colección pública del MoMA Museum of Modern Art (New York, USA).

Por otro lado, Sol Bailey Barker construye volúmenes geométricos de aristas pronunciadas, que abandona en la sala para descubrir, luego, el poder simbólico que sus esculturas ejercen sobre el visitante. Barker propicia el encuentro entre el objeto y el universo semántico de quien lo observa.

Gamaliel Rodríguez presenta acrílicos de gran formato. En estos se puede observar, con facilidad, las figuras bien definidas de casas y edificios. Sin embargo, esta pasividad es interrumpida por un cuerpo amorfo que bien podrían ser nubes o maleza, pero que en ambos casos devoran y transgreden las estrictas normas de la arquitectura.

Finalmente, tenemos el trabajo de Augusto Ballardo, un artista que en los últimos años ha venido observando con detenimiento el entorno natural donde se asentaron las culturas prehispánicas. En este proceso ha descubierto elementos visuales que podemos encontrar aún en nuestros días y que funcionan como patrones dentro de una compleja estructura social.

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Ruins And Relics Trawled From The Thames Find New Life in Sol Bailey-Barker’s Powerful Show

“For years these objects acted as triggers to my own memories or portals to other people’s – they are gateways to the past”

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'THE PERPETUITY OF RUIN', CURRENT EXHIBITION 22 JUNE - 3 AUGUST 2017 FIELDWORKS GALLERY, 274 RICHMOND ROAD

Throughout Bailey-Barker’s life he has collected objects from natural and man-made environments. Varying from Neolithic tools to contemporary refuse, some have value historically, culturally, emotionally, whilst others are simply interesting for their form or materiality. These objects have been collected from house-clearances, mudlarking, found in wildernesses and junk yards. He is particularly fascinated by tools and the way they have been animated and revered over time.

Bailey-Barker refers to his findings as route objects as they inform his abstract sculptures, which in turn function as new sacred forms, taking on the mythic qualities of the objects they draw from. Each sculpture is born from a ritual: finding a route object, excavating and observing, living with the object, categorising and assembling, extracting or imbuing narrative; resulting in an endless performance.

For example: 17th Century Pipe + flint arrowhead + goldfinch nest + axe once owned by the recently deceased Dr John Slome + crow skull + metal shard = sculpture number 88 (Peripheral Form).

Until recently the route objects behind Bailey-Barker’s practice have been concealed and sculptures have been exhibited without their corresponding equation of found objects. In THE PERPETUITY OF RUIN,Bailey-Barker reveals the equation behind his sculptural process, presenting an immersive installation and a new series of tapestries in which route objects are assembled, categorised and sewn onto canvas.

The objects amassed in these works include both certified antiques and fakes calling into question the importance of authenticity in historical relics. Does it matter if an antiquity is real if it points to a true notion of history? Can we identify the facsimile and the genuine? Is there an inherent quality specific to the real?

The works presented in this exhibition have been amalgamated over 20 years. Objects found in the artist’s childhood and previously cherished are displayed beside debris recently washed up on the banks of the River Thames. Hierarchy affiliated with value is discarded, emotional attachment sacrificed and the resulting tapestries become a means of presenting abstract yet meaningful information about form and the qualities of materials. Each object in these tapestries is a clue to a specific history but the jumbled, declassified presentation suggest other possibilities of history.

Through these works Bailey-Barker questions his own relationship to time and memory presenting the possibility of the co-existence of the past, present and future.

FIELDWORKS GALLERY 274 RICHMOND ROAD E8 EQW

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[solbaileybarker]

THE PERPETUITY OF RUIN 22 JUNE - 3 AUGUST 2017 FIELDWORKS GALLERY, 274 RICHMOND ROAD

Throughout Bailey-Barker’s life he has collected objects from natural and man-made environments. Varying from Neolithic tools to contemporary refuse, some have value historically, culturally, emotionally, whilst others are simply interesting for their form or materiality. These objects have been collected from house-clearances, mudlarking, found in wildernesses and junk yards. He is particularly fascinated by tools and the way they have been animated and revered over time.

Bailey-Barker refers to his findings as route objects as they inform his abstract sculptures, which in turn function as new sacred forms, taking on the mythic qualities of the objects they draw from. Each sculpture is born from a ritual: finding a route object, excavating and observing, living with the object, categorising and assembling, extracting or imbuing narrative; resulting in an endless performance.

For example: 17th Century Pipe + flint arrowhead + goldfinch nest + axe once owned by the recently deceased Dr John Slome + crow skull + metal shard = sculpture number 88 (Peripheral Form).

Until recently the route objects behind Bailey-Barker’s practice have been concealed and sculptures have been exhibited without their corresponding equation of found objects. In THE PERPETUITY OF RUIN, Bailey-Barker reveals the equation behind his sculptural process, presenting an immersive installation and a new series of tapestries in which route objects are assembled, categorised and sewn onto canvas.

The objects amassed in these works include both certified antiques and fakes calling into question the importance of authenticity in historical relics. Does it matter if an antiquity is real if it points to a true notion of history? Can we identify the facsimile and the genuine? Is there an inherent quality specific to the real?

The works presented in this exhibition have been amalgamated over 20 years. Objects found in the artist’s childhood and previously cherished are displayed beside debris recently washed up on the banks of the River Thames. Hierarchy affiliated with value is discarded, emotional attachment sacrificed and the resulting tapestries become a means of presenting abstract yet meaningful information about form and the qualities of materials. Each object in these tapestries is a clue to a specific history but the jumbled, declassified presentation suggest other possibilities of history.

Through these works Bailey-Barker questions his own relationship to time and memory presenting the possibility of the co-existence of the past, present and future.

FIELDWORKS GALLERY 274 RICHMOND ROAD E8 EQW

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How to Change the World - Sol Bailey Barker - "Between Night and Day"

The work of Sol Bailey-Barker draws its breaths from myths, legends and mathematics. He courts the earth with sculptures that balance like satellite dishes upon ancient cairns. His pieces evoke the stars and spectrums of deep carbon. Hollowness, balance and light fused with deep thoughtful m

Review of Between Night and Day by James Thomas for Nomadic Press.

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'BETWEEN NIGHT AND DAY' 1 JUNE - 8 JUNE 2017 CURATED BY KALEIDOSCOPE, LONDON Extract from exhibition review by The Nomadic Press. "The work of Sol Bailey-Barker draws its breath from myths, legends and mathematics. He courts the earth with sculptures that balance like satellite dishes upon ancient cairns. His pieces evoke the stars and spectrums of deep carbon. Hollowness, balance and light fused with deep thoughtful meditations on being, change and symbol.The great metal hoods of his pieces escape in spires of metallic smoke. The charred oak bases dropped like the cool stones from the dreams of beings that breath in alien ways. They look the way a Jurassic shark might see her own shadow beneath her as she glides through an ancient sea, reflecting the turning storybook of space in the watery warp of water above her.There is an ineffable quality of blending in Bailey-Barker's pieces—of reckoning the edge. One can feel that the sculptures are both independent and in asymmetrical communion with one another. They resonate in tonal conversations with agendas beyond time. They are artifacts of heat, diamond pythons pouring upwards. At their best, they alchemized the sculptor’s longings into codicized sequences, beautiful flowers, whispered incantations that dance like stories of the void from mouths of dreamy shamans. Each a thistled crossbow considering nature beyond the limits of ordinary."

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Photos of my current exhibition ‘FROM MYTH TO EARTH’ at The Koppel Project Hive, 26 Holborn Viaduct, EC1A 2AT. Sculptures ‘FORMS SHAPED THROUGH TIME’ installed at Holborn Circus (a few minutes walk from the exhibition).

Read more about the exhibition: http://thisistomorrow.info/articles/mitologia-de-la-tierra http://www.foundsomepaper.com/the-koppel-project/ http://theprisma.co.uk/2016/10/17/from-myth-to-earth/ https://www.culturelabel.com/blogs/culturelabel-du-jour/from-myth-to-earth-exploring-colombia-through-art http://whatshotlondon.co.uk/from-myth-to-earth-exhibition/

Visit Tuesday - Saturday 11am - 7pm. The exhibition has just been extended until 10 November. 

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‘From Myth To Earth’ at The Koppel Project Hive (26 Holborn Viaduct) has been extended!

FROM MYTH TO EARTH 8 September - 10 November 2016 The Koppel Project Hive, 26 Holborn Viaduct Artists: Sol Bailey Barker & Gabriella Sonabend

In 2014 artists Sol Bailey Barker and Gabriella Sonabend travelled to Colombia to spend six months exploring its landscapes and researching and responding to its histories, mythologies and contemporary state. Travelling across the vast landscapes of the country, walking the land; Sol created 15 sculptures, which reflected his historical research whilst engaging with the physical and ephemeral nature of place. These sculptural gestures were created using: axe, chisels and fire. The sculptures were photographed and then left in situ, serving as monuments to particular events and myths some of, which are fleeting moments amongst a long history of upheaval.

Gabriella wrote a parallel narrative for each landscape, offering alternative windows into these worlds. Both Sol and Gabriella’s works draw on interviews, research and observation. Two of Gabriella’s stories have been published in the 2016 Nomadic Press Journal: SATE”

Following this period in Colombia and a further year of research into Colombian history and the contemporary Latino Diaspora of London; Bailey Barker and Sonabend present FROM MYTH TO EARTH a new immersive installation at The Koppel Project Hive. Dealing with notions of dispossession and shifting identity this project ricochets between colonial history, family stories, myths and observations of lives both in Colombia and London, presented through sculpture, painting, audio narrative, video and soundscapes.

With the support of The Koppel Project and the Arts Council of England, Bailey Barker and Sonabend installed the monumental sculptures ‘Forms Shaped Through Time’ at Holborn Circus and curated MITOLOGIA DE LA TIERRA a parallel exhibition of 6 Colombian artists at The Koppel Project (93 Baker Street) from 15th September – 5th November 2016.

MITOLOGIA DE LA TIERRA 15 September - 22 November 2016 The Koppel Project, 93 Baker Street Artists: German Arubbla, Juliana Gongora, Maria Leguizamo, Ivan Castillo, Melissa Cruz Garcia, Crista Castellanos & Omar Castañeda

Whilst travelling through Colombia and since returning to London; Bailey-Barker and Sonabend met and came across the work of a number of Colombian artists, who influenced their perspective and deepened their understanding of Colombia. 

In particular these artists are connected by a fascinating and complex relationship to time, history and perception; each finding ways to portray history with a philosophical questioning that highlights the complexities of Colombian identity and expressing oneself, within or outside of the country.

With the support of The Koppel Project and the Arts Council of England, Bailey Barker and Sonabend have curated and are delighted to present MITOLOGIA DE LA TIERRA an exhibition of 7 Colombian artists who Bailey Barker and Sonabend believe are key voices in understanding contemporary Colombian identity. The decompression room features ‘Mapping Memories’ an ongoing research project by Veronica Posada Alvarez and Lorena Raigoso seeking the recognition of Latin Americans in the UK, aiming to make visible their cultural practices whilst strengthening community cohesion and sense of belonging to the areas in which they live, work and meet.

Read more about both shows: 

http://thisistomorrow.info/articles/mitologia-de-la-tierra

http://www.foundsomepaper.com/the-koppel-project/

http://theprisma.co.uk/2016/10/17/from-myth-to-earth/

Paintings by Gabriella Sonabend and Scupture by Sol Bailey Barker. FROM MYTH TO EARTH

‘United Fruit: Banana Republic’ by Sol Bailey Barker. FROM MYTH TO EARTH

‘Forms Shaped Through Time’ by Sol Bailey Barker installed at Holborn Circus as a part of the From Myth To Earth exhibition programme. These sculpture have now been extended and will remain at Holborn Circus until January 2017.

‘Echar La Cascara’ by Sol Bailey Barker. FROM MYTH TO EARTH

‘Paintings about Time’ by German Arrubla. MITOLOGIA DE LA TIERRA

[thekoppelproject]

FROM MYTH TO EARTH exhibition and events

On Tuesday night Gabriella Sonabend read 3 stories from the ‘From Myth To Earth’ anthology written for the current exhibition at The Koppel Project Hive. This was followed by an exhibition tour with collaborator and exhibiting artist Sol Bailey Barker. Read about their exhibition: http://thekoppelproject.com/from-myth-to-earth/

For those who were unable to join us for the reading our US collaborators Nomadic Press are sharing one of Gabriella’s stories per week on their home page. Listen here: https://soundcloud.com/user-153572198

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‘Wyrd Then : Weird Now’

13th April - 21st May 2016

“The Koppel Project is delighted to present its second exhibition ‘Wyrd Then : Weird Now’, featuring the work of Sol Bailey Barker, Tom Hatton and Joe Farley. For ‘Wyrd then : Weird Now’ artist Sol Bailey Barker takes the ancient ritual axe as a starting point to explore notions of sacred objects and rituals of the Neolithic landscapes of Europe. Through an investigation of the evolution of sacred forms and materials and in reviving shamanic characters to perform ancient object based rituals, Bailey Barker reflects on the relationship between societies and their enduring power symbols.

‘Wyrd Then: Weird Now’ features work from ‘Outpost’ a photographic series by Tom Hatton made around the North Wales mining town of Blaenau Ffestiniog. The series, presenting the closed slate mines as evocative space-scapes, captures the harsh geometry of the landscape, which has inspired much of Bailey Barker’s work.”

Images above: Sculptures by Sol Bailey Barker, Screen print by Sol Bailey Barker, Photograph by Tom Hatton from ‘Outpost’ series, Installation by Sol Bailey Barker

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BULLETS TO SPADE by Sol Bailey Barker

300 x Winchester 308 Bullets , Oak and Bronze, 2015

The glamorisation of weaponry, desperation and the aspirations to be a hero in war draws communities into violence. In Colombia Sol Bailey Barker collected bullet casings found in the streets of San Agustin. Bullets to Spade meditates on turning instruments of death into instruments of life used for growing food and building homes.

"They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore." Isaiah 2:4

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‘Fire dome’ Sol Bailey Barker artist portrait 

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FROM MYTH TO EARTH; SEEKING ARCHETYPES IN GREED AND HEALING

In 2014 Bailey Barker and Sonabend travelled to Colombia to spend six months exploring it’s landscapes and researching and responding to it’s histories, mythologies and contemporary state.

Travelling across the vast landscapes of the country, walking the land; Sol created 15 sculptures, which engaged with the physical and ephemeral nature of place. These sculptural gestures were created using: axe, chisels and fire. The sculptures were photographed and then left in situ. These serve as monuments to particular events and myths some of, which are fleeting moments amongst a long history of upheaval.

Sonabend wrote a parallel narrative for each landscape, which offer an alternative window into these worlds. Bailey Barker & Sonabend’s works draw on a combination of interviews, research and observation.

Above are a series of images from the project. 

From Myth To Earth will be exhibited in July 2016 at Display Gallery London. This exhibition brings together this large body of research and work created over the past year. Inviting you into an immersive world of sculpture, sound installation, audio narrative, documentation, painting and elemental spatial interventions From Myth To Earth is a world in itself.The exhibition program will include the launch of ‘From Myth To Earth; Seeking Archetypes in Greed and Healing’ an artist book by Sol Bailey Barker; an artist talk about the project and the journey by Sol and Gabriella; a live reading by Gabriella and two workshops in Latin American storytelling in association with The International School of Storytelling.

Many thanks to Lugar A Dudas Gallery in Cali for providing a workspace to begin this project and a support network in Colombia. Special thanks to Ivan Castillo for introducing us to the wealth of Colombian culture.

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From Myth to Earth - Display Gallery

In 2014 artists Sol Bailey Barker and Gabriella Sonabend spent six months in Colombia exploring its landscapes, histories and mythologies. Beginning with a month long research residency at Lugar a Dudas Gallery in Cali the artists’ trip spanned the country. Travelling across vast landscapes, interviewing people of all backgrounds and walking the land; Sol …

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'Lost in shapes' Paint and ink

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’ lead sandwich and two stone ellipsoids’. San Agustín. San Agustin, Colombia is an area renowned for incredible ancient stone carving and violent conflict.

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'Shapes Formed Through Time'

Cedar, 2015

‘Sculpture becomes a means for challenging our perception of an environment. A multi-sensory form, which can engage all of the senses and alter a space; its smell, acoustics, vibration. A sculpture can become an entry point into memory, history and storytelling.

'Shapes Formed Through Time' developed as a result of listening to landscape. Walking the mountains of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta in pouring rain, it was possible to hear the contours of the land mapped out in water. Living in the Amazon jungle when I pressed my ear to the floor the sound of millions of species described the shape and density of the landscape.’ Sol Bailey Barker