Gareth Jones 'Modular Plinth' 2003.
'A pedestal is as much a prison as any small, confined space'. - Gloria Steinem
Plinths, Frames and Pedestals. These three techniques have one thing in common... everyone is talking about them and not necessarily in a positive light.
For a number of years now curators have paid especial attention to how works of art and artefacts from history are displayed in their art galleries. Now don't get me wrong, they have always been sticklers for detail, but recently their attention has roamed to pastures new.
The new objects of their attention are plinths, frames and pedestals. Pictures have always been framed, small objects always placed on plinths and exceptional pieces of work placed on pedestals. However in more recent years there has been a decided shift: why on earth does sticking a piece of work on four pieces of white MDF suddenly make it untouchable, irrefutable and unobtainable?
Recently, having discussed these 'plinth theories' during the curation of our first collaborative display and consequently our illustrated accompanying publication, I found a number of interesting online articles.
http://www.axisweb.org/dlFULL.aspx?ESSAYID=24
The above article is an interview between the artist Gareth Jones and art historian Jon Wood. Within this article Gareth Jones discusses his installation at the British Art Show 6, Plinth Series.
Gareth Jones: “I first started using the plinths to get over a problem I had in my work, which is that I didn't like plinths and I wasn't interested in reinstating the baggage that they carried. To me that seemed like a very conservative way of presenting something, a way of maybe giving a fake aura to an object - as if the plinth or the frame could somehow give something to the work that it didn't have already. I think my work very much comes out of an idea that the work should stand for itself in some way - so a plinth becomes just a useless support.”
Gareth Jones: “So the whole thing with using chipboard and plywood is about using very simple DIY materials and seeing if I could take them on to another level: to see if I could take something as potentially banal as chipboard and actually make something quite stylish out of it.”
Gareth Jones: “ I suppose that in the past a curator might have been seen as a facilitator and a plinth can also facilitate seeing an object. But I actually think plinths make objects harder to see. When I make an exhibition I'm interested in the relationship between the things I've made and the room as a whole and a plinth or a frame is something that stops you relating an object to the room as a whole. It's something that puts rings around a work.”
The following article comes from a website related to an exhibition named, Plinth by Plinth [2012],
“Antony Gormley famously explores the metaphorical space of the human form through the physical. As a typical foundation for 3-dimensional representations of the figure, the plinth has crept into Gormley’s practice. In the act of raising images of the gods above human level, traditionally the plinth circumstantially referred to the status of the human figure, which is at the fore of Gormley’s contemporary work.
Antony Gormley’s One & Other graced the Fourth Plinth in Trafalgar Square for 100 days in 2010. The project elevated 2,400 members of the public to the London skyline; each took to the plinth for an hour, using the platform according to their own aims. Gormley engineered a ‘portrait of the UK’ through the individual acts of the participants. This was staged at the monumental level of the heroes that permanently adorn the central London square. Andy Warhol’s prophecy that everyone will have fifteen minutes of fame has become imminent in an age of blogging and reality television. In his fourth plinth project, Gormley once again draws the mundane acts of individuals to the status of high art; this is achieved using the established platform of the eminent Trafalgar Square plinth.
More recently, Gormley has played with the concept of the plinth during an intervention in which he raised the floor of the Hermitage Museum in Russia. The act concealed the plinths of the figures in the classical antiquities room. The artist explained, ‘in my Fourth Plinth project in Trafalgar Square, I raised up the everyday life, for an hour at a time, to the level of a statue. Here at the Hermitage my aim has been to bring the gods to earth, to liberate them if you like.’ These words from the prominent artist reinforce the idea that the plinth detaches the subject from everyday life.
Gormley’s two projects demonstrate that at least for this artist, traditional concepts of the plinth are still valid- that the plinth symbolizes hierarchy. The success of the two projects suggests that artistic community and public alike remain determined to reassess these concepts.”
http://www.fringeartsbath.co.uk/plinth-by-plinth/
theartofmadeline
areudirty
gamechangershow
romaincrisis
