Absurdity is key to this exhibition and bringing some humour or levity to minimalist art which otherwise is too often seen as confrontational, anti-humanist, emotionless and intellectually cold. Minimalism may hide its humour behind imposing machine-made structures or recontextualized ready made industrialized forms, but curator John Hampton attempts to show a lighter side of minimalism, he attempts to show us that it is inherently absurd that we take it so seriously.
Upon entering the space, even before we ascend the stairs we are met with a cartoonish cacophony of bird like sounds which immediately engages the listener in a light-hearted welcome. At the top of the stairs, we are met with Jon Sasaki’s Slab, Base for a Future Monument, 2014, …show more content…
At first, it was unclear what it was, maybe it was only just a cardboard box with shipping labels? The piece by Jon Sasaki entitled A Minimalist Cuber Shipped with Minimal Effort and Expense, 2012, was exactly that. A metal cube 12”x12” shipped without packaging, through the cheapest method from one exhibit to the other. I loved the cleverness of this because it points out through contrast, how we regard art as precious and somewhat untouchable. Tammi Campbell’s piece Dear Agnes, 2014, a letter to Agnes Martin, a Canadian born artist, who was reluctant to call her works minimalist. The letter sized piece of paper with a grid, in graphite, and Dear Agnes at the top, is reflective of some of Martin’s simple lines and grids, while at the same time giving a nod to her ambivalence to be categorized as a minimalist. I was immediately struck by not just the simplicity of form, but of the suggestion of space and silence, as if the letter was not wanting to say anything, merely announce itself as present, as if it was written in a language that Agnes Martin would understand. This work, however, does not fit within the strict minimalist ethos of not pointing to anything outside itself, of being non-referential, it does, however, point back at minimalism, which is more
Upon entering the space, even before we ascend the stairs we are met with a cartoonish cacophony of bird like sounds which immediately engages the listener in a light-hearted welcome. At the top of the stairs, we are met with Jon Sasaki’s Slab, Base for a Future Monument, 2014, …show more content…
At first, it was unclear what it was, maybe it was only just a cardboard box with shipping labels? The piece by Jon Sasaki entitled A Minimalist Cuber Shipped with Minimal Effort and Expense, 2012, was exactly that. A metal cube 12”x12” shipped without packaging, through the cheapest method from one exhibit to the other. I loved the cleverness of this because it points out through contrast, how we regard art as precious and somewhat untouchable. Tammi Campbell’s piece Dear Agnes, 2014, a letter to Agnes Martin, a Canadian born artist, who was reluctant to call her works minimalist. The letter sized piece of paper with a grid, in graphite, and Dear Agnes at the top, is reflective of some of Martin’s simple lines and grids, while at the same time giving a nod to her ambivalence to be categorized as a minimalist. I was immediately struck by not just the simplicity of form, but of the suggestion of space and silence, as if the letter was not wanting to say anything, merely announce itself as present, as if it was written in a language that Agnes Martin would understand. This work, however, does not fit within the strict minimalist ethos of not pointing to anything outside itself, of being non-referential, it does, however, point back at minimalism, which is more