Spring exhibitions open at the Govett-Brewster

Spring exhibitions open at the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery this weekend. Marcel Odenbach: installations 2000-2003 > videos 1977 - 1995 21 August – 5 December 2004

Developed by Gallery Director Gregory Burke, this is a major survey exhibition that brings together four recent video installations and two programmes of video works spanning two decades, by one of Europe's foremost pioneers of video art.

Marcel Odenbach is a pre-eminent European contemporary artist who has, since the 1970s, influenced the development of video as an art medium. From the outset Odenbach’s work has addressed contemporary social and political issues through the lens of recent history.

Lying just below the surface of all of his work is an awareness of Germany’s own turbulent history in the20th century. Odenbach’s starting point is his own relation to society as a native German. From this base he meditates on issues of the moment that have both personal and global significance.

Gridlock: cities, structures, spaces 21 August – 17 October 2004

Gridlock is the latest in a popular series of Govett-Brewster Art Gallery thematic group exhibitions that interpret the response of contemporary artists to prescient and problematic developments in contemporary culture.

This 16 artist international exhibition shows work by New Zealand artists along side work by their international contemporaries and focuses on artists playing with the controlling logic of building and cities and drawing attention to the role they play in ordering daily lived experience.

Gridlock takes its title from traffic jams which are a product of the exact system they disrupt. Starting from the perspective of art each of the artists in the Gridlock exhibition deciphers or disrupts the linear logic of building or design in some way.

Opening Week Events

Opening weekend events include a public invitation to step inside a sauna created by collaborative duo OLO from Helsinki on Sunday 22 August from 10.30am – 5.00pm. Constructed from found materials the pair have built a fully functioning sauna, creating a unique social space for relaxation and conversation.

A highlight of the opening weekend will be the latest Winter Forum: The politics of curating .At 12.30pm on Sunday 22 August Gallery Director Gregory Burke will chair a discussion with leading international professionals to discuss the politics of curating reflecting different national positions and topical experiences on. Forum participants include Ihor Holubizky, Writer/curator; Marcel Odenbach, Curator of Changing the point of view: African video art; Niklas Östholm, Curator; Dr. Britta Schmitz, Chief Curator.

At 2.00pm on Sunday 22 August you can also join Gridlock artists James Angus, Shaun Gladwell and collaborative duo OLO for a discussion tour of their works in the exhibition.

Marcel Odenbach, one of the foremost European pioneers of video art who has remained at the forefront of developments since he produced his earliest video works in the mid-1970s, will speak at the Gallery’s Monica Brewster Club on Tuesday 24 August 6.00 – 8.00pm. Cover charge applies.

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