Situational Attempts at The Artist Room

The Artist Room
20 Great Chapel St, London W1F 8FW

Upon entering The Artist Room to view the gallery’s latest group exhibition ‘Situational Attempts’ curated by Billy Parker, I am immediately struck by the tangential constellations that burgeon between the works on show, all of which broadly fall into a limitless category relating to ‘drawing’. A sense of deftness, a sleight of hand, a precise smudge that traverses cotton paper and the dusty surface of a recently painted white wall – these drawings, suspended in a state of flux, are as much to do with revelation and truth as they are hiddenness and concealment.

The act of drawing as to reveal – to layer, remove and manifest a subject from the tonal depths of its material surface, is keenly expressed in Joel Wyllie’s work titled ‘Alex’. Subtle facial features of a figure shrouded in a white haze simultaneously appear and disappear in the lower central section of an exaggerated rectangular frame. An other-worldly form enshrines this transitory face, rendering a portal to a world just beyond one’s comprehension. ‘Alex’ is striking in the sense that it illustrates the ontology of drawing – a mechanism in which to access and transmute information through a fluid and holistic process. Mysterious and enticing cosmologies forgo the bind of literal representation.

Tentatively placed on the wall in the corner of the room is a graphite drawing on a small piece of found torn paper by Richard Maguire. At first glance the work feels reminiscent of religious iconography as a close-up of an indiscernible figure gazes down towards a point of view beyond the drawings torn frame. The direction of this gaze feels akin to the way angels and saints have often been depicted when looking down upon the earth. Streaks of washed graphite cover the entire paper producing an ethereal quality that feels biblical in its application. This layering of graphite coupled with the figures direction of gaze implies that they are being propelled in some form of backward momentum. I’m reminded of Walter Benjamin’s quote on the Angel of History - the Angel, who’s face is turned toward the past, is being propelled backwards by the force of a storm. He watches a single catastrophe unfold before him as piles of wreckage are hurled at his feet. This, Benjamin proclaims, is what we call ‘progress’. Perhaps then, the literal tearing of paper (and the hiddenness of a world beyond the papers edge) might represent an indeterminate form of progress to which this propelled figure focuses.

Two drawings are intricately pinned to the wall, the pins are so minute that the works themselves look as if they were produced directly onto the wall. ‘Tori’ and ‘Guiness with Sicko’, 2024 are heavy graphite drawings by Katie Shannon that bear a photo-realist element with a filmic quality. The slight fuzziness of the drawings plays homage to the recollective qualities of human memory and dreamscapes. They are channelled through a ‘film still’ style of framing that captures the mesmerising mood, thrill and melancholy of particular moments – whether a club night or an intimate drink, Shannon’s work leaves one questioning the fabric of reality in amongst the habitual events of life. When it feels like you’ve been at the club forever, had you even entered in the first place?  

Flux drawing “Electric field”, 2023 by Arthur Poujois consists of Japanese ink and collage on paper that, at first glance, feels reminiscent of action painting. Yet on closer inspection the work becomes delicately controlled, producing an energising rhythm of intersecting lines that curve and dance in between cut photograph strips. Fragments of a captured life emerge through the dissected image – the shimmer of light on a ceramic object, a dress shoe, the detailed tailoring of a cuffed shirt. There is something both nostalgic and opulent that is present in Poujois’ drawing, but what’s striking is the way the frame becomes part of the work itself. A yellowed wooden board, scorched and chipped away at its edges, contains a history in and of itself. This material which otherwise might be considered detritus, cohesively bonds the entire work together through astute colour reflections and a conceptual nod to fragmented past lives that evade complete remembrance.

Other works on show include Archie Fooks-Smith’s ‘Key Limer2 Outside Sleepers’ & ‘Untitled’, 2024 depicting tiny sleeping figures drawn in pencil amongst a constellation of stitched mark making on coloured fabric. Mia Vallance’s work ‘Untitled’ 2024 is a ghostly negative rendition of a bouquet that loosely forms the shape of a heart. The layers of mark making in Vallance’s print creates a dense atmosphere that upturns our perception of a subject’s existence and its traces. Hugo Hagger’s Bully !, Bully !!, 2022 & Die Rose, 2023 are staged as confessional pieces that are akin to doodles or school desk drawings. The works tap into modes of social commentary that place emphasis on visual syntax – a tacit understanding on drawing without utterance. Oluwatobiloba Ajayi’s ‘Surviving abstraction through abstraction (to borrow from Torkwase Dyson)’, 2024, consists of three small drawings on paper that have been thickly printed with with black printing ink creating a stark tonal contrast and residual layers. There exists a degree of intimacy in Ajayi’s drawings which seem to be derived from photographic material highlighting one’s navigation of memory and personal histories.

Situational Attempts convenes seemingly disparate works and asks the viewer to consider the point at which a thought, an impulse, a doubt can be consciously rendered. Through the richness and varying approximations of each work, the show focuses on the nature of delicate indeterminacy in conjunction with definitive mark making – resulting in works that challenge and transpose our understanding of contemporary drawing.  

Jordan Mouzouris, Curator, Digital
11 September 2024 until 27 September 2024