Clare Woods
If Not Now Then When
If Not Now Then When
Press release
Buchmann Galerie is pleased to announce the fifth solo exhibition of works by the British painter Clare Woods (GB, *1972).
The works in Clare Woods’ exhibition, If Not Now Then When, were painted in the build up to and during lock down in an intense and isolated period which allowed Woods to occupy a position where she could compare the past and the idea of the future closely as the present was so unrecognisable and uncomfortable.
‘I found it so hard to describe what I was feeling and the only way it could be translated into something real was through painting it. I was trying to capture those moments in the home and the focus shift for outside to inside where everything familiar felt unfamiliar and where the detail in the everyday became heightened, re-seeing the ordinary in a different way. I felt as though I was occupying a position on both sides of a boundary of a very transformative space.’
All of the paintings are based on photographs, sometimes her own sometimes found imagery. The cropping and editing of the original photograph through drawing removes some of the form so that they begin to sit on the edge of legibility and figuration. Woods conceptually empties the source image but then replaces a new interpretation during the act of painting. This physical break down of the image allows a slowing down and falling apart of the visual partly forcing the viewer to question their ability to decipher the content of what is in front of them and partly questioning what it means to live in a time of mass image consumption and in a world that treats banality and disaster in the same way.
Though her work cannot exist without photography, it is not the origin of the image that is important as she is concerned with the emotional response the imagery triggers within her and its potential for reinterpretation or translation as she is always preoccupied with the human environment and her desire for certainty.
Clare Woods’ works have been shown in solo exhibitions at The Hepworth Wakefield, in the Southampton City Art Gallery, and Chisenhale Gallery in London, the Mead Gallery in Coventry and the Dundee Contemporary Arts amongst others.
Works in public collections include the Arts Council Collection, London, British Council, London, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, Arken Museum of Modern Art, Denmark, CCA Andratx, Mallorca, Spain, Colección VAC (Valencia Arte Contemporáneo), Valencia, Dakis Joannou Collection Foundation, Athens, Honart Museum, Tehran, The Nation Collection of Wales, Cardiff, The Ophiuchus Collection, Geneva, Southampton City Art Gallery, Southampton and the University of Warwick amongst others.
Feel free to contact the gallery for any further information about the artist or images of the works.
Pressemitteilung
Die Buchmann Galerie freut sich die fünfte Einzelausstellung mit Arbeiten der britischen Malerin Clare Woods (GB, *1972) anzukündigen.
Die Arbeiten in Clare Woods Ausstellung, If Not Now Then When, wurden in der Anfangsphase der Covid-19 Pandemie und während des Lockdowns gemalt. Ein intensiver und gleichzeitig isolierter Moment, der es Woods ermöglichte, die Vergangenheit und die Vorstellung der Zukunft zu vergleichen, da die Gegenwart so ungewohnt und unbehaglich war.
‘Ich fand es sehr schwer auszudrücken, was ich fühlte und der einzige Weg meine Gefühle in eine reale Form zu bringen war, sie zu malen. Ich versuchte diese Momente zu Hause zu fassen, die Verlagerung der Aufmerksamkeit von Aussen nach Innen, wo alles Vertraute sich fremd anfühlte und die Details im Alltäglichen bewusster wurden, ich das Gewöhnliche mit anderen Augen sah. Ich fühlte mich als ob ich eine Position einnahm, die auf beiden Seiten einer Grenze zu einem äußerst transformativen Raum liegt.’
Clare Woods Gemälde basieren auf Fotografien, teils eigene, teils gefundenes Material. Durch das Beschneiden und Verändern der originalen Fotografien mithilfe von Zeichnungen entfernt und überschreibt die Künstlerin etwas von dessen Form, sodass sie sich an der Grenze zwischen Lesbarkeit und Figuration befinden. Clare Woods entleert konzeptuell das Ursprungsbild, um es im anschließenden Malprozess in Öl auf Aluminium neu zu interpretieren. Es entsteht eine physische Aufschlüsselung des Motives, die eine Entschleunigung und Dekonstruktion des Sichtbaren ermöglicht und so den Betrachter zwingt, seine Fähigkeit, den Inhalt zu entziffern, in Frage zu stellen. Die verschiedenen Sujets regen zudem ein Verständnis an, was es heißt, in einer Zeit des Massenkonsums von Bildern zu leben und in einer Welt, die Banalität und Katastrophe gleichermaßen behandelt.
Obwohl Woods Arbeit ohne Fotografie nicht existieren kann, ist nicht der Ursprung des Bildes wichtig, sondern die emotionale Reaktion, die die Bilder in ihr auslösen, und dessen Potenzial für eine Neuinterpretation oder Übersetzung. Die Künstlerin ist immer wieder fasziniert von der menschlichen Umwelt und deren Wunsch nach Gewissheit.
Clare Woods Arbeiten wurden unter anderem in Einzelausstellungen am The Hepworth Wakefield, in der Southampton City Art Gallery, der Chisenhale Gallery in London, der Mead Gallery in Coventry und der Dundee Contemporary Arts gezeigt.
Ihre Werke finden sich in den öffentlichen Sammlungen der Arts Council Collection, London, British Council, London, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, Arken Museum of Modern Art, Denmark, CCA Andratx, Mallorca, Colección VAC (Valencia Arte Contemporáneo), Valencia, Dakis Joannou Collection Foundation, Athen, Honart Museum, Tehran, The Nation Collection of Wales, Cardiff, The Ophiuchus Collection, Genf, Southampton City Art Gallery, Southampton und der University of Warwick.
Für weitere Informationen zur Künstlerin und Abbildungen der Arbeiten können Sie sich gerne jederzeit an die Galerie wenden.
Clare Woods
| 2018 |
Reality Dimmed, Mead Gallery, Warwick Arts Center, UK (exh. cat.) H. Juddah: Clare Woods, Mead Gallery, Warwick Arts Centre, Coventry, UK, Frieze, April |
| 2017 |
Victim of Geography, Dundee Contemporary Arts, Dundee, UK (exh.cat.) |
| 2016 |
The Romantic Thread in British Art, Southampton City Art Gallery, Southampton, UK (exh.cat.) A. Marr, J.Higgie, M.Bracewell, R. Daniels, S. Martin, Clare Woods Strange Meetings, Art Books Publishing, London, UK |
| 2015 |
Imagining A University, Fifty Years of The University of Warwick Art Collection, Warwick University, Warwick, England (exh.cat.) |
| 2014 |
A Tree A Rock A Cloud, Clare Woods (The National Collection Of Wales, Oriel Davies, Wales) Brask Collection at Munkeruphus (Munkeruphus Art Museum, Gilleleje, Denmark) Under the Greenwood, Picturing the British Tree from Constable to Kurt Jackson (St Barbe Museum and Art Gallery and Southampton City Art Gallery, Lymington, UK) |
|
2011 |
Bracewell, Michael & Stephens, Chris: The Unquiet Head, Hepworth Wakefield, (exh.cat.) |
| 2010 |
Nash, Paul: The Elements, Dulwich Picture Gallery, London, essay by Simon Grant (illustrated in colour, p. 41) |
| 2009 |
The Dark Monarch, Magic and Modernity in British Art, Tate St Ives (exh.cat.) Bracewell, Michael: Something Supernatural, This Way Comes, Tate etc., Autumn, pp.62-67 Dillion, Brian: Disc World, Guardian Review, 24 October, p.18 |
| 2008 |
Superstratum, Koraalbery Gallery, Antwerp, Belguim (exh.cat.)
Hussey, Lauren. Interview: For Display Purposes, October, p.13 |
| 2007 | Colección VAC (Valencia Arte Contemporáneo), Catalogue of works, Valencia |
| 2006 |
New Art from London, Chris Townsend, Thames and Hudson ESENCIAS 11, exhibition catalogue, Coleccion Ernesto Verntos, Arte International Deaf Man’s House, text by Barry Schwabsky, Koenig Books, London Review. Wright, Karen. Modern Painters, February 2006 Review. Neo 2, February, 2006 Chisenhale Gallery, London (exh.cat.) |
| 2005 |
Extreme Abstraction, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, (exh.cat.) Make 2', Ken Shuttleworth Herbert, Martin. Feature. Ambient Landscapes, Tate etc, Summer 2005 |
| 2004 |
Monument to Now, Deste Foundation of Contemporary Art, (exh.cat.) Printed Project, letters from five continents, Saskia Bos & Rob Tufnell Forest, Wolverhampton Art Gallery, (exh.cat.)
Failed Back, Modern Art, London (exh.cat.) New British Painting, John Hansard Gallery, (exh.cat.) Herbert, Martin. Review. In: Time Out, London, March 17-24, pg 47 |
| 2003 | 40 Views of and Icon, Comme des Garcons |
| 2002 |
Painting as a Foreign Language, Edificio Cultura Inglesa (exh.cat.)
Hill, Joe. Review. ‘New York: Cohan, Leslie & Browne’, in: Contemporary, December 2002 Smith, Roberta. “Review Clare Woods”, in: The New York Times, Oct. 25, pg 37 |
| 2001 |
The Hydra Workshop, Hydra Greece, (exh.cat.) Tail Sliding, The British Council, (exh.cat.) London Underground, Sungkok Art Museum, Korea, (exh.cat.)
Beck’s Futures, ICA, London, (exh.cat.) |
| 2000 |
British Art Paintings II, exhibition catalogue, Diehl Vorderwuelbecke, Berlin The Art Newspaper, Review. no 108, November Review. ‘Art, Clare Woods’, in: Evening Standard, 26th October Allfree, Claire. Review. ‘Art, Clare Woods’, in: Metro Life, Metro, October 27th Gleadell, Colin. Review. ‘The Power of Paint’, in: Telegraph Magazine, p.37, September 16 Review. ‘And if There Were No Stories’, in: Evening Standard, March 8th Review. ‘Cluster Bomb at Morrison Judd’, in: Flash Art, Jan/Feb |
