MASQUERADE: BE ANOTHER

7 April - 10 May 2013

Curated by Alicia Paz and Eleonore Gros

An intellectual endorsement of uncertainty and chaos in regards to human psychological states is proposed in this exhibition, which deploys a creative exploration of the duality of human nature and the importance of accepting its inherent tension. The alienation and distancing effect of the mask will be portrayed critically, politically. In this context, the exhibiting artists will examine the meaning of perception, mimesis, transformation and mutability as a function not only of dramatic personae, but of personhood in general.

Artistic practice will be here presented as ‘mask’, a space in which paint is considered to be a second skin, sculpture an alter-body, photography and video, twisted doppelgängers. The dynamics of self-representation will be reinvented, turned on their head by means of created alter-egos, theatrically evoking ventriloquism, disguise, and even camouflage.

Opening Event: 12 April 2013

This will include a performance by the collaborative duo Plastique Fantastique.

BEING AT THE EDGE: AT THE EDGE OF BEING

5 March - 3 April 2013

Curated by Kate Walters

Five artists from the far South West present works which explore and respond to the complex context and multiple realities revealed by being at the edge, to consider what all too often tends to be pushed, both privately and collectively, to a neglected margin.

“An elemental land provides an echo for the psycho-geography experienced through and in our bodies: we explore the outer edges by creating, anchoring and embedding maps of our interior interaction with these borders”.

Susan Bleakley, Karen Lorenz, Mat Osmond, Kate Walters and Belinda Whiting

PARALLEL HORIZONS

21 January - 28 February 2013

Curated by Saif Osmani

An international research-based exhibition looking at the multiple ways in which bamboo has been appropriated in a context of space, in place-making and within the process of establishing national boundaries. Each project explores cross-cultural interaction and linkages forged through material and spatial syntax in the formation of cultural codes and future identities across borderlines.

Parallel Horizons stems from Baasher Ghor/Bamboo House, an on-going collaborative platform which brings together 35 practitioners from four continents, including architects, artists, designers, sculptors, photographers and oral historians with the aim of rediscovering stories and narratives misplaced through human migration and interpolation.

A talk and seminar will be scheduled during the exhibition.

THE BODY & THE ARCHIVE

1 November - 15 December 2012

Curated by David Waterworth

Martina Bergman Österberg (1849-1914) a pioneer educationalist working in the area of women's physical training and an early supporter of women's suffrage, taught at one of the founding colleges of the University of Greenwich: Dartford College of Physical Education. The archive of material documenting her influential teaching methods and the achievements of the women who followed them remains with the University. In addition to many photographs, its contents include books, manuscripts, registers, trophies, certificates and badges; alongside uniforms, clothing-lists and cuttings. Altogether the archive records one hundred years of radical change for women both within and beyond the field of “PT”.

In this exhibition, selected artists take a range of responses to the archive in a variety of media, including performance, painting and sound. They seek to explore not only the subject of the body as it is presented within the archive, but also the body of the researcher as it engages with it.

Conference: 9 November 2012

Held at the National Maritime Museum in association with this exhibition, “Performing the Collection: action and reaction in taxonomic space” will explore processes of being in, acting in and engaging with archival space.

TOUR DE HORSE

17 September - 18 October 2012

Artist in Residence: Terence Birch

Following his residency at the gallery during the Olympic and Paralympic Games Terence Birch presents the radical ideas and pioneering work of these nineteenth and early twentieth century visionaries, who in different ways advocated social reform, holistic approaches to education and the power of art and equestrianism to change lives.

From an English painter whose vast murals in great houses often related to topical events, to a French educationalist who believed that in order for people, and countries, to respect each other they needed to know each others’ cultural histories. From soldiers who advocated training the horse through kindness and reward, to a Count who was credited for the re-introduction of Equestrian at the Summer Olympics after it was dropped at the 1904 Olympic Games.

When Birch was imagining this exhibition, he was profoundly influenced by the thinkers described here, who have all had a significant influence on the world today.

THE PRESENT IS A POINT JUST PASSED

7 June – 11 July 2012

Curated by Lizzie Hughes

In the lead up to an event where records will be broken, races won and lost in a fraction of a second, The Present is a Point Just Passed brings together art works and artefacts that give a tangible presence to defined moments of time. Whilst some works carefully reposition empirical data and look at incidents of historical significance, others use banal observations and puerile gestures to render forever noteworthy otherwise unremarkable passing moments. The exhibition will include works by Martin John Callanan, Jan Dibbets, Aaron Koblin, Lizzie Hughes and Jonty Semper, alongside seismograms from the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake.