Research: Materiality by Petra Lange-Berndt

Petra Lange-Berndt, Materiality, (London: Whitechapel Gallery, 2015).

Key Points & reflections:

Re-reading the book 'Materiality' for further analysis on the subject, as this thread is becoming increasingly important to my practice:

• "Material makes more than one language possible. I'm interested in an excess of material, an excess of interpretation." Quoted by Cildo Meireles, 'places for digressions', interview with Nuria Enguita, Cildo Meireles, 1994, p 6. of Materiality book. This quote applies directly to me, as this is also what Im interested in so Cildo Meireles could be a good point for further research. This quote speaks to me as with my reflective material of stainless steel, it can either reflect everything or nothing, depending on its setting. The viewer could interpret something to do with themselves and their consumption of art or commodity if the viewer is left alone with their reflection; but if the cube is in a busy gallery setting - it will literally reflect this commodification. 

• "What does it mean to give agency to the material, to follow the material and to act with the material?" p13. 

• "Discussions of 'material' as an aesthetic category are recent. In its day-to-day applications, material belongs to a lowly sphere" p.26, suggesting that contemporary art is helping to ameliorate material as an aesthetic and not just a lower class item. 

• "material - like matter - is part of a reciprocal relationship with form and idea, the bywords for creative invention." p26. 

• "In an idealist tradition within aesthetic theory that referenced Plato and Aristotle, material was constantly regarded as the base and counterpart to artistic creativity, which, even in its most previous forms, had to be transcended or transformed by art as activity." p27. 

• I think the first essay titled "Introduction// How to Be Complicit with Materials" by Petra Lange-Berndt is the most useful from this book. 

• This book provides a context for what materiality is: “In this context, rather than material production leading to the fabrication of consumer goods, the possibilities of materials should be set free without turning them into commodities.”p. 15. Suggesting that material should be a separate thing from the 'fabrication' of commodities, emphasising a connection with material and process - something we can see within Lynda Benglis' and Tony Cragg's works.

• It's important to state that some of the essays within this book comment about the materiality in the digital age and how computer coding is another material. Though, this is not relevant to my field of study, it's interesting to consider the depths of materiality and how it is adapting to contemporary culture.

Reflections:

• I think my practice is becoming more connected with materiality and process of sculpture and context of painting, than the critique aspect that I engaged with last term. I feel like I am making the material my medium. At the start of the year this book didn't inspire me as much as it does now. 
• This has reminded me of a previous tutorial last term where Andrew said , if one side of my practice had to go, which would I choose to take on - which is more important to me, and it is becoming the sculpture that is important rather than the obvious critique about consumer culture. However, I feel my practice still bares a strong connection with capitalism through the forms of sculpture and painting - being the two most consumable art mediums as stated in the stuffed shark book by Don Thompson. 
• Although these themes of capitalism and consumer culture do intrigue me, they have defiantly become less important to my engagement with the process and artwork I make, and I feel this is a necessary evolution for my practice throughout this course, and my works concern now is this argument between forms and process of painting and sculpture, and labour involving metals. 

Further Research

• Cildo Meireles "is a Brazilian conceptual artist, installation artist and sculptor. He is noted especially for his installations, many of which express resistance to political oppression in Brazil. These works, often large and dense, encourage a phenomenological experience via the viewer's interaction." (http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/cildo-meireles-6633) 
• "I am interested in this relationship between the work of art and the viewer. Of course art can exist without a viewer, but it wouldn’t be so useful." - Meireles, interview with David Baker, Financial Times, 2014 http://www.tate.org.uk/context-comment/articles/who-is-cildo-meireles