Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller: The House Of Books Has No Windows at Modern Art Oxford on artrepublic.com
Exhibition running from Oct 15 2008
until Jan 18 2009
'Making art for us is quite often an intuitive playful state starting from reflections of our subconscious and the world around us. We let the work make itself and follow it through its passage of changes.time plays with our subconscious and our dreams. We try to make works that reflect this magical state,' Janet Cardiff. Modern Art Oxford presents a major new exhibition of the work of internationally acclaimed artists Janet Cardiff and George Bures Miller. The artists are known for their immersive installations involving sound, images and sculptural environments that engage the viewer's senses in the creation of alternative realities. The artists' use of sound as a transportative medium has been described as 'hypnotic, sensually lush and deeply pleasurable.' Filling all five galleries at Modern Art Oxford, the exhibition present seven installations by Cardiff and Miller not previously exhibited in the UK. The exhibition spans the artists' career, and includes their early installation Dark Pool (1995), in which a simple doorway in the gallery walls leads into an elaborate assemblage of furniture, carpets, books, empty dishes and mechanical paraphernalia. As viewers move through the installation, they activate fragments of sound, eavesdropping on music, echoes of stories and snatches of dialogue that tell the enigmatic story of the work's title. Recent works include the spectacular Opera for a Small Room (2005), in which the life of an imaginary opera lover is performed by an orchestra of record players and some 2,000 records, and The Killing Machine (2007) is a theatrical meditation on capital punishment, inspired by Franz Kafka's In the Penal Colony. The newest work, The House Of Books Has No Windows (2008), from which the exhibition takes its title, is a silent architecture of words and stories based on one of the artists' previously unrealised projects. The House of Books Has No Windows is organised in collaboration with The Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh. OPENING HOURS: Tue - Sat: 10.00 - 17.00, Sun: 12.00 - 17.00 Image Credits: Slide Show 1: Road Trip, 2004, Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller, Photo: Anton Bures The Killing Machine, 2007, Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller, Photo: Seber Ugarte & Lorena Lopez Slide Show 2: Opera for a Small Room, 2005, Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller, Photo: Markus Tretter (Kunsthaus Bregenz) Installation view Kunsthaus Bregenz The Dark Pool, 1995, Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller, Mixed media, audio-video-installation10m x 7m, Photo: Cardiff & MillerInstallation Detail The Muriel Lake Incident, 1999, Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller  |
