CONCRETE
Pullman Court, London, London, 09/17/2016 - 09/25/2016
ABOUT
A Contemporary art exhibition at Pullman Court, launching during London Open House. 17 artists will work in the spaces of the Modernist building to discuss its influence and contemporary changes in the lives of the capital and its inhabitants.
Pullman Court is one of the UK ́s first housing projects designed in the Modernist International Style. Completed in 1936, it is an influential private development of apartments of different sizes. It is the first building designed by Sir Frederick Gibberd (1912-1984), who went on to build the Liverpool Catholic Cathedral, the first terminal of Heathrow airport and Harlow New Town, amongst other projects.
In the 80th anniversary of the building, its residents are organising a series of events throughout the year to celebrate Pullman Court’s architecture and raise awareness of what it means universally, for the country, for the city and also locally, for the residents themselves. Events include talks, workshops, tours, an exhibition of historic photographs from the RIBA archive, and CONCRETE, an exhibition showcasing 17 international contemporary artists invited to work within the building.
Eleven years ago, under the umbrella of the 2005 London Open House, an exhibition entitled nineteenthirtysix took place across Pullman Court. On that occasion, three artists celebrated its uniqueness and the historical spaces of the building. In 2016, CONCRETE, will show some of the original works from the first show, alongside new site-specific commissions by artists who are resident or familiar with Pullman Court, and by some who are new to it but who deal with modern heritage and/or the city in their works. Back in 2005, the main issue was to raise awareness of modern heritage in Britain with one fine example, helping to confront a tendency to blame certain modern architecture for many social ills, overlooking issues like maintenance and investment. The artists exhibiting in CONCRETE will reflect on this, on the Modernist forms and elegance, and on the city as a whole, on the way people live in its spaces, and the way politics and the economy force changes on the city and its inhabitants.
Artists and audience will be able to see Pullman Court as an early example of high rise living that has influenced later housing developments, with its apartments set around services and amenities that organise life in a way that has become common nowadays.
Exhibiting artists: Alexander Apóstol, Bob and Roberta Smith, Camila Botero, Monika Bravo, Lisa Castagner, Jaime Gili, Lothar Goetz, Justin Hibbs, Polonca Lovsin, Adriana Minoliti, Santiago Reyes Villaveces, Engel Leonardo, Lucía Pizzani, Lizi Sánchez, Paul Jones, Manuel Saiz and Annalisa Sonzogni.
CONCRETE is curated by Jaime Gili in conjunction with the PC80 committee. There will be a small publication with text by Isobel Whitelegg.
CONCRETE will preview on Friday 16th from 6pm to 9pm and will be open during the Open House London weekend, from 11am to 5pm on Saturday 17th and Sunday 18th September. It will then be open by appointment until Sunday 25th September. Please call Jaime Gili on 07905115871 to arrange a visit.
About the artists in CONCRETE:
Renowned British artist Bob and Roberta Smith will create a special work in his distinctive style for the flagpole at the roof terrace of Pullman Court. His flag will preside the events with an important message for the present. Alexander Apóstol, on the other hand, informed by some South American endeavours of Frederick Gibberd, has worked a piece that discusses the shifting international relationships in town planning at the levels that Gibberd reached in the 1950s.
Adriana Minoliti, says she applies gender studies to geometry and abstraction, the result is a new angle on Modernism that will be seen in her drawings of softened edges and hidden treasures. Lizi Sánchez, on the other hand, literally made a soft shape from a 1930s Modernist typeface, and will install it in one of the entrances at the back block.
Camila Botero will work with elements of the gardens in Pullman Court to develop the work she is currently doing at the Royal College of Art about nature and culture. A fellow Colombian artist, Monika Bravo, who exhibited at the Vatican pavilion in the last Venice Biennale, will show a multimedia installation in one of the interior corridors in Pullman Court, reviewing the early stages of Modernist formalism.
Manuel Saiz will be showing a poetic video piece that looks into our expectations for the future of our cities and their architecture. Travelling not to the future but to the past, local resident Lucía Pizzani, will show a series of collages where she imagines Pullman court ́s apartments as inhabited by important women from different eras who are close to her own story.
Santiago Reyes Villaveces, will work inside some apartments and, with the help of the neighbours, introduce in them elements that will interact with the domestic objects and that he will then photograph and shown.
Annalisa Sonzogni will also introduce simple elements in the architecture that will make us look deeper into some of the details of the internal common spaces at Pullman Court.
Lisa Castagner, who has been a resident in the building for several years, will show a video piece recorded in different apartments when residents were present. Jaime Gili, who also lives in Pullman Court, will make a piece to highlight a lost element in the main entrance to the back block, and will also work a sort of 3D painting in one of the elevators, mirroring Justin Hibbs intervention in the opposite elevator. Both works will bring a new life to the 1930s machinery with their reflecting surfaces, colours and stripes.
Paul Jones will install some specially handcrafted, disruptive elements in the interior spaces of Pullman Court, which will contrast with the building ́s materials and finishing. Engel Leonardo, who visited the building several times this year but is now travelling the Caribbean, is looking for 1930 ́s mirroring buildings in distant places, to talk about the architecture of the globalised elites as opposed to the vernacular, often poorer ways of building.
Artist Lothar Goetz created a mural for one of the flats in 2005, which has been well kept despite daily life and children living around it. The aging work is a great addition to the exhibition and an early homage to the 2005 exhibition nineteenthirtysix for which it was commissioned. Polonca Lovsin, who also took part in that show, will showcase the video she produced then about the possible new lease of life of one of the features of Pullman Court, its swimming pool.
For More Information
MORE EXHIBITIONS
Solo exhibition
Aspex
Group exhibition
The Saatchi Gallery
Solo exhibition
Glasgow Sculpture Studios
Group exhibition
Durham Art Gallery
Solo exhibition
Manchester Art Gallery
Solo exhibition
Josh Lilley Gallery
Solo exhibition
The approach E2
Solo exhibition
Gagosian Gallery, London (Davies Street)
Solo exhibition
Barbican Art Gallery
Solo exhibition
The Herbert Art Gallery & Museum
Solo exhibition
Ancient & Modern
Solo exhibition
Institute of Contemporary Arts, London
Solo exhibition
Edinburgh Printmakers
Group exhibition
Bloc Projects
Solo exhibition
Paradise Row
Solo exhibition
House of Propellers
Group exhibition
Hayward Gallery
Solo exhibition
The Centre for Contemporary Arts
Group exhibition
The Mead Gallery, Warwick Arts Centre
Solo exhibition
Parasol unit
A Contemporary art exhibition at Pullman Court, launching during London Open House. 17 artists will work in the spaces of the Modernist building to discuss its influence and contemporary changes in the lives of the capital and its inhabitants.
Pullman Court is one of the UK ́s first housing projects designed in the Modernist International Style. Completed in 1936, it is an influential private development of apartments of different sizes. It is the first building designed by Sir Frederick Gibberd (1912-1984), who went on to build the Liverpool Catholic Cathedral, the first terminal of Heathrow airport and Harlow New Town, amongst other projects.
In the 80th anniversary of the building, its residents are organising a series of events throughout the year to celebrate Pullman Court’s architecture and raise awareness of what it means universally, for the country, for the city and also locally, for the residents themselves. Events include talks, workshops, tours, an exhibition of historic photographs from the RIBA archive, and CONCRETE, an exhibition showcasing 17 international contemporary artists invited to work within the building.
Eleven years ago, under the umbrella of the 2005 London Open House, an exhibition entitled nineteenthirtysix took place across Pullman Court. On that occasion, three artists celebrated its uniqueness and the historical spaces of the building. In 2016, CONCRETE, will show some of the original works from the first show, alongside new site-specific commissions by artists who are resident or familiar with Pullman Court, and by some who are new to it but who deal with modern heritage and/or the city in their works. Back in 2005, the main issue was to raise awareness of modern heritage in Britain with one fine example, helping to confront a tendency to blame certain modern architecture for many social ills, overlooking issues like maintenance and investment. The artists exhibiting in CONCRETE will reflect on this, on the Modernist forms and elegance, and on the city as a whole, on the way people live in its spaces, and the way politics and the economy force changes on the city and its inhabitants.
Artists and audience will be able to see Pullman Court as an early example of high rise living that has influenced later housing developments, with its apartments set around services and amenities that organise life in a way that has become common nowadays.
Exhibiting artists: Alexander Apóstol, Bob and Roberta Smith, Camila Botero, Monika Bravo, Lisa Castagner, Jaime Gili, Lothar Goetz, Justin Hibbs, Polonca Lovsin, Adriana Minoliti, Santiago Reyes Villaveces, Engel Leonardo, Lucía Pizzani, Lizi Sánchez, Paul Jones, Manuel Saiz and Annalisa Sonzogni.
CONCRETE is curated by Jaime Gili in conjunction with the PC80 committee. There will be a small publication with text by Isobel Whitelegg.
CONCRETE will preview on Friday 16th from 6pm to 9pm and will be open during the Open House London weekend, from 11am to 5pm on Saturday 17th and Sunday 18th September. It will then be open by appointment until Sunday 25th September. Please call Jaime Gili on 07905115871 to arrange a visit.
About the artists in CONCRETE:
Renowned British artist Bob and Roberta Smith will create a special work in his distinctive style for the flagpole at the roof terrace of Pullman Court. His flag will preside the events with an important message for the present. Alexander Apóstol, on the other hand, informed by some South American endeavours of Frederick Gibberd, has worked a piece that discusses the shifting international relationships in town planning at the levels that Gibberd reached in the 1950s.
Adriana Minoliti, says she applies gender studies to geometry and abstraction, the result is a new angle on Modernism that will be seen in her drawings of softened edges and hidden treasures. Lizi Sánchez, on the other hand, literally made a soft shape from a 1930s Modernist typeface, and will install it in one of the entrances at the back block.
Camila Botero will work with elements of the gardens in Pullman Court to develop the work she is currently doing at the Royal College of Art about nature and culture. A fellow Colombian artist, Monika Bravo, who exhibited at the Vatican pavilion in the last Venice Biennale, will show a multimedia installation in one of the interior corridors in Pullman Court, reviewing the early stages of Modernist formalism.
Manuel Saiz will be showing a poetic video piece that looks into our expectations for the future of our cities and their architecture. Travelling not to the future but to the past, local resident Lucía Pizzani, will show a series of collages where she imagines Pullman court ́s apartments as inhabited by important women from different eras who are close to her own story.
Santiago Reyes Villaveces, will work inside some apartments and, with the help of the neighbours, introduce in them elements that will interact with the domestic objects and that he will then photograph and shown.
Annalisa Sonzogni will also introduce simple elements in the architecture that will make us look deeper into some of the details of the internal common spaces at Pullman Court.
Lisa Castagner, who has been a resident in the building for several years, will show a video piece recorded in different apartments when residents were present. Jaime Gili, who also lives in Pullman Court, will make a piece to highlight a lost element in the main entrance to the back block, and will also work a sort of 3D painting in one of the elevators, mirroring Justin Hibbs intervention in the opposite elevator. Both works will bring a new life to the 1930s machinery with their reflecting surfaces, colours and stripes.
Paul Jones will install some specially handcrafted, disruptive elements in the interior spaces of Pullman Court, which will contrast with the building ́s materials and finishing. Engel Leonardo, who visited the building several times this year but is now travelling the Caribbean, is looking for 1930 ́s mirroring buildings in distant places, to talk about the architecture of the globalised elites as opposed to the vernacular, often poorer ways of building.
Artist Lothar Goetz created a mural for one of the flats in 2005, which has been well kept despite daily life and children living around it. The aging work is a great addition to the exhibition and an early homage to the 2005 exhibition nineteenthirtysix for which it was commissioned. Polonca Lovsin, who also took part in that show, will showcase the video she produced then about the possible new lease of life of one of the features of Pullman Court, its swimming pool.
For More Information