Category: Art
Delaine Le Bas first met artist/photographer Tara Darby at the Transition Gallery during her solo show Room in 2005. Tara along with Alex Michon and Cathy Lomax at Transition, became one of her ‘comrades’ as she calls them. 'To be an Artist you need these comrades,' she says 'We are not with each other all the time but as soon as we are it is like the time in between just disappears. Our minds and ways of working are linked in a way that cannot not be defined. We always pick up where we left.' The exhibition is something of a homecoming, after all the collaborations and all the activism which is always implicit in her practice she wanted to work with people she could trust on an exhibition which was more personal and where she could explore facets of her own quixotic persona.
Thus with Tara Darby she has created a performative series of photographs. Her relationship with the gallery, shared interests in clothes and music and particularly a punk sensibility were central to this as she says, 'Keeping it real to me is what it is and will always be about. The artists who run Transition get this, Tara gets this. It's not about being fashionable even though the irony is that that is where I started, on a Fashion and Textiles MA at St Martins 1986 – 1988. Through music and clothing I could truly be me. It was not about attracting the opposite sex, it was about identity and forming that identity for myself. I brought magazines when I could, and music papers. I dressed up in a mish mash, crossing what I saw with the old musicals I watched with my Nan and Great Uncle, with Jumble sale finds and old clothing my Mum had. Even before Dennis Potter I dreamed of people 'singing in the rain' and breaking into song instead of speaking, dressed in fantastic outfits that had the glamour of the films and energy of Polystyrene.'
In the lead up to the show Delaine and Alex Michon (who have collaborated on a special publication for the show entitled Sister and Comrade) were both reading Viv Albertine’s recently published memoir Girls Girls Girls, Music Music, Music, Clothes, Clothes, Clothes. Much of the inspirational spirit of punk and especially the girls in punk lie behind this immersive show which also includes paintings, music and film. So often the media want to put Delaine in the box marked 'exotic Romany' as she herself says 'In the series of portraits with the Kabuki make up I wanted to play with who and what I am. I was taught to do the make up by my old friend Suzi Skelton from Worthing, she was part of the Kemp company. I have much to thank her for regarding how the make up works and what you can do with it. Life is not black and white, as human beings we are complex and multi faceted creatures, we are not flat pieces of paper but living three dimensional objects moving in space. As a child, I grew with music blasting in my head and with clothing and make up I realised that you could be whoever you wanted to be and the best thing to do was not to give a fuck no matter what anyone else said or tried to impose upon you. Free spirit, comrade, sister, Portrait Of An Artist is about keeping it real, for yourself and always remaining true to who you want to be no matter how the rest of the world tries to confine and restrict you in the words of Polystyrene “Oh Bondage Up Yours!!'
Opening times: Fri-Sun 12-6pm