Amelia’s Magazine | London Art Fair 2012 Review: Part Two

elisabeth lecourt map dress
You’ve read the first part of my London Art Fair 2012 round up, now catch up with the rest… starting with Elisabeth Lecourt of Byard Art in Cambridge who creates gorgeous dresses from maps. (I told you maps were big news.)

London Art Fair 2012 -chris wood
I’m always a bit of a sucker for pearlescent materials: Chris Wood (also with Byard) favours the medium of Dichroic glass for angular abstract patterns.

Claire Moynihan byard London Art Fair 2012 -Claire Moynihan
London Art Fair 2012 -Claire Moynihan
Claire Moynihan byard dragonfly
It’s great to see an upsurge of interest in textile art. Claire Moynihan works in detailed felt and embroidery, and is best admired up close – her ‘moth balls’ are beautiful.

London Art Fair 2012 - Justin Hammond
London Art Fair 2012 - Justin Hammond
On the second floor of the exhibition I was able to pop in on Justin Hammond, hosting a display of great new Catlin Guide commissioned art pieces.

London Art Fair 2012 -hannah harkes
London Art Fair 2012 -tom howse
My favourites have to be Hannah Harkes (with a cowboy snogging an Indian) and the naif folk art of Tom Howse.

London Art Fair 2012 -Chris Pensa
Next door Chris Pensa of Love Art London talked me through some of his upcoming tours – check out their website for ideas, I fancy me a tour with the fossil hunter! Read my review of an earlier tour here.

Run riot run laura jordan
A strong theme of disaffection unsurprisingly runs through many artworks, including Laura Jordan‘s Run Riot Run, an intricate map of the riots, shown with Galleryone.

UK Uncut oona hassim trafalgar_square
Oona Hassim took as the starting point for her oil painting a photo of the Anti Cuts Demo in March 2011 in Piccadilly Circus. If I’m not much mistaken this is the UK Uncut parade that led to Fortnum & Mason – despite the blurry feel I recognise it, because I was there – those flags are a dead giveaway. The pieces are oddly energetic and beautiful but how odd to see direct action flogged as fine art!

YouTube Preview Image
You can watch a short film showing her making the initial sketches here. She has an exhibition opening this week at Woolff Gallery.

London Art Fair 2012 -Joanne Tinker
London Art Fair 2012 -Joanne Tinker
At Woolff there was lots of upcycling going on. Special mention goes to Joanne Tinker who created rows of goblets out of sweet wrappers.

London Art Fair 2012 -Susila Bailey-Bond
Susila Bailey-Bond is another butterfly papercut artist, concentrating on their decorative qualities.

Jess littlewood contemporary
Jess Littlewood at The Contemporary London collages together monochrome otherworldly scenes that are very ‘now’. Like a lot.

London Art Fair 2012 -Juz Kitson
Porcelain, ink and wool are the preferred medium of artist Juz Kitson, who created wall installations of skulls, pulsating hearts and corals.

London Art Fair 2012 -Cynthia Corbett Gallery Ghost of a Dream
For the Cynthia Corbett Gallery Ghost of a Dream have produced an amazing collaboration that I first spotted at the graduate art fairs that I visited in abundance last year. The installation uses lottery tickets and the covers of romance novels, which are glued in patterns onto panels, mirrors and chandeliers.

Zak Ove
Irish/Carribean artist and film director Zak Ove at Vigo Gallery cobbles together found objects to create religiously inspired ensembles.

Reginald S Aloysius
At Bearspace I recognised Reginald S Aloysius from the 2011 Jerwood Drawing Prize. His overgrown temples are intersected by the paths of cross atlantic planes.

London Art Fair 2012  jane ward
Jane Ward imagined a disturbed dystopian future of exploding buildings. I hope we don’t end up there!

London Art Fair 2012 -Nomad
Lastly I can’t go without mentioning the huge Nomad light sculpture by Beau McClellan in the entrance to the design centre: yours for just 250,000 euros. One for those Russian oligarchs me thinks.

Categories ,2012, ,Bearspace, ,Beau McClellan, ,Byard Art, ,Chris Pensa, ,Chris Wood, ,Claire Moynihan, ,craft, ,Cynthia Corbett Gallery, ,Dichroic Glass, ,Elisabeth Lecourt, ,Fortnum & Mason, ,Galleryone, ,Ghost of a Dream, ,Hannah Harkes, ,Islington Business Design Centre, ,Jane Ward, ,Jerwood Drawing Prize, ,Jess Littlewood, ,Joanne Tinker, ,Justin Hammond, ,Juz Kitson, ,Laura Jordan, ,Light Sculpture, ,London Art Fair, ,Love Art London, ,Moth Balls, ,Nomad, ,Oligarch, ,Oona Hassim, ,Papercutting, ,Porcelain, ,Reginald Aloysius, ,review, ,Riots, ,Run Riot Run, ,susila bailey-bond, ,textile, ,The Catlin Guide, ,The Contemporary London, ,Tom Howse, ,UK Uncut, ,Upcycling, ,Vigo Gallery, ,wool, ,Woolff, ,Zak Ove

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Amelia’s Magazine | London Art Fair 2013 Review: 12 Top Picks

London Art Fair 2013 LED art
The London Art Fair hosts a bewildering variety of artist talent under one roof at the Business Design Centre. From the banal (the LED artwork above, almost identical to a gadget in the baby sensory room at my local Sure Start centre) to the dreadful (oh god, bad painting) to the sublime (pretty much anything below) to the derivative (copycat Damian Hirst Skulls-R-Us) – you can expect to find it all here. I negotiated the thronging crowds at the 2013 London Art Fair with boyfriend and baby in tow – here are my most interesting discoveries.

London Art Fair sarah woodfine
At Danielle Arnaud Sarah Woodfine had constructed an installation from MDF and cardboard. Like many of the artists that catch my eye these days she ‘explores the imaginary worlds that border the familiar and the fantastical.’ Fine pencil drawings decorate 3D shapes reminiscent of vessels.

London Art Fair 2013 Klari Reis Hypochondria installation
Klari Reis (showing with Cynthia Corbett) hails from San Francisco, where she creates wall installations from colourful epoxy polymers. Her current Hypochondria series features patterned groupings of petri dishes that appeal to my love of all things bright.

London Art Fair 2013 Nadav Kander Bodies
It was great to see one of Nadav Kander‘s Bodies photographs up close: an un-airbrushed version of the feminine that proves you can be true to reality and still utterly beautiful. You can see the whole series in his current exhibition, listing here.

London Art Fair Chris Wood
Installation artist Chris Wood works with glass and light to create enchanting works of art that caught my eye last year and again this time around.

London Art Fair 2013 Sweettoof
London Art Fair 2013 Sweettoof
I have only ever encountered Sweet Toof artworks on the walls around East London but like most contemporary street artists he also creates pieces with the fine art world in mind. His Dark Horse series features a host of scurrilous street scenes, skeletons jousting with gummy grins. His website explains that he ‘masterfully blends urban detritus with bygone decadence,’ and the results call to mind works by Jake and Dinos Chapman, especially their cheerful defamation of prized Goya drawings.

London Art Fair 2013 Ye Hongxing Scream Fine Art Utopia
I first saw works by Chinese artist Ye Hongxing at Scream late last year and was immediately drawn in by her kaleidoscopic use of kitsch stickers, used in their thousands to create Modern Utopian landscapes featuring wild animals (such as the zebra in this detail). Her work is a reaction to the swift changes taking place in Chinese culture.

London Art Fair Butch Anthony
Alabama based folk artist Butch Anthony has tapped into our love of all things skeletal; layering his own doodles on top of junk shop finds. You can see more of Butch Anthony‘s work at his new show, Intertwangleism, opening February 8th at Black Rat. ‘Intertwangleism is how I look at people and break them down to the primordial beginnings,’ explains Butch Anthony, who also hosts Doo-Nanny, his very own annual outsider folk art festival. Watch this video to find out more about the intriguing Butch Anthony.

London Art Fair 2013 Yellow Pollen by Simon Allen
The sculptor Simon Allen creates carved, polished, pigmented forms that appeal to all my tactile senses. His pollen series was featured alongside equally captivating carved metallic wooden forms.

London Art Fair 2013 Mel Bochner words
London Art Fair Mel Bochner
We recently visited the Mel Bochner exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery, so I am familiar with his large scale typographic works. At the London Art Fair his tactile paintings featured extraordinary mounds of screen printed paint. I couldn’t peel my eyes away from the pornographic words.

London Art Fair Shane Bradford
I profiled Shane Bradford many years ago in the print version of Amelia’s Magazine: assorted objects dipped until they are heavily encrusted with glossy paint take on new symbolism and meaning.

London Art Fair Jealous Gallery Adam Dix
I listed Adam Dix‘s 2012 exhibition Programming Myth, which inspired these gorgeous gold leafed screen prints for Jealous Gallery. The images marry old fashioned imagery and a modern day fascination with technology.

London Art Fair Susie Macmurray
Susie Macmurray‘s huge installation bulged from the wall like an overgrown carbuncular growth, unapologetic in it’s vulgarity. A former classical musician, she is well known for her use of unconventional materials such as cling film.

And there you have it: my best bits from this year’s London Art Fair. To see my fave images as I see them follow me on instagram @ameliagregory.

Categories ,2013, ,Adam Dix, ,Alabama, ,art, ,Baby Sensory, ,Black Rat, ,Bodies, ,Business Design Centre, ,Butch Anthony, ,Chinese, ,Chris Wood, ,Cynthia Corbett Gallery, ,Damian Hirst, ,Danielle Arnaud, ,Dark Horse, ,Doo-Nanny, ,East London, ,Folk Art, ,Goya, ,Hypochondria, ,instagram, ,Intertwangleism, ,Islington, ,Jake and Dinos Chapman, ,Jealous Gallery, ,Klari Reis, ,LED, ,London Art Fair, ,Mel Bochner, ,Modern Utopia, ,Nadav Kander, ,Petri dishes, ,Programming Myth, ,review, ,San Francisco, ,Sarah Woodfine, ,Scream, ,Screenprints, ,sculpture, ,Shane Bradford, ,Simon Allen, ,street art, ,Sure Start, ,Susie Macmurray, ,Sweet Toof, ,Whitechapel Gallery, ,Ye Hongxing

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