On-line Exhibit :Google Art Project
For me the deference between an On-line Exhibit and a site containing artworks is vast. An exhibit for me must promote and display the work in a way befitting its nature. My criteria for a good on-line exhibit is simple, and yet brutal. It must be informative and the most immersive experience possible. A web page simply containing art images is not an exhibit. There is often no curatorial work done, as work is simply laid out alphabetically or by some other arbitrary reason. Instead the Google Art Project attempts to honour the years of curatorial work gone in to each museum. Google married many different technologies together for this, at huge expense. The financial advantage is one of the reasons why other can’t compete at a similar level.
The only other competitor of note is http://www.synthescape.com but though it may challenge on one or two levels, (for example the detail of Rivera Court at the Detroit Institute is of hyper-real standard) it too is crushed by the scope and finish of the GAP.
The following joke pops in to my mind when I think of my introduction to my Google love affair. The joke is of dry humour and tests friendships at best. Jesus is being crucified and calls to his disciple. “Peter...come to me I have something to tell you”. Peter tries to make his way to the cross, but is set upon by the soldiers present and soundly beaten and retreats. This sequence is repeated and the number of times he is called and beaten depends on the patience of your audience, with each beating becoming more pronounced and brutal than the last. Finally he gets to the cross, arches up his head to his beloved Jesus, spits out a tooth and asks “What is it Jesus, what would you have me know?” Jesus smiles down and says “You know Peter...I can see your house from here”
The relevance of this I hope becomes clear when I tell you that my brother immigrated to Australia several months ago, and it hit all my family pretty hard, none more so than my mother. My mother had never used a computer before and had no interest either. Then one day I sat my parents down and opened Google Earth/Maps, zoomed in to my brother’s new address in Melbourne. Together, we looked around the neighbourhood and finished or tour right at his front door. All of a sudden he was not so far away “We could see his house from here”. This virtual journey led my mother to persisting with learning to Skype and as a result probably sees him more now than when he lived a few towns away. It is not the same as seeing him in person but it’s the next best thing. And that is what Google Art Project is, the next best thing to real experience available.
The ability to give a little comfort to my parents in this way was part of reason for love for Google but it goes much further. I am an Art Teacher and Google Earth Mapsallows me to take my teenage students on a virtual tour of churches and buildings of relevance around the world. We can examine 3D versions of the buildings with 360 photographic views available inside and out. The level of detail is amazing and yet being improved constantly. We can place mark our favourite sites and follow the pilgrimage routes of medieval times. It is a far cry from the black and white text book of my school days which left a lot to the imagination ...literally. Images were few and far between in the book often without scale or measurement. The riches of images available today could not have been imagined all those years ago.
The development in technology is lost on my students, but not on me. I have witnessed it first hand over the past 25 years. My earliest experience with computers was writing the hundreds of “Go to” and “run” luminous green lines of programme in order to get the computer to add and subtract or any other simple function. With the development of the internet in the late 1980s and early 1990s, things began to change and an ever increasing rate. My students don’t marvel at what can be done but are despondent about what can’t be done. However even they found themselves impressed with Google Art Project from its inception.
With the arrival of spring this year, my love bloomed anew. In mid January Google Co-FounderLarry Page announced he was taking over from CEO Eric Schmidt. Nerves and concerns reflected in their share prices but all that was to change in early February with their launch of Google Art Project (GAP). It was not only Art-News worthy but ground breaking across the board.
Just under 20 world famous galleries opened their rooms for Google to begin this venture,including New York City's Museum of Modern Art, Berlin's Alte Nationalgalerie, Madrid's Museo Reina Sofia, London's Tate Britain, France's Palace of Versailles and Italy's Uffizi Gallery.
Over 17 leading galleries and museums across the world have come together to be part of Internet giant Google Inc.'s latest online venture called "Art Project".
This unique collaboration is aimed to enable art lovers and connoisseurs globally to discover thousands of extraordinary artworks by renowned artists in minute detail.
The Google Street View Technology has been adapted in a genius manner, allowing us to flow from room to room in crystal clear picturesque surroundings, smashing previous attempts at creating such an experience. The Google Camera Trolley was used to capture and fake your movement through the gallery.
The Giga-pixel (7 billion) images created by GAP gives a level of detail that even the artist making the piece would never have experienced . We can zoom in so close as to see discrepancies and flaws in the weave of a canvas, and areas of craquelure becomes great canyons in relief before our eyes. We don’t have to worry about museum monitors and guards as we get closer and closer. Even the most hyper-realistic pictures are transformed in to abstraction under this level of scrutiny
In 1890 French painter and writer Maurice Denis offered the following definition of a painting"Remember that a picture, before being a battle horse, a nude, an anecdote or whatnot, is essentially a flat surface covered with colors assembled in a certain order."
The truth of this statement is displayed for all to see. Although we have never been able to get this close to the paintings previously, the fact that these paintings are not really there to touch, is not lost on me. That would not be permissible in most galleries anyway.
Some critics may feel that we get too close, peeking behind the wizards curtain and removing the magic of the work.
The question to explore is not whether the GAP replaces the experience of seeing real masterpieces, but how it alters it. Having seen Salvador Dali's iconic melting clocks blown up across the walls of a thousand college dorm rooms, fans are often stunned to discover that the real "Persistence of Memory" at MoMA is actually quite tiny, almost a miniature. Widespread photographic reproduction has granted Dali's clocks a stature that has arguably amplified the image's tremendous psychic power, thereby transforming our relation to the original. In the future, our expectations of our non-virtual Old Masters will be affected too if the hyperreal level of detail of the Google Art Project becomes the standard. We will be trained to see totally new things in them, and likely experience the originals altogether differently. Yes, in the future, we will all have to mind the GAP.
As an art teacher and art lover, I travel to museums as much as possible buying the DVDs and more recently Virtual tour packs for computers. Most are of a poor standard, rarely updated and several are not compatible with current computer anymore. Many gallery sites continue to rely on still images only, although few have tried to include the 360 view as it becomes more the norm and cheaper to have.www.view360imaging.com .GAP uses a combination of both that is a perfect symbiosis. As you flow from room to room, you can click on the pictures you like and examine them in a still image format with its hyper-real resolution. You can select favourites and set up your own exhibit and invite friends. Visiting the virtual gallery does not have to be a solitary experience as it starts to lean towards social networking.
The debate over real verses virtual will be ever-present around this and nothing can compare with taking students out of the classroom and in to a museum.(http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/07/real-vs-virtual-examining-works-of-art-online/?scp=3&sq=google%20art%20project&st=cse )
However with the current financial climate and various other reasons it can be more and more difficult to take groups on these ventures. The alternative used to be a very poor substitute. Fighting with The Louvre PC Tour (which I purchased 4 years ago and now won’t work on my current computer) was always a losing battle. Though it did attempt a real tour experience, it was chunky and sluggish. Even the charming audio of footsteps as you moved from room to room could not save it. In fact I seem cursed with that Museum as at the age of 14 my school tour to Paris was in vain, as upon arrival the Louvre was closed for renovations. My pilgrimage spanning days on busses and boats was without fulfilment. That will not happen to my students. It can be achieved with the click of a button.
But I digress...My question to myself was, “Is this the mother of all on-line exhibits”?
A change in the background colour would perhaps lessen the eye-grabbing nature of this video burning brightly in the 30 square foot room. Perhaps a change in the age of the actress would remove a large number of possible life tragedies that she could have experienced. Or simply Britta is of a similar age to Cecily and acts as a substitute for the artist. The high polished finish could be seen to take from its rawness, and makes it too “pure” and almost unreal and a reduction in the production could make it more relatable. But this quality is present in all of Cecily’s video work. The formula remains true also. The protagonist is placed in a controlled monochrome environment in which they become the personification of a human emotion be it rage, grief, anger or another charged emotion.
“Marks, blobs, drips, glazes and brushstrokes of thick paint, the subject merges and emerges from the many layers of paint built up over many months, even years” Ciaran O Sullivan
Born in Co. Louth in 1975, Ciarain studied both at the National College of Art and Design and at the Limerick School of Art and Design. He is currently an active member of Limerick’s largest studio collective, “Contact Studios”. He has exhibited nationally in both group and solo shows including the R.H.A.’s Annual Exhibition.http://contactstudios.wordpress.com/about/
Is it perfect? Of course not, and here lies a major flaw, for the moment there is no Google Louvre, no Prado, no featured Irish Gallery but I believe more are on the way and I am greedy for them already. Also some paintings are blurred for copyright reasons and that can hamper some virtual visits, but the quality of information and connective links makes up a lot of this lost ground. Is it better or worse than really going to the gallery... it is just different. Can the experience be made better? Only time will tell. Google are usually ahead of the game when it comes to combining technologies. As attempts are made for a more immersive experience different avenues may be explored.
Already we can create on-line avatars that live and socialize in “Second life” a virtual world (http://secondlife.com ). There you can go to movies, visit galleries, buy art, land, whatever. If that sound a little geeky then, perhaps Google like true masters will need to look to the past in order to create a better future. The retro computer games helmet of the 1980s might be the way forward, as it contains the computer screen on the visor. So every tilt and turn of your head is replicated in the virtual world...still a little geeky? But whatever happens the doors to the virtual galleries are truly open
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“Black Tears” by Cecily Brennen:
Entering the screening room of the Crawford Gallery is like being submerged in a sensory deprivation tomb. The traffic and busy streets of Cork City are left 2 stories below this vacuum of sound and colour. The blacked out room and the simple black bench-seat for the viewer are all part of the emersion technique. All focus is drawn to the 20 foot screen. The video starts with a close up of a woman in her mid 50’s. Actress (Britta Smith: known for her performances in “The Magdalane Sisters” 2002, “My left foot” 1989 and “In the name of the father”1992). She is without makeup and every blemish is on display. Her fair unkempt hair, tied loosely back is also without attention. Unadorned with even the barest of jewellery, this is the woman in the raw. She is simply clothed unlike some of the performers of Cecily’s other video work which features nudes in galleries and similar places which is a little surreal. But the clothing makes it all the more real. However Britta is set against an unnatural bright and brilliant red backdrop that is magnetic to eyes in the darkened room.
In comparison to other art disciplines “Video Art” is still in its infancy. Pioneered in the mid 1960s by Art Leaders such as Warhol and Joan Jonas, some of its greatest successes came from more obscure artists such as Bruce Nauman and his 1965-6 video “ Walking in an exaggerated manner” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtRpUB7J1tU) or “Pinch neck” 1968.(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkfOgavdhak&feature=related).
There are a few varieties. Single-Channel, Multi-Channel and Installation. TheSingle-channel is the closest to a traditional art appreciation experience. A video is screened in a television style relationship with the viewer. Multi-Channel video can be used in other ways, for example, surrounding the viewer with videos on every wall and ergo changing the experience to immersion or intimidation . Installation works involve the environment even further, combining other aspects with the video for an extra-sensory experience.
For this piece Cecily uses the Single-Channel video technique. The video performance begins as Britta starts to cry. This is normal enough, and the viewer watches the actress go through a range of grief from gentle sobs to a crescendo of animalistic soul wrenching wails. She varies from looking off camera and vacantly into the distance, to directly at the audience in an angry accusing way. The feeling on unease experienced is confirmation of the pieces success. This journey through grief is repeated a second time and just when you ask may ask the reason for that... you realise that instead of the earlier transparent tears she is now crying black ones. They stream in contrast with nature down her cheeks. This is made all the more impressive by the fact that the video appears to be a continuous un-edited piece of footage. The piece lasts 5 minutes approximately before it loops and starts again. The slick presentation of the video is due to the involvement of Seamus Deasy (Cinematographer: Known for work on movies such as “The General”1998 and “Neverland” 2011.)
This is a minimalist piece in terms of its reduction to its purest elements. It is simplistic in its nature, one figure against a monochrome background with a single emotion. In this lies its strength and perhaps its weakness. The grief which is all-consuming is just that, nothing more or less. On my second and third viewing I confirmed my suspicions, there are no codes to decipher no hidden meanings, just pain. On return to this at a later date you will find no new symbols, no fresh revelations but you will experience this difficult 5 minutes again. You will be forced to feel confused, concerned and perhaps reflect as I did on a personal grief.
One can only guess at the events that conspired to inflict such woe, a death of a lover or child, but it could be any other imagined tragedy. The possibilities are only limited by the viewer’s lack of empathy or life-experiences. The vibrant red could be symbolic of blood and black tears the physical manifestation of the depth of emotion and the graveness of this situation. But its elements are so refined there is almost no room for manoeuvre and little for misinterpretation.
Brennan’s practice has expanded to encompass video, sculpture and installation addressing two related but distinct subjects, that of physical pain and affliction, on the one hand, and that of psychological trauma, on the other. Damage and fortitude are her abiding concerns, and the perennial search for those strategies of survival that allow ordinary human beings to endure and overcome the various afflictions by which they are beset.**Aidan Dunne, Irish Times, May 5, 2010
The video was originally shown alongside watercolours and drawings as part of “Black Tears” exhibition in the Taylor Galleries Dublin in April and May of 2010. These other pieces share the same “Reduction to the Pure”. Despite the change in media the strength of the work stays the same.
This screening in “The Crawford” is
To launch the screening Cecily Brennan will give an informal presentation on Thursday 13 January, 5:30 pm (free entrance). Cecily Brennan lives and works in Dublin and Berlin and has shown extensively in Ireland and internationally including ‘Transmediale’ MMX Berlin, (2011); ‘Love Video’ Oriel Mostyn Gallery, Llandudno (2011); ‘Dark Waters’ Station Project Platform Arts, Belfast (2011); ‘Collecting the New’ Irish Museum of Modern Art
(2010); ‘Unbuilding’ Mermaid Arts Centre. ‘Black Tears’ Taylor Galleries, Dublin (2010); ‘Voices’ commissioned by Breaking Ground, Ballymun (2009); Ard Bia, Berlin, ‘Singing the Real’ Iziko South African National Gallery, Capetown (2007) and ‘Balancing’ Ormeau Baths Gallery, Belfast (2005). Cecily Brennan is represented by Taylor Galleries, Dublin.
For further information please contact: dawnwilliams@crawfordartgallery.ie
Crawford Art Gallery, Emmet Place, Cork, Ireland
www.crawfordartgallery.ie
(2010); ‘Unbuilding’ Mermaid Arts Centre. ‘Black Tears’ Taylor Galleries, Dublin (2010); ‘Voices’ commissioned by Breaking Ground, Ballymun (2009); Ard Bia, Berlin, ‘Singing the Real’ Iziko South African National Gallery, Capetown (2007) and ‘Balancing’ Ormeau Baths Gallery, Belfast (2005). Cecily Brennan is represented by Taylor Galleries, Dublin.
For further information please contact: dawnwilliams@crawfordartgallery.ie
Crawford Art Gallery, Emmet Place, Cork, Ireland
www.crawfordartgallery.ie
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“Double Take” an exhibition of paintings by Ciaran O’Sullivan
The newly refurbished Belltable Art Centre provides the perfect backdrop to O’ Sullivan’s work. On entering the space you will see how the pristinely clean, sail-white walls work in a complementary contrast to the visual explosion of paint that is his work. This is the third exhibition in the Belltable since the remodelling and truly “third time is the charm”. These arresting pieces demand the viewer’s attention as paint literally extends from the 2-Dimensional surface, almost making low-relief sculptures of several pieces. The 19 strong show surrounds the viewer in a barrage of images and abstractions working together as a harmonious whole. The ratio of realistic imagery to abstract shape /colour varies from piece to piece allowing the viewer to choose paintings that work best for them. The well titled show “Double Take” represents the experience one has as the viewer may need to revisit a painting more than once to find the image amid the abstraction or the abstraction amid the image. Some figures scream themselves in to existence in front of you and others fade in to the background like failing memories.
Ranging in size from smallest: 1.5ft by 1ft, to the largest at 4ft by 3ft the scale varies wildly but the quality remains constant. This work is all about contrasts. Control contrasting with freedom, clarity with ambiguity, detail with vague, and realism in contrast with abstraction. Each piece contains these elements in a shared existence. They act, react and interact with each other and the viewer.
Spilled, hurled or dripped, the treatment of the paint could be a clue to the relationship O’Sullivan has with the featured protagonists. Is it a representation of their character or simply what was needed, where it was needed in order for the piece to work? The figures are personal to the artist and as a result are treated reverently. The faces of his father and wife can be seen emerging from a number of paintings. Within the work they exist in an abstract world and the viewer could be forgiven for thinking this is an extension of their reality, a reality Ciaran imagines for them or remembers them in. Titles such as “Fire in his Heart” and “Trapped” hint at the emotional content portrayed in the paintings. The relationship he has to the people represented is of key importance to the artist, and is used as a driving force to finish these paintings to the highest level, some taking months and years to reach a conclusion due to the processes used.
However, though it may be important to O’Sullivan that these people are relevant to him, it is not necessary for our enjoyment of the work that we know them or the connection. In fact that frees us to imagine further possibilities as the art becomes that of the viewer and no longer belongs to the artist.
Of course we can look at these as simply portraits but on another level it’s obvious these works are about the paint, from the thinnest translucent wash to the thickest opaque slab. We will know more about paint from five minutes with one of O’Sullivans paintings than some artists learn in a lifetime. Application can be as varied as a Pollock’s dripping session to a Titian’s touch. One of his great successes is allowing the paint to work for him. Saturated solutions of colour-clouds search out the edges of the paintings like brilliant emerging nebulas from the beginning of time, reaching out for the very precipice of space. This extension of paint does not restrict itself to just the two dimensions but also reaches out from the piece to the viewer, defiantly emerging from the surface, unwilling to be contained. On the surface, lairs of impasto give a very real presence to the image, reaching out to us, begging us to touch as texture becomes as import to the painting as it would to a sculpture.
Other formal elements such as line, colour and shape are treated with a delicate mixture of The Controlled and The Accidental. Every separate thing, be it glaze, blob or mark is at work with or against its surroundings. The depth and number of glazes applied and allowed to dry through and pure, unmixed with later glazes, shows a passing of time, an investment of skill and a process of thought. In previous shows O’Sullivan has put some of his sketchbooks on display as a partial reveal of his process. And one of my only criticisms of the show was they were not present. In these we can see that the craftsmanship in his drawing is seldom bested and his sketches are often purchased as readily as his paintings. Every exhaustive measure is taken to ensure that accuracy to the figure is achieved. This becomes more and more difficult as the paintings surface begins to rise and be reshaped from the repeated application of colour upon colour. There are some colour combinations that are repeated across several works, and these pieces are kept apart in the exhibit in order for them to exist independently. For example the warm earth colours and laughing children in the painting “Flower Girls” is displayed alongside a cold coloured screaming self-portrait of the Artist called “Trapped” . This clever curating ensures each piece to be a stand-alone success but also allows all to work together to add strength to this show.
The show runs from 10th February to 31st March 2011
Born in Co. Louth in 1975, Ciarain studied both at the National College of Art and Design and at the Limerick School of Art and Design. He is currently an active member of Limerick’s largest studio collective, “Contact Studios”. He has exhibited nationally in both group and solo shows including the R.H.A.’s Annual Exhibition.http://contactstudios.wordpress.com/about/ 
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