Piecework Orchestra
National Waterfront Museum
Inspired by two of South Wales’ biggest exports: industry and music, Torsten Lauschmann has created an interface which enables him to control domestic appliances such as vacuum cleaners, hairdryers and drills to program musical tones and rhythms.
His ‘Piecework Orchestra’, located within the National Waterfront Museum subverts the idea of industrial production and surprises the viewer with its cacophony of sound.
The title is derived from the term ‘piecework’, which describes types of employment in which a worker is paid a fixed “piece rate” for each unit produced or action performed.
Archive for 15 April 2007
Torsten Lauschmann
15 April 2007
Rebecca Gould
The Trojan Horse
Norwegian Church, SA1
Rebecca Gould brought a contemporary take of the mythical story of Helen of Troy, to the Norwegian Church through sculpture, film and music, portraying herself as Helen jetting out of Swansea on a fast boat to the musical accompaniment of Bonnie Tyler’s ‘Holding out for a hero’.
The film was presented in the belly of the Trojan horse that not only carried the story of the siege of Troy but also suggested a new type of siege, bringing glamour and wealth in its shell.
15 April 2007
Carwyn Evans
A Grand View
King’s Road, SA1
Taking inspiration from a carved ‘double picture frame’ in the Swansea Museum collection, delicately created by a seaman from interlocking pieces of carved wood, Carwyn Evans has constructed a series of house-like facades that replicate a simple cross-hatched drawing.
The facades become iconic in aesthetic against the backdrop of new apartment blocks of SA1 and stand as a ghost-like reminder of Swansea’s industrial past but also suggestive of its new status as a changing, evolving city.
15 April 2007
Milena Dopitova
Everything returns because it loses its way
Vojta
We still do not know where will be the last cemetery
Swansea Museum
Milena Dopitova intervened within the collection at Swansea Museum to explore the personal experience of historical objects and to realign them with a potential previous use.
In the Ceramic Gallery we overheard conversations about the artifacts that suggested ideas of their owner and their history, putting them back into the context of their use. A series of drawings that looked at the action of war depicted the fear and anxiety of the artist and a film of a young boy learning to play the violin revealed his mistakes and emotions on show for all to witness.
15 April 2007
Rhona Byrne
Learning to fly over Swansea
St. Mary’s Church
Rhona Byrne spent time navigating the air above Swansea in a series of flying lessons. In her moving and evocative film she documented this altered perspective on reality.
Learning how to fly over a city that she explored as an artist, Rhona considered ideas of belief and the existential interactions with spaces we experience.
The film projected in St. Mary’s, Swansea’s largest and most central church, engaged us in a meditative experience of place as well as a fascinating visual depiction of a changing city.
About St. Mary’s Church
Additional sponsorship for this project was given by
Horizon Aviation Ltd., Swansea Airport, Fairwood Common, Swansea SA2 7JU. Tel: 01792 296600
15 April 2007
Sara Rees
Kairos
Swansea Marina
In making this work, Sara Rees collected materials washed up on shores and abandoned in streets, and has used them to construct a floating sculpture.
The work’s premise is as an object which has arrived here from some unspecified time in the future. The audience is invited to suspend disbelief and to imagine the nature of the future from which this object has come.
15 April 2007
Niamh McCann
Flock Of Ospreys Looking For The Old Blind Sea Captain Who Dreams Of His Deceased Sea Fellows Under A Visiting African Sun
Dylan Thomas Theatre
Niamh McCann has taken her inspiration from different elements: the background sea/skyscape in her mural is a simplified graphic representation of the James Harris Snr painting ‘Swansea Bay in Stormy Weather’; an African cigarette logo provides the red sun; the over looking ospreys are a Swansea logo and reference and finally, the title, combining all these and intimating the presence of a character from Dylan Thomas’s Under Milkwood.
All these elements (and their back-story) come together to create a landscape, which is both local and disparate within the given landscape of Swansea.
15 April 2007
Zoe Walker & Neil Bromwich
Siege Weapons of Love
Guildhall & Rotunda
‘Siege Weapons of Love’ is the latest development in Walker and Bromwich’s ‘Friendly Frontier Peace Campaign’; a campaign that celebrates love through bizarre and romantic acts.
For Walker and Bromwich, Brangwyn’s brilliantly coloured Empire Panels, housed in Swansea’s Brangwyn Hall, provided an aesthetic and conceptual starting point, and the duo have created a new flag which will be raised on the flag pole outside the Guildhall in a public ceremony. They have also made models which graft together flowers and weaponry to create poetic hybrid objects that talk of love not war.
15 April 2007
Jaan Toomik
Seagulls
Dancing with Dad
Waterfall
Jaan
Guildhall Council Chamber
Jaan Toomik’s personal films depict a sense of frustration both physically and emotionally in his futile attempts to communicate effectively.
Shown here in the grand surroundings of the Council Chamber, the films suggest institutional and political restraints, and represent the difficulties and restrictions of us as individuals within the system.
15 April 2007
Helen Sear
Plantasia
Central Library
Referencing the exotic fantasy world of the Brangwyn Panels, Helen Sear’s ‘Plantasia’ was photographed in Swansea’s tropical hothouse.
The proximity of Plantasia to the shopping complex provides both a contrast to and an extension of, the “dream of escape” described by Henri Rousseau when he visited the glass houses of Paris to study for his paintings of the jungle, and the closed eyes of Helen’s subjects allows them a space of private reverie amidst the forensic gaze of the camera.
15 April 2007
