Aid & Abet is an artist run warehouse gallery space close to the railway station in Cambridge – Friday night saw the opening of their “Temporary Residence” at Kettle’s Yard.
Aid & Abet: “The exhibition focuses on work dealing with transitions and thresholds and the evolution and transformation of image, material and object through pathos, humour and a meticulous approach to process. Common to the work methodology is an interest in elements of the outsider, the cult, and the uncanny. The exhibition will include a variety of sculpture, print, collage and film.”
This mutually beneficial exercise brings a young group of artists and their audience into Kettle’s Yard and makes the Kettle’s Yard audience better aware of a relatively new gallery space in the city. Aid & Abet and Kettle’s Yard share similar curatorial philosophies – their community-minded, restriction-lite ideals allow far more contact with the artists and their work than is generally available.
Prince Volume – Iain Paxon
An example of the ‘open’ gallery approach came from Iain Paxon who gave a comic and inventive performance of “Prince Volume” to a large audience in the house itself – the story of a prince and his faithful horse Clop searching for a kingdom. Iain narrates the story in a cape using the house piano for accompaniment with slide projections of monochrome silhouette drawings.
Other work included “Lament” a film by Sean Vicary – sequences of landsapes, woodland and abandoned buildings, with added animated elements of pumping hearts and leaves becoming throbbing chrysalis-like objects. www.seanvicary.com
Kevin Hunt’s delicately placed sculpture rings miraculously survived the evening.www.kevin-hunt.co.uk/
Amang the Rigs – Martyn Cross
Martyn Cross series of collages in found frames subverting vintage knitting patterns in subtle and obvious ways. Mega-bearded figures and smoking children in a “League of Gentleman” or “Wicker Man” dystopia. www.yateheads.blogspot.co.uk
Louisiana Blues, Anywhere – Richard Proffitt
Richard Proffitt’s sculpture “Louisiana Blues, Anywhere” features an abandoned rusty moped skeleton with sheep skulls, fleece, wire, sticks, burnt fabric and an orange light bulb bringing to mind folk rituals and tribal relics. www.richardproffitt.co.uk
The exhibition is supported by a series of talks, workshops and performances and runs until April 14th when Norwich’s OUTPOST take over. For more details visit Kettles Yard.
