Mnemonic City: INTER-SCAPE

21 of September 2013 at Building Bloqs, London

Inter-Scape is the latest in a series of exhibitions by MAGMA under the project title “Mnemonic City”.Mnemonic City embodies the experience of the city through the exchange of personal memories by the artists, exploring the idea of the city as a receptacle, taking inspiration from Plato’s Myth of the Cave. The allegory explores the relation of humans with their environment, questioning what is real and what appearance is.

After the focus on the market place in ‘Moving Streets’, the group’s previous exhibition, Magma Collective moves outward with Inter-Scape to the geographical margin of the city, zooming out after zooming in.

Members of Magma sleeping rough for a night, in the Edmonton marshes The MapEdmonton is like a doorway between country side and city where things are left to rot, odd half constructions, abandoned, a lost land (re)conditioned by humans. We travel through miles and find one hidden village after another, yet, it is still London; the city does not seem to end. We see the signs of a broken power left by the human impact; it shows an attempt at calculation but its failure gives room to jump and explore new potentials in the use and perception of a space. Artists are humans too and bear a responsibility by generating new structures. We should therefore question our own effect upon this inter-scape through the work derived from our interaction with its ruins, estranged edifices and samples of earth within this post suburban non residential mixture between motorways and factories.

We see it as a passage to and from the city, a grey liminal edge. In this tentative natural area kept behind fences, communities live day to day, some have returned to a tribal state living on barges, in tents, on the edge of the canal which was once a high place of trading. We are asking people to leave the city as they know it and experience a sense of possibility, in the dormant state of a place. This means a place which holds the ghostly memories of an activity that became redundant. The work of the artist will consist in creating a point of reference where the margin evolves in the way a landscape passes at very high speed outside the train window.

the walk “River” a performance by Sofia Figueiredo “Drifting, Grasslands” a dance piece by Alexandra Baybutt, Mark Carberry, Lindsey Best and Wendy Windle Below, on the left Carlos Mol during his action and on the right the installation “Walking the Line… forgot something about the future” by Bruno Jamaica Below pictures of the thrilling performance by the Purple Ladies Above and below on the left, Onikakushi, an installation by Mario Frulio and Momoko NishizonoBelow and top right, the installation “…thread softly because you thread on my dreams” by Réka FerencziBelow “Moirai” by Réka FerencziBelow the performance “A walk on the pole” by Rodrigo Cesar

From the outset Magma Collective researched and experimented on the relationship between the psyche and the environment. This led each artist to create a continuous response resonating with the rest of the collective as much as with the surrounding artistic and cultural community. Having initiated work around the idea of Mega City, Magma moved through Mnemonic City, a more detailed overview of the structure of urban survival in relation to the allegory of Plato’s Cave, to focus its attention on the centre of the city itself: the market place, the hub of ambiguous communication.

In Moving Streets, the space, observed and transformed into a work of art, appears as the site of an endless repetition. Yet, the details will vary, the values will change, people will be different or walk by at different times, and exchange words and currencies differently. There is therefore no solidity or permanence and this inspired Magma to look for this paradoxical inconstancy and this sensation of dissolving memory elsewhere in the geographical margin of the city.

After Dalston, and Ridley Road market in particular, Magma moves to Edmonton, a Saturnian ring around planet London. Behind this itinerary lies the idea of a creative re-mapping of the metropolis. An inversion occurs. Magma leads the audience to zoom out after zooming in. Where do the signals end, from the stone sinking to the water circles ? These signals, Magma follows right into the waste land, where remnants of nature collide with remains of industry. Here nature seems to be waiting in an in between zone to be entirely conquered or re-conquer itself in its entirety.

written by Pascal Ancel Bartholdi

ART VIDEO AFTERNOON

Short movies inspired by the theme of Inter-scape been showcased at the venue

SHIFT Juan Carlos Zaldivar – 5m Quest (Prelude) – Yuri Pirondi – 14.30m (RE) BIRTH – Benjamin Minot – 8m ZoneX, Ebb and Flow-The Phantom Promise – Pascal Ancel Bartholdi – 12m PROJECT A19 – Rupert Jaeger vs Julien Thomasset – 5m Commuting: Dark heart of the Lea – Bill Howard – 7m Ines von Bonhorst – Immutable – 15m Shahrzad – Koorosh Asgari – 7.44m Brooch Pin And The Sinful Clasp – JoWOnder – 18.29m Mourning Circle – Ioanna Theodorakou – 3.11m

interscape_022 The Gallery“Not with love but with fear” by Jaime Valtierra“The Night” by Jaime Valtierra“Untitled” by Irene Pulga“Untitled” by Irene Pulga“Island” by Yuri Pirondi“Heron Interogation” by Julien Thomasset“In search of… ” series by Réka Ferenczi Top and below on the left “Soll uns Haben” by Rupert Jaeger. On the right the installation “Untitled #47” by Rodrigo Ferreira

A detail from the installation “Creation, Meditation, Transformation…” by Amos Sheinthe video “Impetus” by Ines von Bonhorst

The video installation “Immutable” by Ines von Bonhorst

“Quest: Prelude” by Yuri Pirondi

The video installation “ZoneX, Ebb and Flow-The Phantom Promise” by Pascal Ancel Bartholdi

interscape_038

A detail from the installation.The installation “Footpaths within the silence” of Momoko Nishizono and Mario Frulio“Transmission” by Charlie Vallely The video installation “N7 Piece” by Iury LechInstallation “Medusa Oblongata” by Monkey Jar, Live drawing by Carlos Mol, Live Music by Bitch ‘n’ Monk