Exhibition: Stuart Middleton & Luiz Roque at Tramway
Last week I spent my day off work wisely and walked up to Tramway where two new exhibitions were on. In the main hall is Stuart Middleton - a mixed installation of kinetic sculptures, a raised platform of wooden timbers pulled from domestic settings, and a long tent which also forms a tent which houses a stop-motion animation of a dog sleeping and barking. For such a large room it felt very full purely because of the scale of the works.
We started off in the tent which is built using metal rods and white sheeting that has been stained or marked by what looks like rust, creating this very aesthetically pleasing print on sections of it. The tent forms a tunnel which encourages the viewer to become more aware of their surroundings and sense of space as they walk through it. I felt a bit like a small child in a maze as I became very excited to see where the turns of the tunnel would lead me.
The white tent also housed a TV screen which played a stop-motion animation of a 3D modelled dog sleeping or dreaming or barking, with two long floor cushions provided to sit on either side of the tent. The close up shots of the snout sniffing or licking its nose actually very convincing that it was a real dog - this is the image you can find on the posters for the show.
Leaving the tent we were met with a gigantic floating wooden floor supported by timber framework to look like a giant stage - every wooden timber slat sourced from domestic environments. The 'stage' creates a massive blockade in the room, again playing with the sense of space in the room and how the viewer moves through it. I had the massive urge to climb on to it but restrained myself.
Around the raised wooden floor were kinetic sculptures made from wood dowels and motors. These looked like revolving doors seen in New York subway system or something yet the revolving doors lead to nowhere - each sculpture an inescapable maze perfectly sized for some small creature. Again, a play on awareness of space.
These three components to the exhibition don't really seem to correlate or connect all that clearly aside from their play on space - yet somehow the show as a whole really works in this room. Whether its the sheer scale of each work in this room and how they interact in breaking up the space for the viewer or because each piece is so different from each other - either way I really enjoyed how Middleton has pulled this room together.
In the smaller gallery space at the front of Tramway was a screening of Luiz Roque's film 'HEAVEN'. A film exploring the control of bodies by the state through the denial of the existence an epidemic immunodeficiency disease that is affecting the transsexual community in this vintage-looking futuristic love story set in 2080 - 100 years after the the discovery of AIDS.
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| still from HEAVEN |
I'll be honest here and say that the film looks stunning - you cannot fault the cinematography of each shot and the quirky use of effects to make scenes look 3D such as the news broadcasting scene. That being said I watched the film twice and still don't fully understand the narrative. It comes across as disjointed and confusing with no real plot to it.
That being said it's still worth seeing as its the first screening of this film in the UK.
Overall Tramway impresses once again and if you're looking for something to do one afternoon then its definitely worth a wee jaunt down to see both shows before they end.
Stuart Middleton closes on 23rd October
Luiz Roque ends on 15th October
- Melissa x