Art13 London, has announced the line-up of international artist projects to be presented at the Fair, which will take place from 1-3 March 2013. This year ArtLyst lends its support as a media partner with London’s largest new contemporary art fair in a decade. It will be a truly global event, bringing together over 120 galleries from 29 countries around the world. Art13’s commitment to showcase works by established and emerging international artists is complemented by the diverse line-up of the 20 projects that will feature throughout the Fair. Visitors can discover installations by artists from Asia, the Middle East and Africa as well as the West, and the range of media employed in these works will enhance the multi-sensory experience of visiting the Fair.
At the heart of Art13 London will be Chinese artist Zhu Jinshi’s remarkable new 12-metre-long installation Boat (2012). Composed of bamboo, cotton and 10,000 sheets of rice paper, the sheer size and visual impact of Boat sits in stark contrast with the delicate nature of the xuan (rice paper). Apart from conveying the cultural significance of xuan – commonly used in Chinese calligraphy and traditional painting – Zhu Jinshi’s Boat also becomes a vessel that signifies the artist’s journey and the viewer’s own passage through space and time.
Stephanie Dieckvoss, Fair Director, commented, “Art13 London will be a place for discovery – visitors will have the rare opportunity to encounter large-scale sculpture and installation works from across the globe. It’s great that the projects encompass so many different regions, particularly since a number of the projects have been crafted specifically for the Fair.”
The 19 remaining projects are located throughout the Fair for visitors to see in the aisles, between the booths and in unexpected corners. Welsh artist Bedwyr Williams’ Sentry Box (2012) is inspired his memory of the Action Man toys of his childhood. Situated in the Foyer of Olympia Grand Hall, the candy-striped and faintly sinister upturned sentry box provides a deliberately intriguing, if somewhat unsettling, introduction to the Art13 Projects.
Ghanaian artist El Anatsui’s large-scale wall-sculpture In the World But Don’t Know the World (2009) is a 10- metre-long work that is comprised of tens of thousands of discarded metal bottle-tops – flattened, cut and ‘sewn’ together with copper wire. Despite being made of metal, the work shimmers with colour, appearing transient, fluid, and cloth-like. Meanwhile, from the Republic of Benin, the Fair will host Romuald Hazoumè’s installation Petrol Cargo (2012). A succinct commentary on the trade of contraband petrol between Benin and Nigeria this work takes the form of a specially adapted moped.
There will also be a strong Middle-Eastern presence throughout the Fair. Lebanese artist Zena El Khalil’s interactive project, entitled A’ Salaam Alaykum: Peace Be Upon You (2009) is a four-metre-tall mirrored sculpture of the Arabic script for ‘Allah’. The work slowly rotates and is conceptualised by the artist as a symbol of peace, reflecting its surroundings in a way that is both inclusive and celebratory. The cross-over between the sculptural and the performative is also seen in Roelof Louw’s seminal conceptual work Soul City (Pyramid of Oranges) (1967) which consists of roughly 6,000 oranges carefully arranged into the shape of a pyramid. Visitors will be encouraged to take an orange, thereby taking an active role in transforming the sculpture’s physical and aesthetic structure.
Sound art installations will be heard intermittently throughout each day of Art13 London. For example, Younes Baba- Ali’s work Call for Prayer – Morse (2011) is a work which renders the Muslim call to prayer into Morse Code – sounding at prayer times which correspond to the city in which the work is exhibited, while Ella Finer’s Public Address System (2013) subtly adds a further layer of sound to the background hum of the Fair, coexisting alongside Olympia’s existing public address system.
Eastern European sculptural practice is seen in Hungarian artist Szilárd Cseke’s Deep Look (2012) which features a spinning neon light inside a tower of tyres and Lithuanian artist Žilvinas Kempinas’s kinetic sculpture Fountain (2011), in which a fan rotates disturbing a minimalist array of black tape on the floor. Everyday materials are reconfigured into witty and epic sculptural forms by Scottish artist Mhairi Vari and Indonesian artist Handiwirman Saputra. Vari’s coreropememory (2013) is made from a profusion of silk ties whilst Saputra’s Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk – no.7 (No Roots, No Shoots – no.7), (2011) repurposes plywood and corrugated roofing for the enormous sculptures which seek to challenge the relationship between the extraordinary and the mundane.
Full list of projects:
Michael Aerts (b. The Netherlands), Obelisk (2007) | Deweer Gallery, El Anatsui (b.Ghana), In the World But Don’t Know the World (2009) | October Gallery, Younes Baba-Ali (b. Morocco), Call for Prayer – Morse (2011) | FaMa Gallery, Harmen Brethouwer (b. The Netherlands), BronzeBell (2013) | Hidde Van Seggelen Gallery,Szilárd Cseke (b. Hungary), Deep Look, (2012) | Ani Molnar Gallery
Zena El Khalil (b. Lebanon), A’ Salaam Alaykum: Peace Be Upon You (2009) | Tanit Gallery, Ella Finer (b. United Kingdom), Public Address System (2013) | Yeo Workshop, Romuald Hazoumè (b. Benin), Petrol Cargo (2012) | October Gallery, Doug Jones (b. United Kingdom), In Servi Deo et Laetare (Serve God and Be Cheerful) (2008) | Ceri Hand Gallery Zhu Jinshi (b. China), Boat (2012) | Pearl Lam Galleries, Ranbir Kaleka (b. India), Cul-De-Sac in Taxila (2010) | Volte Gallery, Žilvinas Kempinas (b. Lithuania), Fountain (2011) | Volte Gallery, Peter Lemmens (b. South Africa), Proxy (2013) | Van der Mieden Gallery, Chris Levine (b. Canada), Flowers of Light (2013) | Fine Art Society Contemporary, Roelof Louw (b. South Africa), Soul City (Pyramid of Oranges) (1967) | Richard Saltoun Gallery, Handiwirman Saputra (b. Indonesia), Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk–no. 7 (No roots, no shoots–no.7) (2011) | Gajah Gallery Astrid Svangren (b. Sweden), Nocturnal Extras (2012) | Maria Stenfors Gallery, Mhairi Vari (b. United Kingdom), coreropememory (2013) | Domo Baal Gallery, John Wallbank (b. United Kingdom), Untitled (2012) | Tatjana Pieters Gallery, Bedwyr Williams (b. United Kingdom), Sentry Box (2