Turner Prize nominee Marvin Gaye Chetwynd and American photographer Anne Collier mark the 20th anniversary of Studio Voltaire with their first solo presentations to take place within one of London’s public galleries. Chetwynd will present her largest commission to date, Hermitos Children 2, within a large-scale installation whose props and interiors will immerse visitors within her world of 16th century wandering troupes and wild, costumed, carnivalesque live performances.
This ongoing project – the sequel to Hermiotos Children, which was presented at Altermodern, the fourth Tate Triennial – takes the form of an experimental television crime drama which follows female detective Joan Shipman as she uncovers and solves sex-crimes. The film combines staged cinematic sequences with footage of live performances recorded in London, Nottingham, Krakow, Gothenburg, Gozo, Vienna and Australia.
Rather than documenting events chronologically, Chetwynd coheres both scripted and live elements into a single overarching narrative. On Saturday 6 September 2014 a large-scale live performance will be held at Studio Voltaire and, referencing Catwoman and Minoan bull-leaping, elements of this will be included in the final cut of the film.
New York-based artist Anne Collier meanwhile, has been commissioned in a two-part project titled Women with Cameras: a book detailing source material from Collier’s vast, eight-year Woman with a Camera series and a slide projection piece comprising a selection of this extensive material.
This lengthy series incorporates meticulously arranged still life compositions of found objects and pop culture paraphernalia, photographed against the stark surfaces of the artist’s studio in an exact and precise manner. The objects are scrutinised closely, as if formal evidence, to highlight a set of psychological associations surrounding power and gender that the printed media produces, with the objectified female as a recurring focus. Collier’s work intends to incite a debate surrounding the effect of our contact with culture, cliché and stereotype upon our personal experiences.
Whilst Collier and Chetwynd are two contemporary female artists whose work explores gender and convention, their practices are entirely dissimilar, resulting in two visually opposing commissions which will clash and contrast with one another and provide an overview of varying techniques within contemporary Western art.
Marvin Gaye Chetwynd and Anne Collier: Major New Commissions for Studio Voltaire 20th Anniversary Autumn Programme, event taking place on 6 September 2014, Studio Voltaire, 1A Nelsons Row, London SW4 7JR. For more information visit www.studiovoltaire.org.
Credits
1. Woman With A Camera (Cheryl Tiegs_Olympus I), 2008.
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