TERMINALIA PRESS RELEASE

'The Undisputed Heavyweight Champion of the World III', 2014 Charcoal & polymer varnish on paper 50x32cm
Curated by Reece Jones Matthew Cowan, Reece Jones, CJ Mahony
PRIVATE VIEW	Thursday September 4th 6:30-8:30pm
EXHIBITION DATES	Friday September 5th –  Saturday October 4th 2014
GALLERY HOURS	Wednesday-Saturday 11am-6pm or by appointment
Artists exist within and alongside pre-determined, pre-existent boundaries, co-ordinates and pathways long since established. They are variously aware of the proximity of these territories, their histories, their previous inhabitants, their provocative neighbours and dearest defenders. Making more art re-asserts these invisible lines, naturally challenges them or deliberately disregards them - enabling the layout of entirely new spaces in which to dwell. Before modern systems of mapping, tradition insisted that members of tribes, townships or cities would physically trace the borders of their parish, being made aware of its variables, correcting its anomalies and assuring a new generation would carry the knowledge on. This knowledge was often forcefully imprinted on the psyche of young villagers by beating upon them at key junctions or even bouncing them forcefully on marker stones or fence posts. The tradition became known as ‘Beating the Bounds’ and is still practiced on occasion to this day. The artists in Terminalia all seek to draw attention to or deliberately subvert particular marker points. Either exploring latent lore and tradition, marking new terrain by counteracting existent architectures or allowing unstable signs and signifiers to create navigational anomalies and mis-steps. Reece Jones
EDITOR’S NOTES
Matthew Cowan is a New Zealand artist working in the realm of traditional European customs and folklore. His works are photographs, videos, installations and performances that play with the inherent strangeness of the continued popularity of long established folk customs in a modern world. Many of his works can be viewed as staged folk performances in themselves, acting on the elements of rituals which link people to the past. In investigating the celebration and intent of such traditions, a primary theme is the presence of humour and subversion of the accepted social order. Cowan has recently exhibited in, London, Sapporo, New York and Auckland. A newly commissioned 16mm performance film, The Terminalia of Funny-land is showing at Te Tuhi Centre for the Arts in Auckland, New Zealand from August 2014. Recent solo exhibitions include Agency Gallery in London and NURTURE Art, New York. For 2009, Matthew Cowan was the artist in residence at Cecil Sharp House, the headquarters of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. Reece Jones predominantly makes invented images on paper using particular processes to enforce or define pictures whose initial subject territories may be whimsical, improbable, impossible or theoretically muddled. Cross references, samples and complete fabrications are often layered and juxtaposed until an image is made manifest whose origins are potentially difficult to define. In his recent work Jones uses ‘evidence’ of mythological or supernatural beasts as a point of reference, working with and evolving these core signifiers until they become apparently more authoritative. Ultimately the viewer is invited to assess the legacy of surface, process, documentary, translation, actuality and illusion. An ongoing game of Chinese Whispers wherein a mischievous player throws occasional curve balls. Jones graduated from the Royal Academy Schools in 2002 and was one of the founding members of Rockwell project space in Hackney. His work has shown internationally. Solo shows include All Visual Arts, Andrew Mummery Gallery and Triumph Gallery Moscow. Group shows include: Lion & Lamb, London; Newlyn Gallery; Stephane Simoens, Belgium; Voorkamer, Belgium; Torrance Art Museum, LA; Drawing Room. London; Fruesorge, Berlin; Tokyo Wonder site and Transition, London. CJ Mahony’s practice explores stability, impermanence, and space via the distinction between sculptural object and immersive environment. Using structures that allude to corridors, paper folds, geometry, fragments, support structures, the subterranean and backstage spaces, her work ranges from large scale, site responsive constructions to fragile, speculative models. Her work sets up complex contrasts between the dimensions of architecture, the scale of the human body, and the idea of the object, often manipulating light and darkness to create a heightened state of awareness and uncertainty, requiring the audience to negotiate physically and emotionally in order to traverse the work. Mahony graduated from Camberwell’s MA Fine Art course in 2012. She has featured in the Art Angel Open 100 and The Catlin Guide and was a finalist for the Royal Society of British Sculptors Sculpture Shock (Subterranean) commission. Over the past 8 years she has undertaken a large number of public commissions. Group shows include: Block 336, London; Aid & Abet, Cambridge; Matt Roberts, London; Momentarily Lost, Leeds; Aurora International, Norwich; Borrowed Site commissioned by Situ Projects Cornwall; The Fishmarket Gallery, Northampton; and Wysing Arts Centre, Cambridge. Forthcoming projects include; The Hand That Takes, Cambridge Junction, and Machines to Crystallise Time, Smiths Row Gallery.