Exhibiting artists:
A. van Campenhoaut, Carina Diepens, Stephen Nicholas, Sarah Pickstone
extract from The Unhinged Critic / Matthew Caley
[ for A Plan for Living ]
supposedly says The Un-hinged Critic resemblance
and affirmation canot be uncoupled
without a gentle carnage
but never in the
architect's model where perspective leaves merely an odour
and bodies once posed vacate responsibility
A Plan for Living is an exhibition of large-scale drawings, paintings, sculpture and installations.
The show takes its name from a painting by Stephen Nicholas, now hanging in the studio home of artists Carina Diepens and A. van Campenhoaut in the Netherlands. This connection between old friends forms the starting point to a conversation about the process of making art. The project explores the tension between planning and making, between idea and realisation, between purpose and result. A plan sets an intention; it is an act of optimism and a gesture towards potential. It also knowingly encompasses the possibility of failure. A map, a scheme, a drawing – a plan - suggests an act that is open to new form and with this marks a beginning and an inherent capacity, a generosity of spirit.
The artists search for the dynamic between the planned and the unexpected, the controlled and the uncontrolled, between the material and the immaterial. They are not only looking for the final image but want to probe the relevance of the creative process as a parallel for human connection, feeling and understanding.
A Plan for Living acknowledges the physical space of making as well as the mental space that underlies it.
As the world grows more polarized and undergoes rapid change, its social challenges inevitably enter the studio. These issues compel artists to take a stance—though the responses are rarely straightforward. Instead, they manifest in abstract ways within the work of the four artists.
