05 Sep 2009

Alison Moffett: Marchland, at 1K Projectspace, Amsterdam

1K Projectspace is pleased to present an exhibition of new sculptures, and graphite and ink drawings by London based artist Alison Moffett.

Marchland – by definition, is a boundary, borderline or frontier. In Moffett's meticulous renderings she reworks fragments of modernist architecture, and simple shed-like buildings into a landscape of settled ruins. The artist sees these depicted structures as existing on the boundary of an inhabited milieu, where human habitation is seen only through the artifacts and shells of architecture and infrastructure left behind.

The laws of nature do not discriminate in their ability to lay waste, and Moffett's compendious manipulations recapitulate this great leveling which strips bare the necessities of humanity.

The artist continues:

These drawings depict a window into an alternative plane. Like Thoreau's Walden, they speak of the basics, whose moment of fleeting habitation has passed. Shell-like, left behind, they are ravaged by undisciplined phenomena.

With reverence to the barefoot architect, Moffett sees these sheds and shacks as universal structure. She is dealing with the substance of drawn space - both in the grand sense and the humble human/architectural sense. Quite literally, a drawn stillness,

Her rendered inclusion of chicken wire fence stands as an important symbol. Considered so not only for it's function as a border, but as fundamental structure, and as well in it's use as a building material. In her sculptures chicken wire is utilized encased in Perspex. A torquing of the grid, and of surface and substance are at play here. In these three-dimensional works resides an elegant escape from the turbulent drawn world. They have stepped out of the 2d space, resulting in deceptively simple molecular constructions of carbon, our building block of life and the graphite used to draw.

Previous to this body of work, also using a strategy of shifting and twisting place, time and space, Moffett created a series of drawings that situated famous modernist buildings on the moon. Gropius House for instance, sits alone in a desolate moonscape.

Moving between drawing and sculpture, between the actual and imagined, Moffett investigates the interdependency of opposites.

At first glance one is confronted with the fragility of these works, which in turn convey a powerful sense of longing, loss and quietude.

With unbiased critical reflection through her compassionate draftsmanship, the vista offered by Alison Moffett is clear in its subtle optimism.

Alison Moffett was born in the US and now lives in London, after completing her Masters degree at the Slade School of Fine Arts. Ms. Moffett has established her presence as a British based artist, stated as such in Art Review's 2004 supplement London's Top 25 New Artists. Solo exhibitions include Max Wigram Projects in London, and Galerie Schleicher + Lange, Paris. Group exhibitions include Expander at the Royal Academy of Arts in London in 2004.

1K Projectspace is a new artist run exhibition space in the Westerpark, exhibiting contemporary artists from the Netherlands and abroad.

Tram 10 to Wittenkade, tram 3 to Frederick Hendrik Plantsoen,
bus 21 to van Beuningenplein.
5 minutes walking from Westergasfabriek, or Marnixplein.