Street Level Photoworks : Gayle Chong Kwan

Gayle Chong Kwan
The Obsidian Isle
Ran from: 15th October - 11th December

THE EXHIBITION
'The Obsidian Isle' is a significant new body of work for Chong Kwan which documents a fictional island located off the west coast of Scotland, on which reside one country's lost and destroyed buildings and places. Presented as an installation of large-format photographs and sculptural works, The Obsidian Isle explores ideas of collective history, national identity, landscape, and tourism through the prism of the senses and the distortion of memories. From structures that fell into dereliction after the Highland Clearances, buildings destroyed during the Second World War, places torn down to make way for new developments, or structures that collapsed due to poor construction, the island is a place where visitors are invited to remember or possibly to collectively 'forget'. 'The Obsidian Isle' questions what is kept, what remains, what falls into ruin or is destroyed, what persists and how these can be altered by memories, myth or competing histories.

Chong Kwan's 'The Obsidian Isle' refers to a controversial literary work. Ossian, the blind 3rd century poet who was 'discovered' by James Macpherson in the 18th Century, was presented to the public as the narrator and supposed author, of a cycle of epic poems. Supposedly translated from fragments of ancient sources in Scots Gaelic, it aroused huge controversy: Samuel Johnson called Macpherson "a mountebank, a liar, and a fraud, and that the poems were forgeries"; Hugh Blair upheld its authenticity; and a Committee for the Highlands was set up to investigate its sources and the veracity of Macpherson's claims. Ossian was hugely influential in the development of ideas of the Scottish landscape and notions of national identity at home and abroad: Napoleon was said to carry a copy with him; Ingres painted the 'Dream of Ossian' and places inspired by and named after Ossian, such as Fingal's Cave in Staffa, and Ossian's Cave in Drumkeld, became major tourist attractions.

The ten large-format photographs are constructed from found images, three-dimensional elements and medium-format photographs taken by the artist, which are re-made as mise-en-scenes of the island, which are then photographed in the studio.

Developed in partnership with Ricefield and includes research carried out at the Glasgow Project Room (Trongate 103) in April 2010.
The exhibition has been printed at Street Level and produced in partnership with Peacock Visual Arts, Aberdeen.

An exhibition minigraph with an article by Dominic Paterson is available.

THE PUBLICATION
'The Obsidian Isle': Designed and published by Gayle Chong Kwan and Graphical House
ISBN 978-0-9565200-3

A full-colour 60 page limited edition publication featuring large-format photographic works, sensory drawings, text works and a wrap around pull-out map artwork. Edition of 500. Featuring specially commissioned texts by: Dr Fiona Stafford, Professor of English and Fellow of Somerville College, University of Oxford; Dr Dominic Paterson, Department of History of Art, University of Glasgow; Murdo Macdonald, Chair of History at of Scottish Art at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, University of Dundee; and Laura McLean-Ferris, ArtReview magazine's Editor at Large, and an art critic for The Independent.

GAYLE CHONG KWAN
was born in Edinburgh in 1973 and is based in London. She has shown extensively in the UK and internationally; including participating in major international Biennales, such as the 54th Venice Biennale 2011 and 10th Havana Biennial, Cuba, 2009.

She is represented by galleries in Paris, Madrid, and Milan and was recently selected by Haus de Kulturen de Welt in Berlin to develop 'Invisible Twinning', for Urban Meridian, Asia-Pacific Biennial.

Chong Kwan holds a BA in Fine Art from Central Saint Martins College of Art, a BA in Politics and Modern History from Manchester University and an MSc in Communications from Stirling University. She regularly gives lectures and talks at art colleges, galleries and institutions both nationally and internationally including: The V&A, London / Tate Britain, London / La Villette, Paris. Awards have included: Vauxhall Collective Award for Photography 2009 / Pépinières Européennes pour Jeunes Artistes Award / Arts Council England International Fellow.