Last weekend it was mostly Deptford and that excellently painterly highly rewarding beautifully curated artist-led A Gesture, An Action group show at APT Gallery down in Creekside, this weekend it was mostly about jumping on the train out of Haggerston and going South of the river again, this time the delights of Peckham are calling (do like going to Peckham, great fruit stalls, real people) back to the wreckage of Safehouse yet again for another Blink show that, unless you did catch it then it really was a case of too late to blink, you already missed it. Another in that series of Room Share artist-led group shows that seemingly happen every two or three months or so, every six months maybe? Shows that we have covered rather positively before on these fractured pages and no, there wasn’t really the feeling that we needed to bust a thankless gut to get the review up before it was all over, there really wasn’t the indication that anyone was that bothered about what anyone besides their mates might be thinking. Does it all feel just a little insular and something of a closed shop? Maybe all art shows do? Yes, I could have made the effort to go to the Friday night opening to this short sharp one weekend only show and rush a review up that night but hey, there’s something like forty artists talking part this time and by the time you’ve squeezed all of them into the space along with a couple of cheerleaders each then there really is no room for anyone else to get into the wreck of a building let alone much of a chance of seeing the art properly, which in many ways is of course an excellent thing. Art shows should feel like events, they should be exciting, they should be packed, the last Blink certainly was and we really do need art events that excite. When art does excite, and especially when the artists do it themselves like this, then art really is good. yes I could have gone on Friday and rushed up some words that night, but no, let’s go see without the elbows and bodies in the way this time. Word is it really was packed out on the Friday night, seems opting to see the art instead early on Saturday afternoon was the wisest option. Not to say it was that quiet on Saturday afternoon, more than healthy numbers in here.
Now if the purpose of these Blink shows, or indeed the show next door, a group show called Snag, is to create and curate an event then it and they certainly work and gloriously so. These shows certainly are events even if we are maybe getting just a little too familiar with crumbling walls of Safehouse now, these shows really do work as events. If the purpose is to inform us about the artists in the hope that we go find out more about those artists, which surely is the main objective when putting together a group show like this? Then both these shows kind of fail. Once again, other than the work of artists I’m already familiar with, I really have no idea who’s work I’ve been looking at in either of the shows at Safehouse One and Two this weekend. And I did promise myself I wouldn’t moan about labels again – there’s a woman upstairs asking about one of the pieces and telling one of the artists how much she detests QR codes and how much having to go through all the hassle of using her phone annoys her so much, there’s someone else joining in and saying he doesn’t even own a smart phone as he pulls out something that looks like it might have been cutting edge twenty or so years ago, “I just bought this” he says proudly. Yes, there are pieces of paper piled up over there but hey, try matching what’s on the paper to the rather haphazard all over the place hang! So no, I swore I wouldn’t moan about the lack of a simple artist name somewhere near the pieces and no I don’t know why a simple label is considered so uncool and unpleasing especially in this complete mess of a place. So no, I haven’t got a Scoobie Doo when it comes to who might have created what in either of these two shows and there is a lot of art in both the spaces, a lot of jousting for attention, and that’s before all the noise the space itself makes with all those walls and holes and marks left from previous shows and the traces of previous lives – we’re not talking spotless white walls in here, those walls are talking loudly before you even start to consider the art hanging on them, indeed at times you are wondering what is art and what is the actual faltering building? You are kind of bombarded with stuff, with marks, with cracks, it is an overload. Dare I say there’s too much art in here this time? Hey, no moaning, if they don’t want to tell us who painted or sculpted what then so be it, we’ll remain oblivious and just enjoy the pleasure of the moment, of the event(s) and a couple of really good art shows.
Safehouse One and Two, for those who may not know, are a couple of semi detached houses in Peckham that are pretty much little more than shells of former homes. I guess at some point soon they’re going to be demolished, for now they make for great art galleries and especially in terms of artist-led shows with all the stripped out floors, missing doors and (very) distressed walls. If we have it right then this is the seventh Blink? The shows only last for one weekend (hiring this space or indeed any art space isn’t cheap these days, these people are paying almost as much for a weekend in this dump as we were paying for a month in a prime spot in the middle of Vyner Street just ten years ago, space for artists to do it themselves is a major major problem in this city now, more than it has ever been!). With Blink and their Room Share once again a different artist is acting as curator taking one room each, one of the five or six rooms in one of the two houses and filling that room with the art of their invited artists (there mates?). So you end up with forty or so artists in the Room Shares and if you’re lucky you get to put a name to that piece or indeed those pieces that really grab you. Labelling issues and the slightly aloof too cool for you art school attitudes aside these Blink shows tend to be really (really) good, they’re well worth your time, indeed the last one featured in our best art things of the year round up at the end of 2024.
Frankly I’m not even going to bother trying to work out who has painted what, I have no idea who’s rather good sculpture is hanging there or who installed that piece I spent quite some time walking around and admiring? There’s a great painting over there, yes there are artists who work I know from other shows in other places (or from following their social media feeds as is the way these days), on the whole though, I have no idea who’s work I’m looking at in either of these shows. Hey, if they don’t care then really, why should I? I do though, i do care, I want to know who painted that piece in the second room damn it! Oh, I promised I wouldn’t moan. Let’s just treat both shows as events, as great big joint installation pieces, as positive art statements of some kind or other. The art is, on the whole good, who cares who did what, who needs a name? Who needs anything more than the reward of the half hour or so spent in each exhibition and then the walk back to the station feeling rather good about it all. Sure, not everything in Blink (or Snag) is great, there’s enough that is though, and sure, the hang might be all over the place when, what with all the chaos of the actual building, a touch of formality and line might have been a little more powerful and a little less messy but hey, this is on the whole another really really good Blink show and as one of the artists not happy with the previous coverage on these pages said to me last time, “what do you know?”. Here comes another #43SecondFilm of some of Blink, let the art do the talking via some lo-fi phone footage, see I don’t mind taking photos or filming it with my phone, just f**k bloody QR codes and have to try and see the screen in the awful light of this pace and the assumption that everyone has a phone or want one, or to makes sense of a list that makes very little sense and oh stop moaning, on the whole I really liked the show (yet again)
So Blink was in Safehouse Two, meanwhile next door in Safehouse One in the other half of the semi-detached falling down house the Message in a Bottle welcome map is out and Snag is happening. Snag is a Sculpture show, another group show with another long list of participating artists pinned up in the darkness over there. Didn’t see any advance publicity or indeed any listings anywhere in the art media for this one so we have no advance warning in terms of names. Was rather hoping this half of the space would be open as well, pleased to see it was. Once again, we have a group show, once again a big list of participating artists, this time there’s a list up on the wall downstairs (rather than bloody QR codes) but those lists really aren’t corresponding with anything and once again I have no idea who has done what or what the price of fish might be or where the building ends and the shows begins. Once again there’s some good art in here, there’s one or two really great pieces of sculpture or installation or whatever you want to call it in here, once again there’s some maybe not so good bits but once again enough of it is good enough to make this a rewarding show. I can’t tell you who did what, here’s another #43SecondFilm, there’s a bag load of photos down there, if we had some names we’d maybe pick out some highlights, maybe say a whole lot more but we don’t so we won’t and no, no moaning, just shut up and enjoy it.
Two good art shows, a more that fine way to spend a Spring afternoon, a massive bag of oranges from one of the Peckham fruit stalls, a quick look at what’s going on in Ceremony at the Copeland Gallery, there’s supposed to be some free to enter workshop/discussion going on but they don’t seem that keen on letting the likes of me in. A quick leave of a leaf or two and on we go to the next art thing, where will it be next weekend? Actually there will almost certainly be loads more art explored before next weekend, actually this time the next art thing was a stop off at Whitechapel on the way back East and a look at the latest offerings in the Three Colts Lane spaces. Check out the new shows at Maureen Paley and whatever might be hiding behind the very uninviting unsigned Herald Street Gallery door that I’m pretty sure they’d rather we didn’t knock on, it does feel like such an inconvenience to them, surely if they wanted us to come in and see the show that only opened a couple of days ago they’d at least offer a clue that there’s a gallery there and that they might be open or is that as uncool as labelling work? The new show at Herald Street didn’t excite much, neither did the current exhibition at Project Native Informant and you know the policy around here is to only really cover things when we have something positive to say so I’ll keep my big mouth closed and my thoughts to myself. Wonder who did painting that gorgeous little painting in the corner at Blink? Wonder if these oranges will be sweet? Wonder why art can sometimes feel so unfriendly? Wonder if there’s any point is writing all this? Why make the effort? Blink was rather good again (sw)
Previously on these pages…
As always do click on an image to see the whole thing or to run the slide show…
THE ORGAN 