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Page 1: Virtually Real

virtuallyreal

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virtuallyreal

Petros Chrisostomou

Bruce Ingram

Grant W Miller

James Moore

Suzanne Moxhay

Jamie Tiller

Julia Willms

Simon Woolham

Dawn Woolley

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Virtually Real

First published in 2011 to coincide with the exhibition

Virtually Real, 1 March 2011 – 21 May 2011

© The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, except where otherwise stated

All images © The Artist 2011

ISBN-13 978-1-874331-44-5

EAN 9781874331445

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a re-

trieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electrical, mechanical

or otherwise, without first seeking the permission of the copyright owners and of

the publishers.

The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery

University of Leeds

Parkinson Building

Woodhouse Lane

Leeds LS2 9JT

Front cover Image: Bruce Ingram, Thousand Years III, 2008

Back cover Image: Dawn Woolley, Interloper (fence), 2008/9

Designed by James Moore and Dawn Woolley

Printed by the University of Leeds

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virtuallyreal

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‘In these angles and corners, the dreamer would appearto enjoy the repose that divides being and non-being. Heis the being of an unreality’ Gaston Bachelard1

FROM the origins of spatial realism in paintings to the

flattened planes and spaces of modernism, the illusion of

space has been a central aesthetic concern within the

canon of art history.

In a visual culture where photography and CGI create

facsimile spaces that are disposable and instantly

digestible, this exhibition aims to bring together work that

subverts the representation of space. Each work contains

an element of trickery that confounds rather than confirms

our expectations of reality. The artists ask the viewer to be-

lieve in the integrity of their scene, inviting them to look

closer and explore the fiction of the space they have

depicted. Like Bachelard’s ‘being of an unreality’, the

spectator must allow themselves to inhabit a space that

is situated between reality and the imaginary.

The title words Virtually Real form a somewhat oxymoronic

concept. Philosophical ideas of the term ‘virtual’ reveal it

to be something that has the properties of an actual thing;

something that can issue real effects. We take ‘virtual’ to

mean not real, but displaying qualities of ‘the real’.

Following that definition the other title word ‘real’, is

characterised as a confirmation of truth, of a physical

existence. It is perhaps best described by Philip K Dick,

1. Bachelard, Gaston. ThePoetics of Space, Boston,1994, p145

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when he wrote ‘Reality is that which, when you stop

believing in it, doesn’t go away’2. This draws our attention

to subjective and objective realities, and describes an

unmistakable definition of the objective ‘real’.

Objectivity is highly problematic when you try to define it or

pin it down. Art works are always subjective to the artist

who created them, offering a unique vision or interpretation

of reality. Works of art are embedded with the intricacies of

the individuals who produced them and the training,

discourse and cultural experience that they have undergone.

In this exhibition, the artists play on our assumptions

of objectivity. The art works appear to represent reality but

on closer inspection we apprehend a certain feature or

detail that stops us believing in the initial interpretation

and the subjective nature of the work comes to the fore.

This inevitably leads to a group of works that display some

traits of surrealism and the uncanny.

Philosophical explorations into an individual’s understand-

ing of the real run at least as far back as Plato. One of

Plato’s main concepts was that we don’t live in a world

where things ‘are’, but in a world where things ‘seem’. In

his work The Republic3, written around 360BC, Plato

describes a theoretical experiment called The Parable of the

Cave. In the parable, we are asked to imagine a group of

people that are held captive inside a cave, and have been

there for their entire life. The captives are held in a fixed

position so they can only see one wall of the cave and

2. Dick, Philip K. “How toBuild a Universe ThatDoesn’t Fall Apart TwoDays Later”, The ShiftingRealities of Philip K. Dick,Selected Literary AndPhilosophical Writings,Ed. Lawrence Sutin, NewYork, 1995, p261

3. Plato, The Republic,Trans. Desmond Lee, London, 1955

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cannot move from that viewpoint. Behind their position is

a blazing fire casting light onto the cave walls. In-between

the captives and the fire is a walkway, along which the

captors move, holding up objects so that they cast their

shadows in view of the captives. The only visual experience

that they have is these fleeting shadows moving across the

wall in front of them, and their perception is reinforced by

their discussions amongst themselves about what they are

seeing.

The experiment moves on with one of the captives being

released, initially to explore the cave, revealing to them the

world outside their line of sight. They gain understanding

that the shadows they’ve been looking at are not real. The

freed person is then released from the cave into the world,

where they see the fullness of reality.

In the parable the captives inside the cave represent

ordinary people who live in a world of illusion, where the

visible world that they focus on in everyday experiences is

imperfect. The freed person is able to attain the most

accurate view of reality in a constantly changing world. They

are the only one with a concept that there is anything

beyond the ‘reality’ of the cave wall. They naturally return

to the cave to explain their findings to the other captives,

but face rejection and ridicule from them. As a group the

captives exist in a consensual ‘virtual reality’. It is thought

that Plato intended the freed person to signify a philoso-

pher, in particular Socrates, his famous teacher who was

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killed by the Athenian state for his philosophical views.

The idea Plato cogitates on in the parable, that people

understand reality based on data that agrees with their

perception, education and shared experience, is central to

many philosophical fictions. A well-known example is TheTruman Show4, in which the central character Truman

Burbank lives a staged life inside a TV show – a fact which

is entirely beyond his comprehension. From his subjective

point of view, reality is the world of the small town he lives

within. A chain of events allow doubt to creep into Truman’s

world, and the closer he looks at the surface of his

surroundings and the relationships with his friends and

family, the flimsier it all seems. The story climaxes with

Truman’s desperate attempt to break out of the fake that

he has become convinced he is living within. The TV show’s

creator, acting as the captor from Plato’s cave, and as a

kind of God that oversees Truman’s reality, is convinced that

Truman prefers the fake cell that he lives within to the

rough, unsafe real world outside of the studio. The choice

of whether or not to remain inside a known fiction - a

virtual reality - is central to the films conclusion.

In this exhibition we hope the artworks ask the viewer to

question their perception of reality. The artists play the role

of the captors in Plato’s cave and The Truman Show. The

audience is imprisoned by the apparently straightforward

reading of the works, but then becomes aware of the

constructed nature of the scenes. Like Truman, or the

4. The Truman Show, Dir.Peter Weir, ParamountPictures,1998The plot of this film iswidely acknowledged asbeing influenced by PhilipK Dick’s novel Time out ofJoint although it is not adirect adaptation.

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released captive from the cave, the spectator is unable to

return to belief in the original illusion.

*

Invented architectural space forms the basis of James

Moore’s work, where subject matter is constructed inside a

computer modelling programme. The paintings Sea Walland Railings are derived from a collage – or model – that

is built from small sections of hand painted paper, which

are in turn scanned into the computer rendering applica-

tion. A virtual snapshot is taken of the scene and the

resulting image becomes reduced back to the realm of

painting. The work City 17 is the result of a different process

– it is a reproduction from a computer game. Moore explores

these environments with the eye of a photographer, ‘moving’

around the levels ignoring the intended flow of the game,

instead looking for a good virtual photo opportunity. The

snatched stills are then used as a basis for an oil painting

on canvas – pulling the hi-tech dynamic virtual space back

to the archaic realm of painting. By presenting these virtual

spaces in the form of paintings, a relationship to reality is

implied. It’s not immediately apparent that the paintings

aren’t depicting real places; it could easily be believed that

they are ‘normal’ landscapes. The audience sees reality

although they are only looking at shapes and shadows, like

the captives in Plato’s cave.

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Like Moore, Suzanne Moxhay creates artwork that is

seemingly realistic but is in fact completely fabricated.

Manipulation of space drives the process of her work

through its different stages. ‘From the photograph, to the

print, to the three dimensional set in the studio, and then

back to the photograph, imagery is continually moved

through real and illusory space.’5 The works show beau-

tifully collaged scenes that retain the elaborate character-

istics of the source imagery – bits of moiré print pattern

can be picked up on the surface of some elements, put side

by side with hi-resolution pieces of image, forming a

seamless whole that is grand in scale. Sampled sections

of photograph are repeated throughout the composition,

creating a uniformity that is comforting and familiar rather

than disruptive to the implied realism of the scene.

Grant Miller’s paintings intensively explore the illusion and

construction of space. They create a visual experience that

appears abstract at first, but reveals itself to be a highly

complex physical space. The effect is of a net of fragments

of the real world – some architecture perhaps, or the

deconstructed remains of an interior – entwined within

organic pulsing layers of physical paint that web across the

rigid layers. The intricate complexity animates the paintings

and allows the viewer to become lost in the hierarchy of

colours and forms; subtle layerings of resins, opaque grid

lines and vanishing planes. The paintings bring to mind a

description written by Maurice Merleau-Ponty in Phenome-nology of Perception. ‘…the house itself is not the house5. Moxhay, Suzanne

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seen from nowhere, but the house seen from everywhere.

The completed object is translucent, being shot through

from all sides by an infinite number of present scrutinies

which intersect in its depths leaving nothing hidden.’6 The

architectural spaces in Miller’s paintings are seemingly

both interior and exterior, giving the viewer the feeling that

they are experiencing multiple angles of perception.

*

Much of the artwork in this exhibition could be said to evoke

uncanny sensations. It is a concept defined by Freud in

his 1919 essay The Uncanny7. It describes the uncomfort-

able strangeness, or even fear, experienced when viewing

something that is familiar and unfamiliar at the same time.

In his essay, Freud outlines various scenarios that could

trigger an uncanny experience, such as a foreign object or

event invading a familiar domestic space, or seeing a

human-like automaton that borders on familiarity.

In the 1970s the roboticist Masahiro Mori, noted for his

pioneering work on the emotional responses of humans to

non-human entities, published an article entitled ‘The

Uncanny Valley’8. It described the responses of test subjects

to humanlike robots. He noted that the more closely the

robots resembled human beings, the more they appeared

virtually real, and the greater the level of acceptance by the

test subject. However, when the robots became too human

the test subjects began to react negatively towards them.

6. Merleau-Ponty, Mau-rice. Phenomenology ofPerception, London,2002, p79

7. Freud, Sigmund. TheUncanny, Trans. DavidMcLintock, London, 2003

8. Mori, Masahiro. “TheUncanny Valley”, Energy,7(4), 1970, pp 33-35

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He found that ‘when our perceptual system switches over

from noticing the life-like aspects of the robot to underlin-

ing the discrepancies’9, the test subjects expressed feelings

of eeriness or discomfort about the appearance of the

robots. He called the point at which they became too

life-like and repulsive to the test subjects ‘the uncanny

valley’.

Although this research was only ascribed to humanlike

robots, the perceptual system could also describe our

experience of viewing some of the artwork in this exhibition.

There is an initial viewing state of familiar acceptance for

seemingly straight forward imagery. Then the mind begins

to register certain incongruous details that lead us to

question the initial reading, and finally we no longer look

for the everyday aspects of the scene, only picking up on

the aberrations that reveal it as a falsity. This effect

operates to some extent in all the works included in VirtuallyReal. As in Freud’s definition of the uncanny the artwork

9. Hollander, Ari. “PlayingGames with PainfulMemories: Designing VRExposure Therapy Simu-lations for PTSD”,[http://seriousgames-source.com/features/fea-ture_053006_ptsd.php],2011

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and the realms they describe transform from homely

and safe into unknown and unexpected dimensions.

They become unheimlich10 – something that was supposed

to remain secret or concealed but became visible to the

viewer.11 Like the humanoid robot in the depths of the

uncanny valley, the details that expose the unreality of the

artwork become visible to the viewer. The sense of intellec-

tual uncertainty is defined by the homely familiar setting

and its unhomely and disturbing details.

Dawn Woolley’s photographs voyeuristically depict partially

concealed women. The images appear to be real but they

have an uncanny nature which prolongs the look of the

viewer and exposes the artificiality of the scene. As the

spectator notices the cut edge of the paper, the women’s

bodies are revealed to be two-dimensional cut-out photo-

graphs. Like Mori’s humanoid robot the legs appear to be

life-like (or death-like) but are not living, they are artificial

imposters. ‘The spectator also undergoes a transformation

from voyeur to fetishist as the body is revealed to be an

inanimate object.’12 In the work the two-dimensional and

three-dimensional are juxtaposed in a comment on reality

and idealisation.

Jamie Tiller’s photographs also play on the notion of the

familiar and the unfamiliar as described by the uncanny.

Marginal architectural zones are used to confuse pictorial

space, in which real places appear unreal and border on

being compressed abstract planes. The works in his Black

10. In Freud’s The Un-canny, a central conceptinvolves the words heim-lich and unheimlich,roughly translated fromGerman to mean homelyand unhomely.

11. Freud, Sigmund. TheUncanny, Trans. DavidMcLintock, London, 2003

12. Woolley, Dawn

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Box series are photographed at night without any human

presence. The locations appear so unnatural and empty that

'… the city itself becomes illusionary, like the set of a film

or a computer generated architectural model.'13 The method

of photography used here gives the images a strange sheen,

dislocating the scene into something that looks highly

artificial. The artwork becomes the spatial equivalent of an

automaton – something that resembles reality but in a too-

perfect manner that isn’t able to suggest life.

The relationship between real and artificial spaces is

explored in Julia Willms’ video Revision, and in her

accompanying photographs. Her work clearly juxtaposes

elements of homely and unhomely imagery that sit together

in a surreal space that is intriguing to view. Her video

projection seamlessly merges existing architectural space

into something strangely subverted; offering the viewer a

convincing version of reality that slowly disintegrates into

impossible situations. ‘The installation is about the

threshold between the real and the imagined space. The

spectator stands in the real space and is invited to cross

the threshold and step into the image.’14

*

It is unsurprising that our visual senses are confused by

the conflicting imagery in artwork that confounds di-

mensions and prevents normal registers of scale. In recent

neuro-psychology research, Richard Gregory defined our

13. Tiller, Jamie

14. Willms, Julia

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visual perception of the world when he wrote, ‘vision is

certainly not infallible. This is largely because knowledge

and assumptions add so much that vision is not directly

related to the eyes’ images or limited by them – so

quite often produce fictions.’15 We often don’t see what is

in front us, but instead see what we expect to see, our vision

being heavily informed by our preconceptions and expecta-

tions of the world around us.

We buy into visual fictions, or more accurately, we see what

we expect to see when presented with a familiar-looking

image. Much of the artwork selected for this exhibition

contains a blurring between the boundaries of the real and

the illusory; the disjuncture between reality and imagined

spaces. Our attention is vexed by some incongruous

elements that disrupt the seemingly straightforward in-

terpretation of the scenes. Some of the artwork in VirtuallyReal plays on the role of assumption in sight.

On the first instance of looking, Petros Chrisostomou’s work

confuses our sense of scale. As Richard Gregory describes,

our knowledge and assumption tells us that we see a real

interior space with a monstrously scaled sculpture

domi- nating the room. As we take time to interpret

the subtle visual clues within the photographs we are able

to determine the visual trick, that the room is miniature and

the giant sculpture is an everyday object. Space and scale

become tools to explore ideas of value and commodity. ‘The

sensation of the uncanny is achieved through a disjunction

15. Gregory, Richard. Eyeand Brain: The Psychol-ogy of Seeing. Oxford,2007, p6

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in the work, due to the contrasting elements that have been

combined, that allows the viewer to speculate the real and

the imaginary…’16

Bruce Ingram’s work in this exhibition also contains a

blending of dimensional forms. The collages take on a

physical presence and exist as sculptures, blurring

boundaries between figurative sensibilities and abstract

materiality. Through the creation of organic forms and

found imagery alluding to gardens and nature the audience

is transposed to an imaginary space. The titles such

as The Midnight Garden add to this departure to fantasy.

Ingram’s tree sculptures titled Thousand Years relate to the

art form of bonsai, the capturing of a contemplative scene

that miniaturises the majesty of nature down to a tiny scale.

In Ingram’s work the real is reconfigured ‘…through a

playful and experimental process of collage and collection,

the experience of the everyday world is gathered and

organised within new forms of art works.’17 Images lifted

from different periods of art history are mixed with the

consumer culture of today resulting in works that confuse

space and time.

Simon Woolham’s Pop-up drawings also inhabit the space

between two and three dimensions. Beginning with biro

drawings, ‘…dilapidated environments come to life in a

skint version of enchantment: a tree stump or a broken

fence are filled with the meanings of the events that go on

around and about them.’18 Cut and folded paper transform

16. Chrisostomou, Petros

17. Ingram, Bruce

18. Woolham, Simon

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everyday objects into emotive sights for memory and

recollection. When viewed as a group, the three dimensional

drawings form a coherent world with the snippets of

narrative that unfold in each ‘location’, like memories of

overheard conversations. The particular locations described

in Woolham’s pop-ups conjure nostalgic recollection for the

spectator.

*

Baudrillard’s theory of the hyperreal is a fitting place to

bring this essay to an end; it’s a concept central to his work

Simulacra and Simulation, written in 198119. Hyperreality

is a theory that was heavily referenced in the film TheMatrix, and involves a negation of reality, and an adoption

of simulations and virtual spaces as the predominant realm

of existence. According to Baudrillard, the hyperreal is

located in all the simulated places in the modern world that

offer a saturation of signs, narrative and imagery – places

such as casinos, theme parks, shopping malls, movies,

video games and social networks. With ever more sophisti-

cated technology the simulation became the predominant

experience. In The Matrix these ideas are taken to their

extreme and reality is completely concealed by the simula-

tion – or as Morpheus says to Neo ‘The Matrix is the world

that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the

truth.’20 It could be said that art exists as part of the

hyperreal - especially if an artwork attempts to blur the

boundary between reality and simulation.

19. Baudrillard, Jean.Simulacra And Simula-tion, Trans. Sheila FariaGlaser, Michigan, 1994

20. The Matrix. Dir. Andy& Larry Wachowski,Warner Bros Pictures,1999

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The aim of Virtually Real is to bring together artworks that

play on the senses and assumptions of the audience. Like

the shadows in Plato’s cave or the simulations of The Matrix,the artworks offer a veneer of reality, but unlike the captors

mentioned above, the artists do not intend to hold us within

the illusion, but merely to show us the other possible spaces

of imagination and memory.

James Moore & Dawn Woolley 2011

Julia WillmsRevision, 2007 Video, 5:52 mins (looped),edition 3/3 + 2EA

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PetrosChrisostomou

Icarus, 2008Colour photograph on Diasec

Courtesy Galerie Xippas,Paris/Athens

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Reflexion, 2008Colour photograph on Diasec

Courtesy Galerie Xippas,Paris/Athens

4, 2008Colour photograph on Diasec

Courtesy Galerie Xippas,Paris/Athens

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BruceIngram

Midnight Garden, 2006Mixed Media

Courtesy Spring Projects

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Thousand Years V, 2008Mixed Media

Courtesy Spring Projects

Thousand Years III, 2008Mixed Media

Courtesy Spring Projects

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GrantMiller

Untitled ( DAI – 312)2007, Mixed Media

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Untitled (PRO-63)2007, Mixed Media

Detail:Untitled ( DAI – 312)2007, Mixed Media

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JamesMoore

Sea Wall, 2010Oil on Canvas

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City 17, 2010Oil on Canvas

Railings, 2010Oil on Canvas

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SuzanneMoxhay

Sirocco, 2007C-type Print on Diasec

Courtesy of BEARSPACE

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Sequoia, 2008Archival Digital Print onAluminium

Courtesy of BEARSPACE

Detail: Sirocco, 2007 C-type Print on Diasec

Courtesy of BEARSPACE

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JamieTiller

Black Box #4, 2007 C-type Print on Diasec

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Black Box #3, 2007 C-type Print on Diasec

Kabin Collection

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JuliaWillms

Revision 2007Video, 5:52 mins (looped),edition 3/3 + 2EA

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Urban Household 52008, Digital Collage, C-type Print on Aluminium,1/5 + 2EA

Urban Household 12007, Digital Collage, C-type Print on Aluminium,5/5 + 2/2EA

Courtesy of Andrea Bozic

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SimonWoolham

Chase Pop-Up2009/10, Biro Pen andCollage on Paper

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The Sheds Pop-Up2009/10, Biro Pen andCollage on Paper

The Shortcut Pop-Up2009/10, Biro Pen andCollage on Paper

The Pissy Shed Pop-Up2009/10, Biro Pen andCollage on Paper

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DawnWoolley

Interloper (fence)2008/9, Colour Photograph

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Interloper (stockings)2008/9, Colour Photograph

Detail:Interloper (fence)2008/9, ColourPhotograph

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AcknowledgementsLayla Bloom, Tony Rae, Hilary Diaper, Zsuzsanna Reed Papp, Laura Millward, Hollie

Kritikos - Blades, Liz Stainforth, Paul Whittle, Peter Farmer, Solomon Papasavva,

Jennifer Cuff, Lucy Jackson and Mindy Lee.

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‘In these angles and corners, the dreamer wouldappear to enjoy the repose that divides being andnon-being. He is the being of an unreality’ Gaston Bachelard

FROM the origins of spatial realism in paintings to theflattened planes and spaces of modernism, the illusionof space has been a central aesthetic concern withinthe canon of art history.

In a visual culture where photography and CGI createfacsimile spaces that are disposable and instantlydigestible, this exhibition aims to bring together workthat subverts the representation of space. Each workcontains an element of trickery that confounds ratherthan confirms our expectations of reality. The artistsask the viewer to believe in the integrity of their scene,inviting them to look closer and explore the fiction ofthe space they have depicted. Like Bachelard’s ‘beingof an unreality’, the spectator must allow themselvesto inhabit a space that is situated between reality andthe imaginary.

01/03/11 - 21/05/11

The Stanley & Audrey Burton GalleryParkinson Building, Woodhouse Lane, University of Leeds. Leeds, LS2 9JT