Anne Low: Chair for a woman

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Anne Low, "Bedchamber for a paper stainer (bedsteps)," 2018

courtesy the artist, photography by Toni Hafkenscheid

Artist Talk | Anne Low Tuesday, January 22, 7pm

Join exhibiting artist Anne Low and CAG Curator Kimberly Phillips as they discuss Low’s “wanton” approach to historical material, her process of extraction, translation and invention, and the literary sources that helped inspire Chair for a woman.

The Contemporary Art Gallery is pleased to present Anne Low’s first solo exhibition in a Canadian public gallery. Chair for a woman comprises five new sculptures (all 2018) presented upon a bespoke plinth in the middle of the gallery, along with an ambitious, large-scale piece filling an entire wall. 

Low’s artistic research looks closely at historical objects, materials and surfaces. She is concerned with the specific conditions under which such objects are produced and consumed—particularly by women—and the domestic spaces they define.

Her practice is often informed by the imagined pasts of architectural spaces in which she exhibits. Given the Contemporary Art Gallery was purpose built rather than something like an adapted storefront or former home, Low saw this exhibition as an opportunity to consider ways of seeing with specific focus on exhibitions and the systems of presentation seen in art museums, prompting us to consider the act of looking in reference to strategies of display.

The five new sculptures in the exhibition have been created and inspired by items found in the domestic interiors of a range of cultural contexts stretching from 1550 BC Egypt to Edwardian England: a fire screen, a writing desk, a set of bed steps, a stool and a chair. Using these as points of reference for the exhibition, Low has created a suite of entirely invented forms.

Bedchamber for a paper stainer (bedsteps) takes the shape of an obscure piece of bedroom furniture familiar to the European upper classes. Chair for a woman is an interpretation of an ancient Egyptian artifact in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, catalogued under the same enigmatic name. Dead blood takes the form of a small hand forged stool upholstered and tufted in hand woven silk. Ancestress takes the form of a shrunken writing desk with a working drawer, inside of which hides a package of paper tied with handwoven silk. And finally, Grubby recalls the often lavishly decorative screens placed in front of drawing room fireplaces when not in use.

The plinth that hosts these sculptures is also offered as a sitting bench for visitors to view the final work of the exhibition. Mounted on the far end wall of the gallery like a picture is a large new work created specifically for this exhibition, resembling a fragment of an imagined architectural space. Cut-out voids indicate missing elements of this illusive room, and a hinged door swings outwards from the wall upon which a short length of flocked wallpaper is displayed.

One of the most persistent concerns of Low’s artistic practice is the way in which subjectivity can be articulated through the materials and objects that we gather around ourselves. While in previous exhibitions a singular woman might be imagined through her installation, with Chair for a woman, this expands to a multitude of different possible fictional women and the emotional and psychological states consumed from the domestic objects they own.

Bio

Anne Low is based in Montréal, Canada. Recent solo exhibitions include The Fine Line of Deviation (with Evan Calder Williams) and Paperstainer, Mercer Union, Toronto (2018); A wall as a table with candlestick legs, Tensta Konstall, Stockholm (2018) and Witch with Comb, Artspeak, Vancouver (2017). Recent group exhibitions include Soon Enough – Art in Action, Tensta Konsthall, Stockholm (2018); Clive Hodgson & Anne Low, The Block, London (2017); Dream Islands, Nanaimo Art Gallery (2017); Vancouver Special: Ambivalent Pleasures, Vancouver Art Gallery (2016); Standard Incomparable, Armory Center for the Arts, Pasadena (2016); The Grantchester Pottery Paints the Stage, Jerwood Visual Arts, London and Reading the Line, The Western Front, Vancouver (2015). In 2017 Low was included in the Loewe Craft Prize, La Fundación Arquitectura COAM, Madrid; Chamber Gallery, New York; and 21_21 Museum, Tokyo.