'The Golden Hammer' - a workshop with Henry Coombes at Hospitalfield

'The Golden Hammer' - a workshop with Henry Coombes at Hospitalfield

To coincide with his solo exhibition 'Black Button' in The Cooper Gallery at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, Dundee, Glasgow-based artist Henry Coombes presents the outcomes of a two day workshop with 3rd and 4th year students at Hospitalfield earlier this month. The exhibition in the Lower Foyer gallery runs from the 27 January to 24 February 2007.

Henry Coombes is one of six artists that will represent Scotland at the 52nd Venice Bienniale this year, in the exhibition ‘Scotland and Venice 2007’. He has also recently been short-listed for a Creative Scotland Award.






For full details on the project, click 'read more'

LOWER FOYER GALLERY
'The Golden Hammer': A workshop with Henry Coombes at Hospitalfield

With student group: Lauren Gault / Diane Lees / Rebecca Lindsay / Jay O'Reilly / Richard Sharp / Kirsten Wilson / Kirsty Buchanan / Fraser MacDonald / Richard Cormack / Janet Brown / Pamela Cardwell / Ai Kato / Neil Scott

Thirteen third and forth year Fine Art students from Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design arrived at Hospitalfield House in Arbroath to experience its nineteenth century architecture, vast and fascinating collection and the surrounding grounds. Hospitalfield (www.hospitalfield.org.uk) is a Residential Arts Centre for artists' residencies and project workshops for the promotion of contemporary arts and international exchange.This workshop was part of the college's programme of professional development for students, where placements outside the institution place students in real situations away from their studios. Artist Henry Coombes, recently selected to represent Scotland at the 52nd Venice Bienniale, and exhibiting concurrently in the Cooper Gallery, was invited to create and lead a workshop at Hospitalfield. The students' brief was to create work in response to a particular object or feature in the house over an intense two days of productivity in the on-site studios.

On day 1 pencil drawings were made of their chosen objects from memory, then Henry introduced the students to working with wet clay to make gestural marks on the paper. This helped the students to loosen up, to stray away from original intentions and taught them not to be precious about their work. The process of making and allowing things to happen was the focus of the workshops rather than the finished outcome. Quickly sculptural objects were made with the drawings in mind, using chicken wire, bits of wood, plaster and scrim.

Day 2 included making clay portrait heads of each other with the students working in pairs. One head was to be made with bare hands and the other with a pair of cumbersome rubber gloves. Wearing the gloves the students could not concentrate on details and instead had to focus on the forms in general, resulting in a raw creative essence apparent in all of the work made at Hospitalfield House.

Back in the Lower Foyer Gallery the students had two hours to collaborate and create a cohesive installation from the individual pieces they had been working on. The Golden Hammer, the title of the exhibition, can be seen suspended in the middle of the raft-like construction. It is fitting that it is forever suspended in motion. Henry had originally introduced it to the students with the proviso that anyone straying from the work in hand would incur the penalty of the golden hammer breaking their work, so they would have to build it up again from the broken fragments. The students' attention never wavered and the hammer was never in action.





Installation view.

Project and Exhibition curated by Jenny Brownrigg.

Lower Foyer Gallery, Crawford Building, DJCAD, 13 Perth Road, Dundee DD1 4HT

Mon-Fri: 9.30am-5pm, Sat: 10.30am-4.30pm

www.exhibitions.dundee.ac.uk