Useless [from Untitled War Series]

This solo exhibition comprised Useless, which visually represents/ speaks to issues arising in visual representations of battles, particularly ones that are presented as cultural conflict, where there is a historical convention of depicting discarded objects. Often these are the debris of warfare, but they can also be the objects of non-war i.e. things that reference life beyond the frame (both of the painting and of war itself). This installation reproduces and groups such objects three dimensionally. ‘Untitled War Series' challenges and confuses the idea of cultural coherence by the range of artistic styles and understanding it utilises and the variety of cultures that the objects refer to. By including historic ‘mismatches’ between style and object, the work renders visible a range of cultures’ attempts to describe the other in their own terms. The work in this solo exhibition was later exhibited as part of ‘Look To this Day’ Castlefield Gallery, Manchester 03.10.03 - 23.11.03. It was developed from large-scale digital prints that were exhibited in Leeds Lens Galerija Cirkus, Chisinau, Moldova 29.09.02 -11.12.02 and later exhibited in ‘The War Effort’ Holden Gallery, Manchester 22.01.03 – 06.02.03 and Foundry Gallery, London. 08.11.03 – 22.11.03. This Solo Exhibition included a public lecture at the Taxi Gallery, 08.06.03 about ‘Useless’ and was an invited panel member of ‘The Personal was Political’, a panel discussion in front of public audience chaired by Dave Beech, Castlefield Gallery 30.10.03. From Untitled War Series was nominated for the £10,000 Comme Ca Art Prize 2003 by Nigel Walsh, Curator at Leeds City Art Gallery, Angela Kingston, Independent curator, Kirsten Lavers, curator of Taxi Gallery and Paul Rogers curator of major festivals in Estonia.