p-hive-index — Alistair Lambert

'Hive'

Installation, BAR Gallery, Willesden Green, London. 2014
Reclaimed timber.

Garden Sculpture

BAR (Brent Artist's Resource) Gallery Residency 2014

A two week residency in a pop up gallery space on Queen's Parade, Willesden Green, North West London. The space had been a fabric shop and the residency was prompted after noticing a pile of unused old timber pallets and shelving stacked away awaiting the skip. The whole site, like so many artist's spaces is marked for demolition and 'regeneration'. Spending time in the space reminded me of my years snooping in old buildings for ACAVA to convert into studios. Making use of temporary spaces like these is part of surviving as an artist in London. The final installation that I constructed from the bits left over had something to do with the idea of an artist as inhabitant, like an insect, finding corners to thrive in, making do, growing and moving on. Scroll down to see the installation.

p-hive-gal

I started out by playing around with the sheets of white boarding and lengths of spur shelving. Breaking and puncturing them.

The big Matisse exhibition was on at the Tate at the time and seeing it encouraged me.

Layering up to create thickness whilst also taking off the harsh sharp cut edges with a radius router bit.

There were also lots of brackets and lengths of metal spur shelving to experiment with.

I also played around with the much chunkier and more tactile timber pallets. Building a barricade against the constant traffic noise outside and the feeling of vulnerability that the shop front gave me (even though it was obscured).

I worked quite furiously in this space for a week. It is bigger than my studio and had a supply of raw material and a coffee machine next door in the BAR project space. People dropped in whilst I worked.

I started trying to bring the flat white wiggles together with the timber. Ideas about camouflage surfaced.

When I started weaving the white pieces through the slots on the timber the feel of the piece started coming together.

Recycled Residency

'Hive'

BAR (Brent Artist's Resource) Gallery Residency 2014