Text by Paul O’Kane for ‘Time Has Burned’, curated by Emi Kubota and Mingzhang Sun. 16-27 April 2024. Willesden Gallery 95 High Rd, London NW10 2SF http://www.brent.gov.uk/willesdengallery
Last night, I must have slept too hot, too heavy. It’s difficult to judge the end of winter and the beginning of spring. To cool down I take my morning grapefruit out into the yard and notice that a wooden wind spinner that has hung here for many years has fallen to the ground. I try to rescue and re-hang it, but the thread has rotted and can no longer be tied. And so, I leave it lying, one more job to be done, when the right time comes.
The schedule for writing this text has become mixed up, and now I don’t have much time. But writing and time are strange relations. It can take a few minutes to read what has taken weeks or months to write, and the opposite can also be true. The works in this show are hugely varied. It’s hard to bring them together under a little parasol of words like this. Some seem so subtle and serene, others raw, rumbunctious and bold. And yet I feel I see the artists’ selves, their spirits or identities, through these differences, or in the differences themselves. The works act as stand-ins for the artists in their absence; each practice is a cypher or surrogate for an undefinable self. In this way the relation of art, to artist and to audience might provide an illustration of Ma, the Asian concept favoured by the curators, relating to the quiet power of negative space, the powerless power of absence. Ma may also be the space I occupy in my search for words that might protect, surround, justify or frame – but never explain. And always without replacing, supplanting or crudely filling spaces opened up by the gesture of this exhibition – which is, thus far, still a proposition.
Time has passed since I began writing. My schedule is mixed up, and according to practical, utilitarian time I should be in a hurry. And yet I am strangely calm, as if the spirit of the task, the time of the exhibition, and the vision of the curators pervade, and link my mind to my fingertips as they play across the QWERTY keys, tapping familiar letters like little drums, sending out a rhythmic sound, a communication that goes beyond words.
I hesitate, and this becomes a gap, a break, a negative space determining the end of one paragraph and the start of another. Now I note that the margins of my page are generous. A student recently told me that margins may have been deployed to stop mice from nibbling treasured books all the way into their text. Ever since, I see margins in a new light, as light, brightly illuminated spaces crucial to the preservation of the words. It’s true that these spaces around and between, within every letter and all around the edges, enable communication.
And so, perhaps it is here, and only here, in this emptiness and absence, within this would-be Ma, that I might hope to collect, evaluate, describe and position these diverse and heterogenous works; this exhibition, which does not yet exist as I write but which resides, virtually sprung, waiting in the desires of its curators and contributors, waiting in the empty gallery space, and in this unfinished writing. The show waits to occur in an event that will soon sink into history, story and memory. I must finish my writing. I must fix the wind spinner. I must clean my breakfast bowl.
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‘Time Has Burned’ 16-27 April 2024
Opening event 18th April from 6-8:30 pm
The “Time Has Burned” exhibition showcases the exceptional works of a group of emerging to mid-level artists, based in London and belong to diverse backgrounds. This exhibition delves into various themes such as spirituality, displacement, and the interconnectedness of human and natural elements, making it an intriguing and thought-provoking experience. The main objective of this exhibition is to showcase works that reimagine time and distance and break away from the limitations of physical space. Our inspiration for this exhibition comes from Etel Adnan’s poem “Time” and the Japanese philosophical concept of Ma, which refers to the limitless potential for growth without boundaries.
Willesden Gallery 95 High Rd, London NW10 2SF
http://www.brent.gov.uk/willesdengallery
ig: @willesden_gallery ig:
@timehasburnedexhibition
Featured Artists:
Dr. Ziyang Chen Emi Kubota Emily Davidson- brett Joy Baek Madeleine Jarvis Micha Horgan Mingzhang Sun Ruby Khan Ruiyao Zhu Toni Martinez Solera Vincenzo Muratore Yiwen Li Yvonne Devine
Image by Emi Kubota
'ONLY YOU' – A few words on Art and Life In London, by Art Writer Paul O'Kane 