BERLIN.- Gallery Barbara Thumm is presenting its fifth solo exhibition with acclaimed British artist Fiona Banner.
The exhibition reflects Banner’s multi-disciplinary practice which looks at the politics, limitations and possibilities of language. Key works from her recent survey shows at Ikon Gallery Birmingham and Kunsthalle Nürnberg investigate the slippage between object, image and text and highlight the central role that Banner’s publishing imprint, The Vanity Press, has played in her work since 1997.
The attempt to survey is also a theme in Banner’s new film Phantom which features her most recent publication, an illustrated reprint of Joseph Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness”. In this film a drone camera simultaneously observes and harries the book like a hawk chasing down its prey. As the drone attempts to focus on the text and images, the downdraught from its blades blow the pages back and forth in an endless fluttering dance. The publication under scrutiny takes the form of a glossy magazine bringing to mind notions of luxury and desire. Here the text is paired with images of the City of London that Banner commissioned from Magnum conflict photographer Paolo Pellegrin. The book also contains Banner’s drawings depicting close-ups of pinstripe, a play on the livery and camouflage of the Square Mile.
Massive floor to ceiling graphite drawings depict close-ups of pinstripe suits enlarged to become oppressive, repetitive clashing patterns. This iconic cloth of ceremonial City dress is then metamorphosed again, this time as a motif on bespoke moulded plywood chairs, designed by the artist. Alongside the film the bent plywood forms operate as functional chairs. They take on human form, drawn over in pinstripe patterning, they themselves become like characters observing the film works.
Pinstripe also appears as an adornment in the sculptural drawing Nose Art which sees two Harrier Jump-Jet nose cones fixed high on the wall. The term ‘Nose Art’ refers to a military form of folk art, where aircraft are graffitied often with popular cultural icons. Banner sees the nose cone as the most heroic part of an aircraft, in this piece they are reminiscent of hunting trophies or breasts.
In the towering Agent Provocateur a single illuminated electronically powered windsock stands over a copy of Banner’s version of Heart of Darkness. Its beam is a search-light attempting to focus on the book, while an intermittent current of air agitates the pages. Rising and falling, to various apparently random degrees, it performs a new language. In motion Wind- sock becomes an expressive character, no longer just machine but rather a snout, a limb, a cartoon.
The title also alludes to the well known lingerie company, whose most successful branch is located at the Royal Exchange in the heart of the City of London. The original exchange building was opened by Elizabeth I as the city‘s centre of commerce. It was once home to the London Stock Exchange, now it is high end shopping precinct. An agent provocateur is someone who acts undercover to entice another person to commit an illegal or rash act.
This text is typeset in a new font designed by Fiona Banner, titled Font. Banner’s font is an amalgamation of typefaces she has worked with previously, through full stop sculptures and typeset and published works: It’s a family tree arrangement where the child of Avant Garde and Courier mates with Peanuts and Didot‘s child. Bookman and Onyx mate; their child mates with Capitalist and Klang‘s offspring - the final font is an unpredictable bastardisation of styles and behaviours. — Fiona Banner
