Collection Displays. Making Traces at Tate Modern, London

''The works in this wing capture making as gesture, the trace of an action. Other works explore the physical reach of the artist and the ways in which the bodily limitations are challenged and extended, as well as the ways artists exploit new imagery to extend their vision of the world.''
(signage, entrance)

Magda Cordell
Figure (Woman) 1956-7
Oil paint on hardboard

 

Lee Bull
Untitled (Cravings White) 1988

The entrance to this exhibition was quite interesting. I couldn't actually guess at first what the sculpture by Lee Bull was all about, but I found it as one really unusual aspect and really powerful aesthetically. In the first room there were two works displayed; work of  Hungarian painter - Magda Cordell and Lee Bul - South Korean contemporary sculpture and installation artist. It has shown two different ways of investigation and peculiar interpretation of the body.
Cordell explores the casual form of body and its inward examination, energetically mimicking the spread of blood, vessels and tissue. Bul goes into some fantastical extremes by creating a complex sculpture of organic outwards of the body (modified and artificially extended),growing in soft costume which represents the vision.
The sculpture as it was one of a kind there catches great attention.



Lee Ufan, From Winds (1982)
Oil paint and glue on canvas

I didn't really get on with a few artworks at the beginning of my visit. I would hardly actually call them art to be honest. I appreciated the scale of them presented in very big size. However I got my three years old boy art to compare with this and I have to say it could be much more obviously called an art. I understand there is a meaning attached to it and in some visitors possibly some inspiration could be revealed, but the works above really hadn't convince me. I don't think they are very representational...with all respect to those who seated in front of them staring and trying to copy some detail out of them. Well I guess there is always the first time for really harsh critique on something like this.

 

 

Asger Jorn
Letter to my son (1956-7)
Oil on canvas

Jean Dubuffet
Vicissitudes (1977)
Acrylic paint on paper and canvas
 

Two works I placed above got very similar aesthetics to it. They're rather simple, but very considerate. They're much more complex too. The first was is just an oil painting but the second one consists of numerous paintings glued together on paper and then placed on canvas. It creates a specific mosaic and it's part of nearly a hundred collages series entitled 'Theatres Memory' as the are a combination of many different places and scenes.

Sam Francis
Around the Blues (1957-62)
Oil and acrylic on canvas

 

 

'Around the Blues' is the one of this type here I liked the most. Beautiful colour palette, nicely balanced spacing and paint's weight.

 

Gordon Matta-Clark
Walls Paper (1972)
Offset lithograph on newsprint paper
 

I spend good few minutes staring into the newsprint paper works by Gordon Matta-Clark. The technique and the big scale made them really interesting and definitely it's got its own special aesthetics. Especially with the second one I was just trying to guess how were they actually made... It looked like someone was sticking newspapers to the canvas and ripping them continuously.

Sigmar Polke
Untitled (Square 2) 2003
Gold paint, oil paint and acrylic paint on canvas

''Polke’s work may be understood as an analysis of the mark-making central to two-dimensional representation. From his earliest practice, he emphasised a dynamic tension between expressive gesture, often humorously subverting its traditional subjectivity, and mechanical reproduction. His paintings combine found printed images with more organically-made painterly marks. He uses half-tone photography from newspapers and magazines, enlarging and reproducing it on canvas, often corrupting the original beyond recognition. From 1964 he began overlaying imagery on printed fabrics, creating a double layer of patterning and undermining the traditional relationship between subject and background. More recently he has been painting on transparent fabric, through which the structural support of the wooden stretchers is
clearly visible. This is particularly evident in Triptych 2002 (Tate T11855).''


The above work by Sigmar Polke was possibly my favourite. I like the layering and artist's use of different media: photography, fabrics and paints. His approach presents an extraordinary effect of two dimensionality and shows an evident self-expression. It captures his gesture and action of creating. Splashes of gold paint bring out the whole image mostly surrounded by darkness what emphasizes the subject even more effectively. I think the artist uses very successful colour palette which together with the textural layers, adds a mystery to the outcome.
The following photograph shows the signage attached to the artwork (placed in quite a distance). It gives the visitor a lot of background information, including an author and his life frame, his origin; title of work in English and in German, year and methods of creation, circumstances of purchase and quite detailed description of artist's approach. The content - totally satisfying. However, generally talking, some of the white foam boards were placed very inappropriately in relation to the work described on them. It was confusing sometimes and sometimes I had to read a couple to find out which artist made the work I was looking at.

Jacqueline Humphries
Untitled 2014
Oil paint on linen

detail


 

Jacqueline Humphries (American artist) paintings were very beautiful. Silver paint, reflecting the light and black paint, absorbing it made a dramatic contrast. This work is very dynamic, complex and powerful to the eye. It gives a metallic impression. I really enjoyed it. It is truly contemporary painting and the artist demonstrates an awareness to the change in our way of seeing caused by shiny screens of technology. An accent of colour, blushes of pink and blue, animates the surface and gives a character to the scribbles and doodles along the way.

Rebecca Horn
Waiting for Absence 2005 and House of Pain 2005
Graphite, coloured graphite and acrylic paint on paper

 

''To look inside bodies and meditate one's own way into them makes it possible to let them become landscapes that are permeated with streams of energy, pulsating craters and mountain-like formations... You approach a hidden centre, maybe the solar plexus and follow a circular motion or energy threads of breathing. It's almost as if you were... using colour to penetrate the layer of an enigmatic landscape that gradually finds its own rhythm in the lines.''  R. Horn

 

I quite liked the look of the above pieces by Rebecca Horn. At first I thought of them similarly to the few first works in the second room. The meaning made up by artist has its reflection in my following perception on it. The technique is painfully simple, but more knowledge and direction to what it can represent in this case, made actually a bit of a change. That's why its rather useful to read the captions.

 

 

Mark Rothko
 Seagram Murals
Oil and acrylic paints, glue tempera and glue on canvas

''Mark Rothko saw these painting as objects of contemplation, demanding the viewer's complete absorption.'' 

The set of nine big Rothko's paintings were displayed in the heart of this exhibition, in a compact space and reduced light, as the artist intended. It supposed to make a viewer feel trapped in the room.
They have dark, very meditative character reached by using dark, limited colours and layering, big sized.
I like the fact these works supposed to be shown in specific environment. Rothko achieved a great shine and mysterious level that makes the spectator contemplating it in more depth.
It was unusual feeling of the artwork and its surroundings put together, with bricked up windows and doors. That aspect intended was definitely achieved and I guess it makes a masterpiece. It is nice, meaningful abstraction. However I haven't found it amazing and I was generally a little bit disappointed with it.