"Ben Woodeson: In too deep "
2001-10-13 until 2001-11-10
RED
Hull, , UK United Kingdom

RED is proud to present In too deep, an exhibition by the Glasgow based artist Ben Woodeson. Independently curated by RED, the show runs along side DEEP ROOT, the ninth international festival of live, sound and new media art organised by Hull Time Based Arts, www.root2001.org.

The faint sound of music is occasionally audible throughout the gallery, and the faint smell of tomatoes hints at what is to come. From the bizarrely portable (an appropriated granny trolley) to the absurdly non-portable, a jury rigged transistor radio made room sized and powered by 60 tins of tomatoes.

Absurdity has to be the over-riding impression, a bathtub of soup sacrificed to power a vintage computer game, a sack of potatoes crossed with the granny trolley and a ghetto blaster. If Heath Robinson woke up needing a Walkman he might have come up with something like this.

Like a conceptual artists' Alice in Wonderland, The Mad Hatters Tea party with the missing Jam cooking the toast. Home entertainment devices functioning from scavenged power, laid out in the gallery like relics of bygone science. Babbage's Difference Engine but a million times more basic and made in a strange world where rationality is banned. Part dodgy experiment, part imagined narrative a la Elroy or Chandler. The aesthetic seemingly casual, the devices shouldn't work but they could do. Well sometimes anyway!

Like a mad child let loose with a science set, Woodeson concocts weird sculptural things, part performance, part sound work and part relic. They each serve a function, but who would go to such extremes? Don't try this at home, just pay your power bill and buy a stereo instead!

Since graduating in 1997 from Glasgow School of Art Ben Woodeson has shown throughout the UK and in Europe. In too deep includes three new pieces made expressly for the RED gallery as well as Everyday Value, which was recently shown at Berlin's BBQ Project.

DEEP ROOT, www.root2001.org

Related Links:

Indepth Arts Resources for United Kingdom

Other Important Exhibitions in United Kingdom