GALERIE GABRIEL ROLT

SONG OF THE ROUSTABOUTS
DOUGLAS WHITE
19 JANUARY - 23 FEBRUARY 2013
Opening Reception: Saturday 19 January 2013
17.00 — 19.30 hrs.





Galerie Gabriel Rolt is proud to present its second solo show of the work of London-based contemporary artist and sculptor Douglas White (Guildford, UK, 1977), who works with decaying objects, discarded waste and other cast-aside materials to create poetic, totemic works that pulse with new life. 

>From 19 January to 23 February 2013, Rolt will present White’s SONG OF THE ROUSTABOUTS, an exhibition of sculptural works including the eponymous large-scale installation made from over 1,000 kilos of wet clay suspended by a strange system of ropes, pulleys and wooden poles. The work, which the artist will construct on-site in the large open space of the gallery, recalls a haunting encounter White had more than a decade ago.

While traveling in East Africa, he stumbled upon the remains of an elephant, which had been mostly scavenged. All that remained was a scattered assemblage of bones and the elephant’s vast deflated skin, draped and folded like a collapsed tent. “Here was a body become landscape, a body both present and absent in which the distinction between the inner and outer had evaporated in the heat and decay. It was a body you could walk through…” said the artist. “Of all those objects that I ever encountered, this is the one I wanted most to possess…”
Two years ago, while working in his studio with wet clay, he discovered that the way it folded and cracked could be made to mimic the thickness and texture of the decaying elephant’s skin. He began developing this process to create a series of works which have been displayed in London and Paris.
The form makes reference to various manmade structures, from the circus big top to the makeshift canopies used by hunters in the wild. The song of the title refers to a musical number in Disney’s 1941 version of Dumbo, in which a band of itinerant workers sing about raising and tearing town circus tents for a living.  


About the Artist:
Douglas White studied Fine Art at the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art (1997-2000) and received his MA in Sculpture at Royal College of Art in 2005. He has had gallery solo shows with galleries internationally. White has exhibited his work and performed in important institutions like  Domaine Departmental de Chamarande, Paris, The Weizmann Institute, Tel Aviv,  City Gallery, Prague,  The David Roberts Art Foundation, London and the ARoS Museum, Denmark.
He was the recipient of the Cockburn Prize, the Deutche Bank Pyramid Award, and was shortlisted for the Jerwood Sculpture Prize, Jerwood Drawing Prize and the Paul Hamlyn Award, among others. 

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GALERIE GABRIEL ROLT
Elandsgracht 34
1016 TW  Amsterdam

T:  +31 (0) 20 78 55 146               



Open: Wed — Sat | 12 — 18 hrs
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Upcoming:
SONG OF THE ROUSTABOUTS
DOUGLAS WHITE
19 JANUARY - 23 FEBRUARY 2013
Opening Reception: Saturday 19 January 2013
17.00 — 19.30 hrs.

Upcoming:
EASTER AND OAK TREES
BERTIEN VAN MANEN
02 MARCH - 06 APRIL 2013
Opening Reception: Saturday 02 March 2013
17.00 — 19.30 hrs.

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Art fairs:

ART ROTTERDAM
7 — 10 February 2013
www.artrotterdam.com

THE ARMORY SHOW
PIER 94
7 — 10 March 2013
www.thearmoryshow.com