Alec Finlay
Windsack
Im Untergut hat Alec Finlay eine Wortzeile „Red Windsock for the Red Baron“ effektvoll und anspielungsreich in Szene gesetzt. Auf drei Meter Höhe flattert ein signalroter Nylonsack als wetterbeständiges ready-made für den Helden der Lüfte, Manfred von Richthofen. Doch hat er jeden hyperheroischen Anflug von Symbolik auf die praktische Funktion des Objekts zurückgeführt. Schlicht, profan und eindeutig wird angezeigt, woher der Wind weht.
Die Fortsetzung dieser nüchternen Ausgangsszene schreibt sich im Laufe der Ausstellung fort und wird zu einer ganz eigenen Geschichte. Längst betrachtet man die Expansion einer geistigen Ursprungsidee, die Interpretationswelle, die sie auslöst, als eminent wichtigen Teil einer so konzeptuellen Arbeit. Das hat beispielsweise eine Arbeit von Hans Haake, für die er Erde für Blumenbeete in den Bundestag schleppen ließ, mit Alec Finlay gemeinsam.
Diesen Sommer steht Finlays meterhohe Stange im Park . . .
In den Windsack bläst Luft, damit nimmt die Arbeit ihren Lauf. Das symbolisch-profane Zeichen, für das er im Titel eine so achtsam-schwebende Zuordnung traf, wird damit von allen vier Windrichtungen und ganz verschieden wahrgenommen.
Nylon, Edelstahl
3,3 m x 1,8 m
2008
Vita
www.alecfinlay.com
* 1966 in Inverness, UK
lebt und arbeitet in Newcastle-upon-Tyne
Ausstellungen und Projekte (Auswahl)
2008 “thoughts within thoughts” (with Pravdo Ivanov), ARC, Sofia (Bulgaria), curator Iliyana Nedkova & Chris Byrne, „100 Year Star Diary”, Kielder Observatory, Kielder, (k),
“Void: White Light Festival”, Guildhall, Derry, Night for Day (neon): Northern Cannon, Newcastle. Commission,
„two fields of wheat”, Milton Keynes Gallery (Offsite), (K)„Noses's Point: Coastal Walk “ (Seaham, County Durham), (K)
2007 „Three Estates Renga” (with Gavin Wade and Ravi Duprees), Birmingham City Council. (K).
Video, „Floating Island Garden (1)” and word-map, for „Four Seasons, Five Senses”, Northumbria Coast Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
„Cubecircle” (with Dan Civico), platforms 000006, Waygood Gallery, Newcastle
2006 „International Edible Art Award”, Village Bakery Gallery, Melmerby.
„folio/series//book/series”, Scottish Poetry Library, Edinburgh,
„String of Pearls”, Dysart, Fife, „Avant-Garde English Landscape”,Yorkshire Sculpture Park,West Bretton. (K)
2005 „Hill of Streams” (with Alexander & Susan Maris), Cairnhead Community Forest, Dumfries and Galloway.
„Three Rivers Crossword”, Nexus, Newcastle. (K),
„The stars before we heard them into conversations”, (performance) Tate Modern, London.
„Ludwig Wittgenstein: There Where You Are Not”, (with Jeremy Millar and Guy Moreton), John Hansard Gallery, Southampton. (K)
2004 „Tweed”Tweed Rivers Interpretation Project, Scottish Borders,
„Your Name Here”, Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh.
„Crossword”,The Public,West Bromwich, „Dance Trace Dance Music” (with Andrew Hodson), Dance City, Newcastle
2003 „Woodland Platform & Xylotheque”, The Hidden Gardens, Tramway, Glasgow,
„Right of Way” (with Guy Moreton), Galway Arts Centre, Galway
2002 „B.Open, Labanotation”, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead
2001 „Flowers of the North Sea”, (with Zoe Irvine) Overbeck House, Lübeck
2008 „Herz:Rasen.The Football Exhibition”, Künstlerhaus, Vienna, „Now Then”, Bluecoat Art Gallery, (K)
2007 „Multiplicities”, ARC Projects, Sofia. Curators: Chris Byrne and Iliyana Nedkova,
„The Printed Path. Landscape,Walking and Recollection”,Tate Britain, London,
„Neon”,The National Glass Centre, Sunderland,
„Harry Smith Remix”, Alt.Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne,
„Sirens: An Evolution from Water, through Water, to Water”, 66 East: Centre for Urban Culture, Amsterdam [Bergen, Berlin],
„Threshold 6x4”,The Front Room, Bridpoint,
„Kiosk”, Artists' Space, New York,
„Inkubator”,Edinburgh Printmakers, Edinburgh,
„In their own words”, End Gallery, Sheffield,
„Waterlog”, Castle Museum and Art Gallery, Norwich and touring to Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts, Norwich and The Collection, Lincoln. (K),
„Mesostic Laboratorium,” Science Learning Centre North East. (K)
2006 „Around About Words” (performance),Tate Britain, London,
„Word Order, Concrete Poetry and its influence”, The Changing Room, Stirling. Curators: Kirsty McDonald
„Forest Laboratory 06”, Darmstadt,
„Ball Im Kopf ”, Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg, Hamburg,
fall,Yorkshire Sculpture Park, West Bretton. Curator Alex Hodby,
„Isles and Lakes”, Village Bakery Gallery, Melmerby
2005 EAST 05, Norwich,
„Soapsuds and Whitewash”,Turner Contemporary, Droit House, Margate
2004 „Revolver”,Witte de With, Rotterdam and touring to ICA, London and Istanbul Biennial,
„Inset (Atopia)”, Blaffer Gallery, Houston, USA. Curator Gavin Morrison
2003 „Outside of a Dog: Artists' Books”, BALTIC, Gateshead. Curaot Clive Philpott,
„Wind Blown Cloud”, Brighton Photo Biennial, Brighto
2002 „Generator”, Spacex, Exeter, „Football Haiku”,Tramway, Glasgow,
„Labanotation”, Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead. Curator Sune Nordgren
1998 „Anthology”,Talbot Rice Gallery, Edinburgh
Awards:
2007 String of Pearls, Dysart Artworks,Winner best work of art in the public realm, Scottish Design Awards, Northern Canon first major North-East Art Commission Award
2006 Northern Rock Three Year Sustainability Award, First International Edible Art Award for Isles and Lakes (Biscuit patterns)
2000 Scottish Design Awards (Best Typography, Best Book, Chariman's Award), for the pocketbooks series. Verse Chain
Windsack
Alec Finlay has effectually and allusively staged the line “Red Windsock for the Red Baron” at the Lower Manor. A signal red nylon sack flutters at a height of three meters as a weather-proof ready-made dedicated to the hero of the skies, Manfred von Richthofen. But he returned that hyperheroic touch of symbolism to the object’s practical use. In a simple, profane, and nambiguous manner, it shows which way the wind is blowing.
The continuation of this sober starting scene develops into a storyline of its own over the course of the exhibition. One has long observed the expansion of an intellectual source idea to the waves of interpretations it triggers, which are an eminently important part of such a conceptual piece. Hans Haake’s piece, for example, for which he had soil for the flowers beds carried into the Bundestag building in Berlin, has that in common with Alec Finlay.
Finlay’s meter-high rod stands in the park this summer. Wind blows into the windsock so that the piece can run its course. The symbolic-profane sign to which he assigned such an attentive- provisional attribute, is thus perceived very differently from all points of the compass.