Subtle and deliberate, Richard Wright's wall drawings are characterized by an enduring elegance. The designs hover between op art, minimalism and the psychedelic with a modern touch, responding directly to contemporary culture and, more literally, to the architcture of the situation at hand. For his Dutch debut at the Van Abbemuseum, Anja Dorn spoke with Wright about tricky paradoxes, frescoes and other fascinations.
‘It is not always possible to control the context of your work. In fact I think sometimes this is a hopeless or even vain inclination (though this doesn’t seem to stop me from trying). “Empty” space is often an important part of what I am trying to do. So working in a group show can be more difficult as there is sometimes a tendency, from various points of view, to want to fill space. Often this has something to do with the balance of a show. But working with other artists is interesting because they give me ideas and also because I am attracted to the thought that my work is inserted into a situation which is less defined – other voices add to a sense of fragility. So the thought of an exclusive and untainted space is perhaps a less interesting possibility for me.
A group of rooms have already been chosen for this exhibition and some works have already been provisionally placed. So it is not a completely free choice, but within this framework I have chosen a room in which in I would like to make a work. At this time the situation is still very open - I do not have a clear idea for the work or how it would connect with the space. As my work will not be the only piece in this room (and I still do not have a clear picture of the overall feeling of the show) I have tried to choose a room that seems to have the most possibilities or the greatest potential for adaptation. Architecture is an emotional as well as a physical structure and it may be that the idea for my work for the Van Abbe will come as much from this dimension as from the volume and light of the space.When I was approached about this show, by Phillip van den Bossche, I liked the group of artists he had chosen, but I was especially taken with his attitude towards the show. It seemed also to hold a great many possibilities. Perhaps it was like a book that you could start reading on any page'.
Reading the title of the show Subversive Charm as a concept at least it seems possible that the public enters with a high attention towards double edges and other forms of tightrope walks, which happens rarely within group-shows. Ambiguousness seems to be an important aspect within your work. Actually your remark on the need of empty space made me think of an aspect of one of your works that seems a kind of tightrope walk to me. At Kunstverein Düsseldorf you had a solo show. The exhibition space consists of one long room on the second floor of a heavy concrete building. You worked on the two short walls stressing the spaces dimensions. On one of the walls a structure of squares recalling a perspectively distorted stair was blend into the space’s shadows. On the opposite wall there was a square field of blue lines breached by black and red circles. It seemed to allude to a non existing window and also to the idea of a painting as a window to a landscape. In fact the shape of the circle referred to a stovepipe that Joseph Beuys had once pushed through the building’s wall to open it to the outside.
While visiting your show I was very busy with the changing visual effects of the drawings, how it came that the lines seemed to flicker watching them from far or how the relation of a single shape and overall impression was constantly shifting depending on the position in space. But movement through space was also motivated through golden letters that one could see here and there in the frames of the fanlights. Of course one was trying to put the letters into the right sequence in order to find an assumed key to the work. The situation made me think of medieval churches and inscriptions. Having left the show and automatically trying to detach from the physical appearance of things I had doubts if a connotation with churches was not a bit dared. It seemed very close to the Secessionists’ idea of the exhibition-space as a cathedral, which of course implies a contemplative attitude of the visitors but also a purist idea of art. But then I found the parallel to medieval churches filled with frescos very interesting in relation to the way of experiencing painting and the way one is looking for stories and iconographic hints which supposably help to channel the impressions and understand. It is also interesting for the way frescos fit into the architecture and simultaneously dissolve its boundaries. In my opinion Italian fresco-painting is an alternative to the dissolution of the walls into windows in French gothic cathedrals, which is aiming at epiphany. Anyhow I was wondering if Italian fresco-painting does play a role for you?‘Yes of course Italian fresco painting has made a huge impression on me. I do like the thought that these works will not come to me. You cannot know the Convento di San Marco without going there and somehow going there (in every aspect) becomes part of knowing.
I think I could talk at length about artists from late medieval Italy that have interested me – especially those from Sienna. I wish I had another life to study them more closely - what is still shocking about these works is the extraordinary quality of manufacture. But in relation to your question, I am not sure about developing the idea of the exhibition space as a cathedral. Though I must say that in general the whole spectacle of the museum does tend to be orientated in this direction. Which may make it difficult to avoid.
De subversieve charme van de bourgeoisie. Burgerlijke elementen in de hedendaagse kunst
Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven
18 March t/m 3 September
Opening
