What (is) realness (is)? Or maybe more what effects it has, how we can think
about it through an idea of proof, how flimsy that is… But that has its basis on a
wafer-thin ever-evasive definition of truth. What we see, what we feel, what we
sense, what we remember, what we think, or something else? Does the real exist
in the space that we silently agree to willingly suspend our disbelief for? Ok I get
yah, for the sake of letting this conversation move on. Metaphysically and that
we will put a pin in it.
Then there is how we see ourselves too, versus a false self, how much do you
unite your Self-self with your internet self? There is not distinction; it is boring to
think there is so. How do we keep it real?
In Beyoncé and Jay Z’s On The Run tour, she juxtaposed portions of the show
as REAL LIFE (video footage of their baby, her spending time with the ocean)
with THIS IS NOT REAL LIFE (fire work display caliber performances riffing on
gangsta life).
All life is a curated life. I don’t need to see you take a shit to think that you are
real.
Conversely do we all really need to be staring down the barrel of a Johnny Depp
playing Hunter S Thompson drug induced kaleidoscopic gun to experience the
real? (The only way TV knows how to show hallucinogenics = a multicolored
rabbit hole, panning in and out like on the segues in Scooby Doo or detective
shows DIDDLE EH DIDDLE EH, DIDDLE EH DIDDLE EH) Eyes bleeding right on
the edge of it all is no closer.
There’s hyperpresence in screens… The ones in your hand, down the end of a
stick, and on our desks, knees, walls, windows, eyes. But perhaps presence is a
different conversation. Here we are talking about capturing as understanding,
artists’ attempt to pause. Blackmirror style?
The works in this show sit within the mess I just described. Trying to be a part of
it, here now, there then. Or looking at an ‘unreality’ as just as good a way to look
at reality, holding spaces in your mind. The saxophone squeaky door takes a
phenomenological approach. And together they are calm?
For the evening- the film screened looks at reality TV and will attempt to yank
you back through that rabbit hole, YouTube clips playing on the walls as you fly
back up and are vomited out. The performance on the night describes our
everyday navigation of online offerings. How glutinous information mass may
dilute a cause, and dwindle attention spans. Less calm.
Perhaps we are all doing our best to keep it real. Succeeding sometimes more

than others.

– Sophie Chapman

Lou Macnamara & Jeff Ko
Yada/Yada/Yada 2013 projected performance

Yada/Yada/Yada 2013 projected performance

Lou Macnamara

Jeff Ko

Claudia Capocci
Squeaky Door 2015
saxophone and door
performance
and
Samantha Russell
Back in the
Foreground 2014 oil
on canvas

Claudia Capocci
Squeaky Door 2015
saxophone and door
performance

Georgia Gendall
Virtual Holiday 2014 film and
restaurant table installation

Georgia Gendall
Virtual Holiday 2014 film and
restaurant table installation

Philippe Internoscia
Deutschland sucht den Megastar 2013 film

Open one night only Monday March 2nd 6pm – 10pm

Zero Hours’ is a term that gives name to a type of contract that allows employers to hire staff with no guarantee of work. Zero Hours denotes a lack of routine and security. On the other hand having a Zero Hour contract with an employee allows for  flexibility.
The the title brings the group together by suggesting that the work has come out of a structural commonality.

With art by:
Chris Sebestik, Poppy Moroney, Sam Hawes, Helen Savage, Sean Elliot O’Conner, Ellie Wyatt and Gwen Cook.

Curated by Helen Savage.

Acoustic band Tall Tales playing in the Nice Gallery Space

Peter Bellamy’s exhibition at the main nice gallery space

The Nancy Allen Show at nice gallery’s temporary satellite space

Fellow nice gallery artists Kaajel Patel and Victoria Grenier looking at Nancy Allen’s drawings

With thanks to Hannah Burton for taking wonderful pictures at the opening!

Our February/March newsletter and program of wonderful events is out!

Have a look at all the things we have planned for the coming month here.

We thought we’d share some pics of our wonderful crazy new artist in residence at work/play with you. It’s a little bit shocking to give someone a key, come back after a few days and find a residency space bursting at the seams with drawings and paintings and sculptures and collages. It’s like an art explosion.

Film Night Poster – background: film still by Patrick Rowan

In December we ran a film night at The Gorringe Park Pub just next to Tooting Railway station, showing moving image work by Peter Bellamy, Sean Mullan, Victoria Grenier, Patrick Rowan, Harriet Horner and Dan Johnson. The Gorringe park have lovely cinema downstairs and all the artist were showing new, fresh of the MacBook work.

The Gorringe Park Pub

Here are some stills from some of the films that were shown that night.

Film Still from Life in The Cosmic Bush by Victoria Grenier

Still from Merz by Harriet Horner, sound by Gabriel Beveridge

With Ella McVeigh, Kieron Marchant, Nancy Allen, Sophie Birch, James Collins, Jessie Churchill, Madeleine Ruggi, Sarah ‘Kenikie’ Palmer and Tabitha Wilson.

Our wonderful curator Sophie Chapman writes:

“Some notes on being small:
At a recent ‘watch an ambitious young curator with a Scandinavian accent wrestle with and nervous laugh their way through a guess you could call it ‘discussion’ with an artist’ Richard Tuttle- the aforementioned addressed remarks some critics had made about the sheer enormity of his commission for the Turbine Hall. He patiently, and lengthily, talked about the difference between scale and size. Obvious to him, not so clear to the rest of us. I think he was getting at the idea of
the presence of ‘a thing’, ones physical relation to it and encounter with it. But Tuttle’s work is usually so fingerly. All about a romantic encounter with the world.
IS there a difference between scale and size? What about a small performance?
Surely you don’t have to be overwhelmed by something to really experience it. What happens when you try to instill something of that impact into something that is in relation to yourself, relatively small? My Great Granny infamously declared/reassured “well we’re all the same size in bed”. Size matters, in context? Being horizontal, it’s a bit more about skill? Or care?
The Little Creatures shows of early 2000’s Los Angeles are a good example of the DIY show. In shop fronts, putting your mates work on, tacking things to the walls: works in progress, sketches, ideas you really care about. They deftly and appropriately depict the work of those just beginning to get going. On the cusp. The lip. Not trying to be something they are not. Not yet inflated fit to burst. When you are an ‘emerging artist’, small works are a must in many
ways.
I’m a bit sick of the bombastic. It’s not like billboards have that much sway anymore anyway, we are all faithfully practiced in drowning out the cacophony and negotiating the slogans. A small work could be like getting a little nick or pin prick on your finger, or stubbing your toe. The slight, the faint, the simple thing- contains within it the possibility of being ever more powerful, just by being so.

One small chips please.”

Small Works Show Poster – Background image by James Collins

T-Shirts by Sophie Chapman, wines by the wonderful Fabio of SW19 Italian

very tactile sculpture/installation by artists Madeleine Ruggi

Nice Gallery artist Nancy Allen’s calendars (alias NancyAllenders) being perused

Sophie Birch (left) with her painting in the background

left: James Collins, right: Kieron Marchant

Sophie Chapman’s delicious ‘Something’ cake

Left: painting by Tabitha Wilson, Right: sculpture by Jessie Churchill

Left: drawing/collage by Nancy Allen, Right: paintings by Sarah “Kenikie” Palmer

Ella McVeigh

Here are some pics of Nancy Allen’s open studio to get you exited about her upcoming show on the 19th of February.

The famous NancyAllender – a wonderful calendar with work by Nancy Allen for every month of the year.

Nancy says

“I have been creating sculptures and drawings for the past four weeks, during my Nice Gallery Residency. I work mainly with materials that react when manipulated, such as Lycra, vinyl flooring and foam. The sculptures droop, grip and lean, as their material characteristics endure. I am preoccupied by the dominance of two-dimensional images and lack of understanding experienced when using new technologies. My sculptures and drawings show how they work and confront two-dimensionality by working in the lineage of sculpture-in-the-round.”

And they are happening in December! Check out our (updated) opening program for Nice Gallery: