Hospitalfield Picture Gallery

Artist’s talk

Graham Fagen Artist's Talk

23 April 2015

6.30 pm for 7.00 pm

SCOTLAND + VENICE 2015

COLLATERAL EVENT OF THE 56TH INTERNATIONAL ART EXHIBITION LA BIENNALE DI VENEZIA

Curated by Hospitalfield, commissioned by the Scotland + Venice Partnership.

Graham Fagen’s talk at Hospitalfield has been programmed to take place just before the opening of the exhibition on the 7 May and just after returning from completing the installation of the exhibition.

Fagen will talk about the work that he has made for Venice within the context of past and recent projects and commissions.

The ambition of Fagen’s work and the complexity of his vocabulary position him as one of the most influential artists working in Scotland today. The constructed nature of history and the myths and fictions that form contemporary identity have become his focus in recent years. He draws on a fascination for poetry, specific musical forms and theatrical artifice in order to focus on ideas of the national, social and political. Certain themes such as conflict, death and colonialism, and motifs such as plants, trees and flowers, consistently reoccur as a means of exploring cultural difference and conveying the personal as eloquently as the universal.

Fagen is an artist who forms deep collaborative working relationships. Working with writers, theatre directors, musicians, and composers enables him to draw on expertise, knowledge and specialisms outside of his own. Contributions from classical composer Sally Beamish, reggae singer and musician Ghetto Priest, and music producer Adrian Sherwood, are clearly embedded within this new work.

Fagen's installation, situated within four of the most extraordinary rooms of the 16th century Palazzo Fontana, draws the viewer on a journey, a choreographed route through each room. We effectively become performers within a planned interior landscape, all travelling a similar path.

Tickets: £5

Free to Friends of Hospitalfield and to students.

Sign up to hear more about Scotland + Venice...

See details of Graham Fagan’s upcoming talk on the same subject at the National Galleries of Scotland