Catching the Travel Bug?

The Polish artist Paulina Olowska thinks art galleries are, at their heart, travel bureaus. She believes that works of art are portals into an endless number of destinations but not necessarily real ones. Ones that have been imagined by artists.

Rosson Crow - Relics of the truth tellers (2017)

 

It's hardly a revolutionary concept but, coming at the (hopeful) end of the lockdown era, it's not one without appeal. It's also quite a loose concept to hang a show on, this one's called Christian Sveaas Art Foundation:The Travel Bureau Selected by Paulina Olowska, because the way I see it absolutely anything would be worthy of inclusion.

 

Abstract, figurative, conceptual, brilliant, or complete shit. Everything in art, by its very nature, is an imagined space. The show is inspired by Orbis, the largest and longest running (founded in 1920) travel agency in Poland, and the way that they offered potential tourists a dream of escape.

 

On a mild April night in the East End of London, the show was at the Whitechapel, I popped in to have a look at it and then, afterwards, I wandered around Shoreditch and Bethnal Green and had a couple of pints in The Blind Beggar pub. That was holiday enough for me, for now, but I would like to travel further afield soon and - all being well - I shall. 

Paulina Olowska - Window Display G.U.M (2018)

Laura Owens - Untitled (2015)

So I'm not 100% sure I took this show in the spirit it was intended and, despite the fact there was some very good work displayed - and some not so good, the overall concept failed for me. I loved the bright red cacti and beaches and sunsets coloured like the Ukrainian flag of Rosson Crow and I could hardly help but admire the fauvist design of Olowska's own Window Display G.U.M but I didn't really get much from Laura Owen's blown up, and defaced, newspaper, Monica Bonvicini's mirror (I've not included a photo as it's been ruined by my gurning masked up face in its reflection), or even Ed Ruscha's Mountain Standard.

Ed Ruscha - Mountain Standard (2000)

Fredrik Vaerslev - Untitled (2018)

Ida Ekblad - The proofreader (2017)

I don't have a lot of luck with Ruscha. I really like some of his work but when I see some out it always seems to be his lesser stuff. Both Fredrik Vaerslev and Ida Ekblad had made some pretty abstract patterns, Marina Abramovic was on a horse - one of the more literal inclusions and one I'd seen before at the Whitechapel, and there was a wall full of images put together that were difficult to really take in.

Too crowded - and some were too high. The only artist included in this bit I'd even heard of was Gillian Ayres but while it's nice that the Whitechapel (as they so often do) are giving less celebrated artists their due it might have worked better if we could have seen them properly.

Skuja Braden's porcelain Ima Woman was better - and better displayed, Julia Rommel's work reminded me of the cover of Dire Straits' 1980 LP Making Movies, and Rodney Graham's Sunday Sun had an enjoyable pop art feeling. While reminding the visitor sometimes the best part of holidays, or days off, are simply reading in bed.

Skuja Braden - Ima Woman (2017)

Rodney Graham - Sunday Sun 1937 (2012)

Paulina Olowska - After Veiled Visions (2022)

Berta Fischer - Xurla (2016)

There were other more literal works on display. A poster for travel in Norway and a painting, by Grabianski Janusz, of a dog in a travel bag. Olowska herself had provided some films of planes taking off which certainly fitted the brief but weren't all that interesting.

The colourful and warped abstraction of Berta Fischer's Xurla charmed me more and even better than that, perhaps my favourite thing in this small two room show, was Till Gerhard's Black Hole. A painting of some tents in a forest with some paint splattered, seemingly randomly but probably not, over it.

I don't know why but it made me feel something. That feeling you get when you're away from home. A sense of exploration and excitement but tinged, quite exquisitely, with a sense of uncertainty and fear. Dread even.

Till Gerhard - Black Hole (2017)

Charline von Heyl - Stationmaster (2013)

Jakob Weidemann - Fra Skogen (From the Fores) (1961)

It was the most interesting area of the show and Caragh Thuring's Night (which reminded me, a bit, of Philip Guston) echoed its exotic feel. Nearby there were abstract works by Jakob Weidemann (very much a fan of Frank Auerbach by the looks of it) and Charline von Heyl.

This lot were all good to look at but, Till Gerhard aside, none of them really made me think of travel. Not in the way that travel really is. Perhaps, in that respect, this show was indeed very much like a travel agency. When you visit them, they show you spotless hotels, pristine sandy beaches, and blue skies. You don't see the mosquitoes, the building sites, or even the loneliness you can sometimes feel when you're away from home. Travel is a wonderful and rewarding experience, and one I'm eager to recommence, but it's not always a comfortable one. If anything this show could have showed that even more brazenly.

Caragh Thuring - Night (2017)