Abigail Reynolds
Russian library net
All bids
| Year | 2020 |
|---|---|
| Medium | Book page, flourescent paper |
| Dimensions | 28 x 21.1 cm |
| Nominated by | Beth Greenacre |
About the work
This is a void that was left in a Russian library plate once I had cut out a net for a three-dimensional ball. When I cut into book pages, I always keep the remainder and sometimes this is just as interesting as the piece that I have removed. I like this net form because although the work is flat, I know it represents the room which has folded itself into a ball. In this instance, knowing this is more satisfying than seeing the ball of the room that I made. I used fluorescent paint to create the sense of an explosion in the library. I often think about voids in libraries in different ways, the most extravagant of these was a journey I made to the lost libraries of the silk road, undertaken in 2016-17 as part of the 3rd BMW Art Journey awarded to me at Art Basel. I cut this net of a Russian library in 2008 but it has remained in my scraps pile until now, when it seemed to me suddenly prescient.
About the artist:
Born 1975 UK, Abigail Reynolds lives and works in Cornwall. Graduated from English Literature at St Catherine’s College Oxford University, and MA Fine Art at Goldsmiths College, University of London.
Reynolds has a multifaceted practice that encompasses collage, sculpture, print, moving image and live events. Much of her work starts with photographs taken from books. Widely circulated images (for example of London monuments) shape our shared perception of places and identities, by which individuals navigate. Though them she considers how subjectivity is mapped onto both place and time. The idea of the library as a model of inclusion and as social infrastructure is an ongoing research thread for her, and she often works sculpturally with glass, using it like a lens to focus the act of looking. All her work is in essence collage; the practice of bringing found materials into a fresh context.
Selected exhibitions include British Art Show 9 tour, Wolverhampton, Aberdeen, Plymouth and Manchester (2021-2022); Taken in a few seconds /// By the reflection of light, Harris Museum, Preston (2020); The Universal Now and further episodes, PEER gallery, London (2018); and We Beat the Bounds, commissioned by Tate St Ives to celebrate the opening of their new building (2017).
Awards include the third recipient of the BMW Art Journey awarded at Art Basel (2016).
