Despite the Royal Hibernian Academy's hotel lobby aesthetic, Vanessa Donoso Lopéz's exhibition, 'Establishing a Mission' succeeds in transforming the unspiring enclave known as the Ashford Gallery, into an all encompassing, meticulously considered domestic arrangement of cherished collectables, resuscitated sewing machines, dismembered figurines, childish compass drawings, defunct furniture, and gaudy wall paper. Lopéz's interventions¬ in the space enable her sometimes trinket worthy artworks to acquire new meanings through their relationship to one another, and their setting. The environment she creates establishes a lexicon of fantasies, rituals, symbols, and perversions.
Lopéz's raw materials are predominantly feminine. On one wall, there is a row of butterflies that are cut out of paper and tied to strings, which are then tied to the second hand of a clocks. As the hands of the clock move, the butterflies tremble at the ends of their stings, quivering to the sound of the perpetual tick-tock of the numerous clocks in the room. In another instance, Lopéz begins with tiny, waxy, plastic, asexual figurines that she adorns with Victorian neck ruffles and arranges into a variety of freak show poses. Sometimes, she positions the figurines inside a series of lanterns, which hang against the backdrop of a burgundy wall that is partly sheathed in embroidered wall paper, and gold trimming. Other times, the figures' crumbling limbs are presented in cheap plastic containers, like action figures.
One of the less saccharine aspects of Lopéz's exhibition, is her use of found furniture. Against one wall is a small divan with a curious box built into its seat cushion. Lopéz has made a small intervention on the surface of the box- a tiny pair of dancing, flipping metal stick men who appear to be propelled by an unseen magnetic force. The intervention is annoyingly cute, and ultimately undermines the simple elegence of the anachronisitc divan. In the center of the room is a kind of homemade sewing machine that has been kitted out with an arrangement of multi-coloured spools of thread and light bulbs. The makeshift machine stands on iron legs that bear the brandname 'Singer,' one of the first companies to manufacture the sewing maching, and a brand that has come to signify an era of domesticity and capitialistic industry in 1950s America.
Lopéz's exhibition at the Ashford Gallery conflates our understanding of the distinctions between exhibitions and installations. In this way, her methodology resonates with Karen Kilimnick's practice of exhibitioning her work mise-en-scène. The variety of sources from which Lopéz draws inspiration also reflects Kilimick's borrowing of material from both high and low culture. The effect of Lopéz's use of specific materials such as teacups, dolls and forturne telling fish, is the creation of a kind of mythological vocabularly that seems to create, and draw upon, a collective feminine unconscious.
Seemingly out of place, and contributing little to the sinister-grandmother's-living-room aethetic of the exhibition, is an unpainted wall, at the foot of which is a pile of paint cans, unwashed brushes, and fish dangling from string. While the rest of the exhibition is of a certain decidely antiquated pallette, this conglomeration of objects is far too white, far too bold, and altogether too prosthetized for the intricate nature of this show. Lopéz is at her best when she is totally over the top with frills. Her collection of objects is a kind of refined squirreling- a deeply personal ordering, and packaging, of illogical objects. However, these objects flail when standing alone, and it is for this reason that the success of the exhibition lies entirely on Lopéz's command of the space around her.
Charlotte Bonham-Carter
Vanessa Donoso Lopéz - 'Establishing a Mission'
Until 2 August
Royal Hibernian Academy
15 Ely Place
Dublin 2
T: 353 1 661 2558
Charlotte Bonham-Carter is an independent art critic and an Assistant Curator at the Irish Museum of Modern Art. Her writing has appeared in Flash Art, Contemporary, Art Review, Art Press, Tank, and Untitled, as well as a number of exhibition catalogues. She divides her time between London and Dublin.
)
)
)