Amy Stephens | Permanence of Space

11 April - 1 June 2024
Overview
Installation View: Amy Stephens, Permanence of Space, 2024, photo credits to Manuel Carreon Lopez
Installation View: Amy Stephens, Permanence of Space, 2024, photo credits to Manuel Carreon Lopez
 

Underpinned by a fascination with geology and travel, Amy Stephens is interested in how we reuse, recycle, and re-appropriate materials from our daily environment. Using photography and collage, works emerge through stages of exploration, materialising as three-dimensional structures. These monolithic forms, or geological artefacts, generate a new perspective on the passing of time and our appreciation of the landscape.

 

Permanence of Space brings together a series of works that culminated from a trip to Carrara in Italy. This exhibition raises questions surrounding context and artistic intention. The artist’s work asks the viewer to be attentive to what is happening beneath the surface, our impact upon that natural world and how we appropriate it for our own purpose.

 
 

About the artist:

Amy Stephens was born in London 1981, graduated 2005 at the University of Reading, BA (Hons) Fine Art and 2008 with an MA in Fine Art at Chelsea College of Art and Design, London. 

 

Selected solo exhibitions: Persistence of Land, Bo Lee and Workman Gallery, Bruton, UK, (2023); Nature knows only colours, Art Seen Maria Stathi, Nicosia, Cyprus (2021); fig-futures, Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool, UK (2018); Land | Reland [Portland], Upfor Gallery, Portland, Oregon, US (2018); fig2, 35/50, ICA Studio, London, curated by Fatoş Üstek (2015)

 
 
Works
Press release
Underpinned by a fascination with geology and travel, Amy Stephens is interested in how we reuse, recycle, and re-appropriate materials from our daily environment. Using photography and collage, works emerge through stages of exploration, materialising as three-dimensional structures. These monolithic forms, or geological artefacts, generate a new perspective on the passing of time and our appreciation of the landscape.
 
Permanence of Space brings together a series of works that culminated from a trip to Carrara in Italy. This exhibition raises questions surrounding context and artistic intention. The artist’s work asks the viewer to be attentive to what is happening beneath the surface, our impact upon that natural world and how we appropriate it for our own purpose.
 
Restless Matter
Restless Matter is made from a piece of metamorphic rock that bears witness to a particular stage in geological history. This sculpture is a celebration of the landscape presented to the viewer as an object of both stability and fragility. This beautiful off-cut highlights a rock that has been growing silently for millions of years, collected by the artist from a quarry in Italy as it was being discarded as waste. 
The stone inhabits both a physical and psychological space. Set upon its modern stainless steel pedestal, there is an air of admiration for the entity itself but also a bond between the natural and the constructed. The millions of tiny crystals are translucent allowing the light to penetrate a few millimetres below the surface creating a soft glow. They form a compact, perfectly-fitted pattern of carbonate crystals. Pitted with star dust and striated, this artwork is focused on exploring the idea of transferability and the importance of recognition for these terrestrial wonders. 
 
Alpi Apuan
This silkscreen depicts a famous working quarry found in the Apuan Alps. The Alpi Apuane UNESCO Global Geopark is located in north-western Tuscany. This protected area has internationally significant geology within which sustainable development is sought and which includes tourism, conservation, education and research concerning geology. 
A photographic image was made into a two layer silkcreen depicting a light pink geometric form that makes reference to the molecular structure of calcium carbonate found in the underlying rock type. The artist often only prints on one half of the paper making reference to the architectural void and the idea that the frame enables the print to transcend into an object.
 
Permanence of Space | Diamond Dust | Golden Echo
This series of photographs were taken by the artist from inside a working quarry. This particular site is where sculptors have come for generations to source offcuts for their work. From hand-written text offering the fate of the marble to perfectly cut endless blocks that lie in peril of their fate.
The sheer scale of the marble operation begins to emerge highlighting giant off-cuts at the base of the excavation. The artist offers a spatial narrative surrounded by beautifully polished brass frames that transform the two-dimensional images into sculptures.
 
Tectonic Façade
This photograph depicts the precarious nature of a working quarry with the marble façade exposed offering the viewer an insight into this natural wonder. A striking line of green fluorescent tape has been applied to the surface to create a contemporary montage. The tape acts also as an alert, asking the viewer to stop, to think and to be mindful about this particular site. Starting inside the frame, the ascent of colour goes beyond the frame and onto the immediate architecture. The viewer is left following the line along and around the neighbouring space.
 
Installation Views
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