Champagne Life: Celebrating Female Artists at Saatchi Gallery

1. Champagne Life

2. Introduction... • The Saatchi Gallery is a contemporary art gallery –all of the artworks on display are made by artists living and working today • These artworks are at the cutting edge of contemporary art • Many of these artists have never exhibited in the UK • The Gallery hosts 3-4 new exhibitions per year • Many artists showing at the Saatchi Gallery are unknown when first exhibited, not only to the general public but also to the commercial art world • Many of these artists are subsequently offered shows by galleries and museums internationally. In this effect, the gallery also operates as a springboard for young artists to launch their careers

3. Overview: Champagne Life • Saatchi Gallery’s first all-female exhibition • 14 artists working in sculpture, painting and installation • The Gallery wants to celebrate the work of a group of female artists, and reflect on what it means to be a female artist working today • However the Gallery is not suggesting that there is such thing as a “female practice”: each artist is being celebrated individually for her achievements • Gender inequality in the art world has been highlighted in recent years. Efforts have been made to address this imbalance, but recent statistics show that it is still much harder for female artists than male artists to succeed. Analysis of the 100 highest grossing auction performances of 2012 revealed a list completely free of women and far fewer women are given solo shows • Champagne Life marks the Saatchi Gallery’s 30th anniversary and pays tribute to its commitment to supporting the work of women artists early on in their careers All works can be viewed on the website www.saatchigallery.com under Current Exhibitions

4. Why the title Champagne Life? Champagne Life –the title of this exhibition- has been taken from one of the artworks on display, by artist Julia Wachtel Champagne Life, 2014, oil, lacquer ink and flashe on canvas Champagne Life suggests high living, prestige and affluence, qualities that have led to champagne’s appropriation into Hip-Hop culture as an indicator of success when artists transition from economically depressed ghetto to uptown highlife. Applied here to an exhibition bringing together the work of 14 emerging women artists, the irony of the title is palpable and throws into contrast the reality of many long, cold, lonely hours working in the studio with the perceived glamour of the art world.

5. The Artists Mequitta Ahuja Alice Anderson Marie Angeletti Jelena Bulajic Julia Dault Mia Feuer

6. Sigrid Holmwood Virgile Ittah Maha Malluh Suzanne McClelland Stephanie Quayle Seung Ah Paik Julia Wachtel Soheila Sokhanvari

7. Julia Wachtel[Gallery 1] Artwork in focus: Champagne Life • Examines two images from popular culture • Champagne Life is taken from a song title by RnB artist Ne-yo who sings: Where trouble is a bubble in a champagne glass , dreams and reality are one and the same  • One of the images is of Kim Kardashian and Kanye West inverted, two famous personalities that dominate the media • The other image is of Minnie Mouse, who has been hand painted twice • Kim & Kanye are supposedly ‘real’ people however, to most, their version of reality is a distant, extravagant existence • Minnie Mouse- a fictional cartoon character (here represented as a plastic toy) has been juxtaposed alongside • Julia Wachtel is comparing Minnie Mouse’s plastic emptiness to Kim & Kanye’s superficiality • Minnie Mouse also nods to a bygone era, perhaps a more innocent time: she is forgotten and used Born 1956 From New York, USA Screen print, oil and acrylic works Takes inspiration from contemporary popular culture and mass media ALL her images are taken directly from the Internet She aims to provide a temperature of today’s culture/society Inspired by Andy Warhol and the POP ART movement Part of a group of artists known as the PICTURES GENERATION Like Pop Artists, the Pictures Generation Artists re-appropriated images from popular culture While Pop Art was largely celebrating culture, the Pictures Generation used their work to critique society

8. Maha Malluh [Gallery 3] Artwork in focus: Food for Thought “Al-Mu’ allaqat 4” Composed of 233 aluminium cooking pots used traditionally throughout the Arab world The pots speak of a globalised ‘throw away’ culture They also represent an individual journey. Some are larger, some smaller, some burnt, some battered. They tell us something about the people who used them MahaMalluh is interested in the stories they have to tell, what have they heard? The title Al-Mu’allaqat links the installation to pre-Islamic 6th century Suspended Odes (or Hanging Poems) traditionally hung in Mecca . They are a group of seven long Arabic poems that are considered the best work of the pre-Islamic era. In those days poets were like news reporters that recorded history as it happened- they were honoured Like the pots, these hanging poems tell us about the people and culture at that time • Born in 1956 in Riyad, Saudi Arabia • Lives and Works in Riyad and London • Inspiration comes from her country, which she describes as “a land of contrasting images and ideas” • Her sculptures are assemblages of objects found in junk shops and flea markets • Their decrepit state speaks of the culture that once valued them but has now discarded them • Inhabitancy is an important theme in Malluh’s installations • “Good art forces you to pause, to contemplate and think harder about your surroundings”

9. Virgile Ittah [Gallery 4] • Born in Paris, France • Lives and works in London • Ittah now works with her partner under the name ITTAH YODA • Her work is often concerned with notions of life and death • She actively wants people to touch her artwork: she sees destruction as part of the life of an artwork and encourages people to interact with them. However the Gallery has a no-touching rule which does not permit this • She often destroys her artworks after an exhibition if it has not been bought • Her work also touches upon issues of identity. Ittah felt lost growing up with a mixed heritage, however now she sees it as a positive: she feels able to reinvent herself • Artwork in focus: Echoué au seuil de la raison • The two wax sculptures are in fact self-portraits • They are in limbo, between life and death- are they mid-descent or about to stand up? • The coldness of the steel bed frames contrasts with the organic material of wax, which the artist must heat in order to work with. It is warm like the human body, yet the result is one of coldness • The cast-iron bed frames are covered in peeling white paint, they are cold and institutionalised. This is not a coincidence, it symbolises Ittah’s personal understanding of her family’s history of mental health and the asylum • Ittah uses white wax because she would like it to appear as marble from a distance. Only as you approach it do you realise it is wax

10. Julia Dault [Gallery 6] • Born in 1977 in Canada • Lives and works in New York • Painter and sculptor • Physical negotiations with material and a bold relationship with colour are central to Dault’s practice • Her sculptures are SITE SPECIFIC • They are associated with minimalism yet speak of fantastical illusions that play with our sense of depth • She has labelled her art DIRTY MINIMALISM- industrial materials and lack of symbolism, yet she relishes the fingerprints, scratches and imperfections that are a result of her process Artwork in focus: Untitled 19, January 5th, 10:27am-1:13pm • Untitled 19 was installed at the Saatchi Gallery on January 5th 2016. It was installed by her Studio Assistant Simon Bird between 10:27am and 1:13pm, hence the title of the piece • All of her artworks are titled in this way- they are documented ‘events’ • She describes each sculpture as a ‘negotiation’ with materials. She uses industrial materials such as Plexiglas, Tambour and acrylic, which are difficult to bend and fold. Strings and knots keep the forms fixed together and to the wall • The end result is one of undulating abstract forms that appear ready to break open and fall apart at any moment • Dault’s sculptural materials recall a Minimalist aesthetic, while her process speaks to traditions of performance and live art • The sculptures document Dault’s bodily engagement with the material, each work is contingent with her strength and energy at the time. Signs of struggle are evident in scratches on the surface

11. Stephanie Quayle [Gallery 8] Artwork in focus: Two Cows • Life size cows made from air-drying clay • Their presence in the gallery brings about a sense of life and reanimates the connection between man and beast. They also speak of our dwindling relationship with nature, as technology advances and urban surroundings grow • “I’m interested in how much we align or distance ourselves from them – how they reflect, question and return our gaze. How they see into our souls and connect us to the natural world and force of nature inherent within.”- Stephanie Quayle • The process of sculpting each creature starts with the longer process of observational sketching in front of the animal itself. She then builds a steel and chicken wire frame, finally layering up with clay • She works very quickly with the clay before it starts to dry out. She also sees this quick way of working as the most direct and subconscious way to work, so that the clay becomes “inhabited” • Quayle’s sculptures marry man with nature, through the organic material of clay itself. Clay comes directly from the ground, and being as old as mankind itself, it has a primitive sense of earth Born in 1982, Isle of Man, UK Lives and works in Isle of Man Growing up on a farm influenced Quayle’ s artistic practice as she was fascinated by the relationship between man and beast (both domestic and wild) She sculpts using other natural materials such as ice, stones and twigs Her animal sculptures appear empowered, they are always gazing defiantly back at the viewer

12. Alice Anderson [Gallery 10] Artwork in focus: Bound • How do we remember objects? What is the relevance of a physical object in an increasingly digitalised society? By weaving objects in copper wire Anderson creates ‘recorded objects’. Anderson responds to the idea that our memories might become disembodied, live exclusively online and questions the ‘how’ and ‘what’ to remember • Her woven objects appear to be ‘mummified’ in accordance with ancient Egyptian traditions. They represent a fixed moment in time. These mummified objects are offering a vision of a changing world, an archaeology of the present • When Anderson binds, she enters a ‘Zen’ like concentration. • Bound was commissioned for the Freud Museum London in 2011 • It references a game Freud used to play with his young grandson to calm his anxiety. The game involved throwing a bobbin and bringing it back along the edge of his cot Born 1972, London, French-British Lives and works in London A sculptor and filmmaker, working primarily with copper wire She works with copper because of its ability to transfer energy and information. She binds objects that are important to her Anderson works both on small-scale objects such as cameras, laptops, skulls and reading glasses, and large scale objects, such as the bobbin and the sphere 181 Kilometres is how far she walked to bind the polystyrene ball in copper wire. It was spun by Alice herself and took 14 days to complete. The piece represents the physical activity involved in creating her works 181 kilometres, 2015

13. Themes: • The impact of technology on human life (Anderson, Holmwood, Quayle) • Popular Culture, Mass Media and the Internet (Angeletti, McClelland, Wachtel) • Nature Vs Manmade (Dault, Quayle) • Identity (Ahuja, Anderson, Bulajic, Ittah, Paik) • Found objects and the ready-made (Anderson, Malluh) • Critiquing ideas of beauty (Bulajic, Paik and Wachtel) • Use of historical sources/traditions (Ahuja, Holmwood, Malluh) • Life-size sculpture (Ittah, Feuer, Quayle, Sokhanvari) • Portraiture (Bulajic, Ittah, McClelland, Paik) • Preserving the present (Anderson) • Life and death (Bulajic, Ittah) • Political unrest/upheaval (Feuer, Sokhanvari) • Minimalism (Dault)

14. Gender means… Equality/inequality is… Symbolism is... Cultural identity is...

15. Artist websites • Virgile Ittah • www.ittahyoda.com • Maha Malluh • www.selmaferiani.com  (gallery) • Suzanne McLellandwww.suzannemcclelland.net • Seung Ah Paik • www.lubomirov-easton.com  (gallery) • Stephanie Quayle • www.stephaniequayle.co.uk • Soheila Sokhanvari • www.soheila-sokhanvari.com • Julia Wachtel Mequitta Ahuja www.mequittaahuja.com Alice Anderson www.alice-anderson.org Marie Angeletti marieangeletti.com Jelena Bulajic www.jelenabulajic.com Julia Dault juliadault.com Mia Feuer www.miafeuer.com Sigrid Holmwood www.sigridholmwood.co.uk juliawachtel.com