Tina O’Connell’s first London solo exhibition, a new body of work in a range of media that bridges sculpture, process painting and print.
Peckham Pothole is a simple cast from a South London roadside puddle. Caught, shimmering almost jewel like, within a modernist acrylic block, the negative impression is enigmatically beautiful and preserved for eternity. Tina O’Connell uses acrylic again in a series of giant translucent spheres, which simultaneously invert and reflect the void in which they are placed.
Over the previous five years, Tina O’Connell’s interest in the material traditions of sculpture increased and a large proportion of the exhibition is given over to her experiments with bitumen.
In the central gallery, she exhibits two formal modernist cubes which dissolve against each other, oozing across an immaculate white canvas to form equal arcing pools of black and cream. In another room, a row of colour swatch geometric forms were seen to collapse almost imperceptibly over time. Visually gorgeous, with a sheen like melting chocolate, these works address issues of time and deconstruction. Part sculpture, part process painting, part spectacle, the pieces question both our understanding of the object and our expectations of solid material form.
