Project Space, Rhys Coren: If We Can Dance Together

Rhys Coren

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If We Can Dance Together is a new commission by London-based artist Rhys Coren. In a multi-screen installation, individual hand-drawn animations loop independently of one another, as a soundtrack assembled by DJ duo Bahamian Moor plays out through wireless headphones. Choreographed to the beat, each animation is based on the 120bpm tempo of the soundtrack, setting an underlying rhythm to the installation.

The viewer is an essential mechanism to the work, linking the disparate animations and soundtrack. With the audio piece as backdrop to the imagery, patterns within patterns emerge, animations slip in and out of synchronicity with one another. Individually the animations dance, permanently attuned to the strict tempo set by the soundtrack, complex relationships form and fall apart, punctuated by moments of total lucidity. The work is a self-organising entity, consisting of individual perspectives and personal narratives, fused by the experience of a singular, emotive response to music. Ultimately the clarity established by the installation collapses as the headphones are removed, and the viewer returns to the café setting of the Project Space.

Project Space provides exhibition and development opportunities to emerging artists offering a small grant to develop new experimental work for exhibition in the unique environment of Café 171 at Jerwood Space, adjacent to the galleries. Since 2004 it has presented new work from artists including Luke McCreadie, Alice May Williams, Paul Schneider, Anna Bunting-Branch, Emma Charles, Alec Kronacker, Meg Mosley, Sara Nunes Fernandes, Johann Arens, Matthew Johnstone, Katie Schwab and Jamie George, Ben Senior, Ralph Dorey, Mindy Lee, Patrick Coyle, Gemma Anderson, Annabel Tilley, Alice Browne, and Holly Antrum.

Rhys Coren, If We Can Dance Together, 2014. Image: thisistomorrow.info