Hayward Gallery - London Visit

On the 17th November we went on a trip to London to visit 3 different Galleries Somerset House, The National Portrait Gallery and the Hayward Gallery. Each Gallery was completely different, with both the type of work and the was that it was exhibited. The Hayward Gallery contained two types of work, one half of the Gallery was by the artist George Condo, his work was in an animated style and was quite strange. The other piece of work in the Gallery was by Pipilotti Rist, this was very interesting in the ways that this work had been produced and shown. The National Portrait Gallery hels the Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize which consisted of different types of portraits by a number of artists, there was a range of varitey with each portrait and they were very interesting. And finally Somerset House exhibited '20 years of the dazed and confused' Magazine, this was really interesting and had a wide range of interesting Fashion Photography.

My favourite exhibition that we visited was the Pipilotti Rist in the Hayward Gallery, the exhibition consisted of sculptures, videos and other pieces of Artwork that showed her career from when it began in the 1980's to the present day. The exhibition is named ' Eyeball Massage'. The exhibition itself is very energetic, although has a calming and relaxed feeling to it, in the way it has soothing music and flowing movement within the videos exhibited.

Throughout the exhibition there were so many different videos and each one was shown in its own special way, especially ones that weren't shown too obviously on a big screen, some were placed in small holes in the floor so you really had to look into it, others were projected onto material that was suspended from the ceiling. My favourite part of the exhibition is the way in which she allows the audience to be incorporated within her work, as it allows a personal connection between the viewer and the work, the audience do not then feel rushed, they can walk around at their own pace. I feel that the atmosphere in the exhibition was very relaxed and calming, it took you into a world of peace and quietness. I think this was due to the soothing noises and ambient lighting, together with the soft flowing movement of the videos, none of the videos were showing aggressive or harsh movements. Combining this peaceful sound such as trees blowing in the light breeze made the exhibition more interesting as it made you feel you were personally in the videos.

http://ticketing.southbankcentre.co.uk/find/hayward-gallery-visual-arts

I really enjoyed this exhibition, I found the ways the videos were shown very interesting and unique. Even though they are not really photography related and more video, I still like the attitude that it portrays, I think it works better with video than it would have perhaps with photography, due to the fact that you are able to see the flowing movements. This is an exhibition I would definately visit again in the future and I think it is a technique definately keep in mind for the future.