Though Leung’s works are highly attentive to their physical surroundings, she conceives of them not as site-specific but “context-contingent,” capable of being realized again and again in different places, but each time conditioned by institutional circumstances that would determine their form. Likewise, they accrue new layers of meaning as they circulate through different situations. When Violets 2 was originally exhibited at Netwerk Aalst, for instance, it was installed on the floor of the gallery space one story above the bar from which the pipes had been removed, mirroring their former placement, only this time as a waste product instead of a conduit for its elimination, as if the building were spilling its guts. Subsequent presentations, however, must contend with the challenges of one set of architectural footprints descending on another, with the reconfigured pipes now foregrounding the spatial eccentricities of their new containers. Meanwhile, Shrooms is particularly effective in group exhibitions, where it acts as a kind of fungal encroachment on the works of other artists, subtly influencing their placement.
When art needs an essay to be understood By Robert Nelson Save Normal text size ACCA until 15 March Thereâs an ingenious drawing machine at ACCA. On a raised platform, an armature pulls at 100 strings in a linear backward and forward motion. The strings run up the wall, fly across the space and tug at pieces of charcoal moored to the opposite wall. Tracing inscriptions 2020, installation view Credit:ACCA / Robert Andrew / Andrew Curtis The resulting drawings resonate with one another in analogous actions. The spectacle is engaging, as you try to work out the engineering: how do the strings coordinate the curved gestures on the wall? On a symbolic level, the work is tantalising. Itâs like an allegory in which divine will is perfectly organised and controlled by a matrix, but perfect compliance does not eliminate chance and chaos.