TOM LOVELACE
For Lovelace, the camera is the audience.
Tom Lovelace is a London based artist, working within the spaces between photography, performance and sculpture. Central themes to his research encompass the collaborative histories of photography and the role of minimalism within contemporary visual culture.
Residencies include London South Bank University (2019-2020), Yorkshire Sculpture Park (2017), Allegra Projects, Switzerland (2017), Lendi Projects, Switzerland (2015) and the Anna Mahler International Foundation, Italy (2012). Lovelace is a Tutor at the Royal College of Art.
greatest inspirations or influences?
In 2004, when I was still trying to understand what my practice was and how I could communicate ideas, I visited Art, Lies and Videotape, a group exhibition at Tate Liverpool. The display delved into histories of performance and live art, particularly in relation to photography and film as mediums which could blur fact and fiction. This encounter had a lasting effect. I began to think more intensely about the intersection of media in dynamic ways and the possibilities that lie in between things.
In terms of artistic figures, most of my influences are rooted in key 20th century artists; from Eva Hesse to Robert Mapplethorpe, Helena Almieda, Walker Evans, Yvonne Rainer, Alina Szapocznikow, Helen Chadwick and Mona Hatoum. In more recent times, Cathy Wilkes and Phillipe Perrano. Minimalism as a movement, as a set of ideas and as a complex language within visual culture continues to inform my practice, stretching from Malevich through to Agnes Martin and Dan Flavin.
As an artist you are known for mixing mediums, is there one that is particularly your favorite?
I intentionally seek out slippery areas and gaps that exist between the media of photography, performance and sculpture. This is where I have found unpredictable and compelling moments occur. However photography is the pivotal ingredient. Without photographic representation, then everything might fall apart. This applies directly to my practice, but also it is interesting if we think in wider terms of how the world would operate without photography and photographic history.
how do you see the art world moving forward from this current situation?
The pandemic that we find ourselves within has challenged everyone in every walk of life, whatever you do. This year has been a complete whirlwind, or tornado for the artworld. The pandemic has denied conventional access to culture - galleries, theatres, performances, bodies. This combined with the Black Lives Matter movement has resulted in every responsible creative having to reassess practice, structures and participation.
I hope physical spaces; galleries and museums can in some form return soon. I feel poorer for not being able to spontaneously pop into exhibitions and spend time with artwork. This is upsetting and I know this felt amongst my peers and my students. At the same time, it has presented possibilities of remote collaboration and there appears to be a return to a DIY approach of making and staging events and displays. This is exciting. Those who emerge from this will be in a strong position. I think art and artists have never been so important. It feels as though a spotlight is on the artworld in anticipation of what will evolve. I am currently working on a London group exhibition; Performing Dawns, which will open its doors on 1st January at Hoxton Gallery. Hopefully with vigour and optimism for the new year.
Is there a work you are most proud of and a most memorable response to your work?
I am most proud of my photogram work. As an artist, one needs to be excited about one's work. And these continue to keep me up at night. I think they offer wonderful possibilities and encounters for the audience, whilst significantly they contain emptiness and silence.
In terms of a memorable response, it would have to be my installation Sweep, from 2015. I initially displayed the work at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and then shortly after at the London Art Fair. I feared ridicule, but the opposite happened. Visitors appeared to be overwhelmed and spellbound by these humble, workaday objects.
Anything else about you or your work that you might like to share.
I am turning to nature, like never before. This is new to me as a subject. And has occurred during recent lockdowns and socially distanced living. I am working towards an exhibition in France next year, and the transformational and fluid qualities of nature are driving the work.
Also, I am one of four brothers. And three of us spend the best part of our lives behind the lens. My brothers Will and Ed are both film directors. We have not previously collaborated, but perhaps that needs to happen sooner rather than later!