|
Rant!Magazine Rachel Cattle & Steve Richards 'Same Old Scene' Transition Gallery, London Few galleries or spaces have consistently shown work of such a vast range of stellar emerging and established artists like Transition Gallery. So prop's to Cathy Lomax who set up the space a few years ago. Her passion for discovering un-earthed talent and obvious eye for sourcing great art, has seen an unrivaled wealth of genuine and exciting exhibitions coming out of East London these past few years and ahead of tomorrow's private view of Rachel Cattle and Steve Richards 'Same Old Scene' at the pace, Rant asked Cathy Lomax to give us a preview of tomorrow's show. Rachel Cattle's work is charged with an anxious emotion. Large areas of her drawings are filled in, colouring book style, with school regulation lead pencil. These heavily penciled surfaces dominate her spare monochrome drawings, which often come together to make comic books such as 'The Darkness'. Her cited influences are horror and folklore, more specifically classic horror films, Dr Who, The Addams family and tales of mythologized creatures such as yetis and werewolves and her work she says is founded in fear and anxiety; "from the dark and unspeakable creatures that live under the bed to the witches that live out in the forest." Her latest work is an animated film called Same Old Scene made in collaboration with Steve Richards which focuses on remembered moments from favourite films, gathering them all together to create a new story (which as Cattle says is less of a narrative and more of a mood). Steve Richards says that "at different times, we remember things slightly differently...and when you discuss it, they all merge into one scene that wasn't actually there..." "Especially when you remember film" adds Rachel, "like the ballroom scene in 'Last Tango in Paris'...the poignant bit at the end in the ballroom...and in my head they were on their own and it was pitch black, just the two of them...but when we looked at it again, that scene is crowded with people and furniture...we each pick out the bits that are important to us and edit out the rest..." Same Old Scene is a completely charming film filled with Cattle's wobbly hand drawn animations and paper models operated by an intervening hand (such as a paper record player which plays a paper version of Roxy Music's 'Same Old Scene') and is accompanied by a collectable Same Old Scene comic book. Cattle and Richards deliberately opt for their low-fi aesthetic as they firmly believe that slick over production can "fuck things up". Richards say that "I've always liked things where mistakes are left in and where you can see or hear the processes that are going on within it...like Elvis's early Sun recordings where it was very instant...it was rehearsed but changes were made on the hoof and if something came out accidentally, they could go in that direction...the production process was intentional to emphasize that...it was about the joy of making it..." And this certainly holds true for Same Old Scene. Same Old Scene will be premiering at Transition Gallery, London where there will also be a selection of Rachel's drawings and some of her comic books on show (and for sale) from Thursday 6 Oct until Sunday 7 Oct. Opening hours are Friday to Sunday 12-6pm. -Cathy Lomax Transition Gallery Unit 25a Regent Studios, 8 Andrews Road, London E8 4QN 020 7254 4202 / 07941 208566 |