Cerith Wyn Evans

Hung through the centre of Gallery 1, this thirteen metre long text neon quotes from the French Situationist, Guy Debord’s book In Girum Imus Nocte Et Consumimur Igni: a Film.

Made in reverse and positioned to correspond with the line of the horizon on the English Channel, it is only properly legible reflected in the glass of the gallery’s windows. The simplicity and size of this installation, and the emphasis of its physical relationship to the outside world through the visceral sensation of natural light and heat, reinforces the ‘here and now’ for the viewer, whilst the text encourages one to travel beyond one’s immediate parameters and invites us to imagine ourselves in an alternative space and time, or method of thinking.

Also within Gallery 1, Untitled (Flute Piece Incarnation De La Warr Pavilion Bexhill), is constructed entirely from transparent materials - seven suspended glass flutes are attached to seven plastic tubes.

These hoses, feeding into the mouthpieces of the flutes, fill with air and extend as they blow a series of notes from each pipe. As the instrument plays itself, the transparent flutes move slightly and produce sound as a phenomena removed from the structure and connotations of musical composition. The abstract, enchanting ‘music’ that it makes, inhabits and articulates the physical space within Gallery 1. It explores the notion that the experience of architecture is both physical and temporal.

Utilizing the proportions of Gallery 2, Evans’ recent light/heat column installation S=U=P=E=R=S=T=R=U=C=T=U=R=E ('Trace me back to some loud, shallow, chill, underlying motive’s overspill…') references architecture.

The filament columns are reminiscent of obsolete industrial technology and light up and dim independently of one another, radiating intense light and heat, and pulsating in rhythms close to the movement of breathing. During the dimming part of the cycle the columns become transparent, and the internal workings and fragility of their construction become visible. This physical vulnerability tempers the almost aggressive, sensuous and aesthetic aspects of the piece.

On the Roof Terrace is the newly commissioned text firework construction quoting from Voodoo Child by Jimi Hendrix:

And if I don’t meet you no more in this world
Then I’ll, I’ll meet you in the next one
And don’t be late, don’t be late

Using juxtaposition and appropriation, Wyn Evans isolates a lyric from the context of one of the most enigmatic rock tracks of all time, and spells it out in firework flares. The text will momentarily blaze its heartbreakingly intimate message out to sea on the opening night of the exhibition, with the burnt remnants left as a semi-permanent relic of the ‘performance’. A piece that directly addresses the glitches and failures in transmission of meaning through language, it also embodies the transient nature of existence, of desire, and of longing.