The Poem is a Temple

Sep 11 — Nov 27, 2021
Field:

Exhibition

 Location:

Gallery, Western Front

Description:

The Poem is a Temple was a solo exhibition by Sriwhana Spong that brought together two works: a sculpture that is part of an ongoing series of instruments based on the Balinese gamelan, and a single-channel film shot in and around the artist’s ancestral home in Bali, Indonesia.

The painter-tailor (2019) constructs a family portrait from 16mm film and HD video footage collected by the artist, her relatives, and the family dog. The hook to which the film repeatedly returns is an untitled painting by Spong’s grandfather, the Sanur artist I Gusti Made Rundu (1918–93). This painting, the intimate surroundings of the family compound, and her father’s memories weave a net in which fragments relating to the effects of colonization, invasion, and tourism on image-making in Bali gather.

Presented alongside the film was Instrument H (Monster Chicken) (2021), a sculpture made from approximately fifty bronze casts of chicken bones and twigs collected on Spong’s daily walk between her house and studio in London, England during lockdown, which passes two 24-hour fried chicken shops. The work, with its bones sucked clean and discarded by humans and foxes, charts a strange  intimacy between city dwellers, while reflecting on human-animal interactions and their ecological impact and evoking the ancient cultural practice of osteomancy, a form of divination performed by throwing bones. Each day at 2:30 p.m. over the duration of the exhibition, the sculpture was activated as an instrument, and moved through the space and surrounding neighbourhood before being placed in a new arrangement for possible future-telling.

The sculpture is part of an ongoing project commenced by Spong in 2015, and for which she is creating a personal ensemble inspired by the Balinese gamelan—a unique orchestra of mostly percussive instruments whose precise tuning traditionally varies between gamelan—creating what the ethnomusicologist Andrew Clay McGraw describes as a community’s “aural watermark.” Compelled by the notion of a place and its community having its own unique sound, each of her instruments is named after a friend or collaborator. 

Curated by Susan Gibb.

List of included artworks:

1. Sriwhana Spong, Instrument H (Monster Chicken) (2021). Bronze, nylon cable ties. Dimensions variable.

2. Sriwhana Spong, The painter-tailor (2019). 16mm transferred to HD, HD video, 32 min. 10 sec.

Documents:

An image depicting three people, a large framed painting, and three dogs is projected in a dark room. The figures within the image stand inside an open structure supported by wooden columns and roofing atop a white tiled floor. Nearby buildings and flora are visible beyond the columns.
A cool toned doorway frames a warm, spotlit room with a wooden floor. A snaking chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs rests on the floor under the spotlight.
A closeup image of a Balinese painting is projected in a dark room. The image features illustrated figures adorned with traditional garments of red, blue and gold. To the side of the projection, two doorways reveal another section of the gallery space and the Western Front foyer.
A person dressed in all black bends down to grab the tail end of a chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs lying on the wooden floor.
A person dressed in all black stands underneath a spotlight with both arms outstretched holding the middle section of a chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs. They hold the chain with enough tension to keep it taut between both fists. The chain hangs freely from outside their fists and drapes down onto the floor where both its tails curl into piles.
A person dressed in all black stands underneath a spotlight with both arms outstretched holding the middle section of a chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs. The person’s gaze is fixed towards the tail ends of the chain that loosely hit the floor. The gesture appears as though the person is dragging the ends of the chain against the wooden floor.
A person dressed in all black faces a doorway leading to the Western Front foyer. Leaving the gallery space, they hold a chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs that drags across the floor.
Two feet climb carpeted wooden stairs. Two chains of bronze chicken bones and twigs attached via plastic zip ties drag across the carpet on either side of the feet.
A person dressed in all black climbs the staircase between the ground floor and second storey at Western Front. They carry a chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs in front of them with its tail ends dragging across the floor.
A person dressed in all black holds a chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs in front of them below their waist. They hold the chain with a loose tension, letting it sag between both fists. The chain hangs freely from outside their fists and drapes down onto the floor of Western Fronts second storey foyer.
A person bends down under a spotlight, reaching their arms towards a chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs resting on the wooden floor. The chain snakes into a shape resembling the letter M underneath the persons spotlit shadow.
A chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs rests on a wooden floor in a shape resembling the letter M. A person stands beneath the central point of the M, casting a round shadow behind them.
In the middle of a darkened gallery, a spotlight shines upon a chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs resting haphazardly on the wooden floor. A doorway centred in one of the gallery walls reveals another darker space.
Tightly framed by a wooden doorway, a darkened gallery spotlights a chain resting on the wooden floor. A room engulfed in shadow is visible beyond another doorway. In this darkened room, only a thin band of light can be seen shining underneath a door sill.
A chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs organically spirals upon the surface of a wooden floor.
A chain of bronze chicken bones and twigs rests upon the surface of a wooden floor. Each bronze piece is connected at its joint by white plastic zip ties.

Related People

Captions:

Western Front is a non-profit artist-run centre in Vancouver.

We acknowledge the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations as traditional owners of the land upon which Western Front stands.

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