posted 16 Dec 2020
Exhibitions
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Gallery: Jonathan Baldock: Facecrime
Jonathan Baldock, Facecrime Bluecoat 2020
We are delighted to welcome back Jonathan Baldock, Freelands Foundation artist in residence at Bluecoat January 2018, for his solo exhibition, Facecrime.
The main installation contains a landscape of ceramic columns inspired by cuneiform-inscribed tablets - an early system of writing - dating from 2500BC. Baldock’s version presents an alternative history of clay as a tool of communication; his ceramic columns feature expressive faces, emoji symbols and make audible groans, whistles and chuckles through concealed speakers. The columns are also adorned with weaving, basketry and glass drawn from different eras of labour, folklore and storytelling like an archeological find from a parallel universe.
The exhibition title itself is inspired by Orwell’s dystopian novel, 1984 - a facecrime being an “unconscious look of anxiety, a habit of muttering to yourself” suggesting that there was something to hide. Facecrime was commissioned by Camden Arts Centre through the Freelands Lomax Ceramics Fellowship.
Watch an interview with Baldock here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udRRcUGGgFM