S1 / projects is pleased to announce an exhibition of recent work by three London-based artists Thomas Bangsted, Bernd Behr and Mathew Gooding.
Thomas Bangsted’s large format, landscape photography considers technology and human intervention in the natural environment. His images locate moments of painterly composition or sculptural form in sites of absent labour. Materials in a builders’ yard are stacked against a red brick wall in plastic grids, abandoned machine parts appear to sprout from green turf, grain pours forth from huge sacks lying on the brow of a hill at dawn. For this exhibition Bangsted has developed a series of landscapes in agricultural settings: the vast mud-field of a busy organic pig farm, a red tractor reared on a lush hillside, a huddle of wrecked cars on a frosted ranch.
Bernd Behr’s work explores cycles of waste and exhaustion in the modern city. Video and photography are employed to document systems of circulation or regulation at work in contemporary architecture. In Hive, cars and trains travel across the screen through a dense network of concrete, an unbroken rhythm of journeys with no visible start or end. In Rorschach Manta black tarpaulin has been torn loose from the roof of an office block. The billowing material is mirrored in the glass on the side of the tower like a parasite lung breathing from the building.
Mathew Gooding’s work pays homage to everyday craftsmanship; floristry, sign-writing or mass-produced jewellery. Gold necklaces and rings from the Argos catalogue appear in a series of felt-tip drawings, a pattern from the side of a bus is abstracted in a wall painting. For this exhibition Gooding has developed new works in a series of sculptures based on the notion of an oasis or micro-landscape as ornamentation in public spaces such as shopping centres or airports. Ostentatious, floral arrangements made from wire, tape and cellophane and paper sit on huge diamonds clad with ceramic tile, carpet or laminate flooring, each casting a shadow made in the same scheme.
Thomas Bangsted graduated from the BA at Glasgow School of Art in 2004 and is currently studying at Goldsmiths College London. His work was selected for New Contemporaries 04.
Bernd Behr studied at San Jose State University and graduated from Goldsmiths College London in 2002. He was selected for Beck’s Futures in 2003 and more recently has exhibited at Triangle France, Marseille and Rachmaninoff’s London. Bernd lectures in photography at University of Gloucestershire.
Mathew Gooding studied at Norwich School of Art and Design and graduated from the MA at Goldsmiths College London in 2003. Mathew’s work has been shown recently at Jeffrey Charles Gallery London, forthcoming projects include YABADABADO! at Cell Project Space London later this year.