Approved: 07.01.2010

Alexandra Blum

Approved: 07.01.2010

200 drawings chart the transformation of Dalston, London. The area's innards have been laid bare, dissected layer by layer. I have spent 3 years drawing the upheaval, from the street, within the vast Dalston Square construction site as artist in residence, and now from within one of the completed flats, a home on the 17th floor.
I live locally, but the arrival of 5 huge cranes signalled massive

Read more ...

  • Location: London
  • Artforms: Drawing
  • Tags: architecture & environment
 

Artist Statement

200 drawings chart the transformation of Dalston, London. The area's innards have been laid bare, dissected layer by layer. I have spent 3 years drawing the upheaval, from the street, within the vast Dalston Square construction site as artist in residence, and now from within one of the completed flats, a home on the 17th floor. I live locally, but the arrival of 5 huge cranes signalled massive change to a once familiar area. I wanted to explore this transformation taking place right on my doorstep. To explore not just the beginning and end points, but the process of change itself: the rawness, sensitivity to spatial experience and vitality of the transitory spaces which existed during the construction period. Navigating the building site to draw became a fantastically disorienting process: a previously accessible space suddenly blocked with impenetrable breeze block, doors 200 metres up opened out directly onto the city, scaffolding manifested new spaces, apparently from thin air, ladders scaled vast heights, a solitary figure could battle with the elements balanced on a precipice, then retreat into an increasingly contained space. An entirely new series of spaces began to materialise: the interior of the construction site running at a different time scale to the rest of the city, as if revealing a condensed version of the life cycle of spaces which evolves over a longer time span throughout the city as a whole. Now, drawing within a home (one of the completed flats on the 17th floor) time I spent within this very space during its raw building site phase, collides with its present state as a domestic, increasingly personal, space. Structural elements evident in both phases seem to have literally travelled through time, their current pristine veneer reiterating the fragility of domesticity, as if it is only possible to take fleeting ownership of a space made temporarily accessible and habitable, before it reverts, once again, to pure space. Time itself has become a structural force, visible both through the rapid transformation of space during the evolution of the building and within the surface of each drawing. Drawing on location has become a catalyst for my own observations and other peoples, and whilst drawing, I have recorded the interaction I've had with passersby and construction workers, along with new and existing residents. Extracts from these interactions create a parallel narrative: 8.4.09 - Boleyn Road: Blazing sun, in a side street, drawing the gap, once a row of independent high street shops and flats, now making way for the train line, in the interim revealing crumbling Georgian terraces and an expanse of pure space. After a few hours a lady with a bun comments that I'm still there, and marvels at how beautiful the development will be when it's finished, along with the new rose garden that will apparently cover the whole of the road we were standing in. She felt however, this would encourage hobos. Opposite us, she explained, the building used to be a hat factory, was now residential, but for people who paid neither rent nor council tax. This was to be demolished and transformed. 17.12.09 - on site, exterior space between block B and the library: 'You need thermals. If I'd the time I'd stand here with a board behind ya! I'm 70 next birthday, I've got bionic hips, a machine in here (taps his heart). Sometimes I feel alright, but other times...then I think maybe I'll retire. But then I go home and get nagged and change me mind. Ha ha!' 9.9.10 - 17th floor, The Collins' flat: Ben Collins: 'Before we moved in, a site manager noticed scratches on the window. Each one had to be replaced, each one carried down, it took three men an hour per sheet, they're incredibly heavy. Efficient though, it's really warm up here...Shall I leave my bag there? Will there be any foreground?' 27.1.11 - 18th floor - The Collins' flat: Looking south, from the bedroom window - sun streaming in, so that I'm in shirt sleeves despite sub zero temperatures outside - it's the in between spaces, the backs of buildings, the decaying plots between one enterprise and another, that are holding the city together, shaping its character and form.

CV & Education

Solo exhibitions 2011 - Archaeology of urban time: drawing Dalston, The Geffrye Museum, London 2009 - Phenomena of Change, Dalston Square, London 2005 - Alexandra Blum, Galerie Vendome, Paris 2005 - Mapping Paris, Espace Henri Gilbert, Paris 1999 - Juncture, Daiwa Anglo Japanese Foundation, London Group exhibitions 2012 - Hackney Cypriot Association, Adopt a Shop Intiative, Lead by Muf Architecture/Art, design by Imaginary Rock, London 2012 - Mapping the Change, Hackney Museum, London 2012 - Pastel Society Open, Mall Galleries, London 2012 - Threadneedle Prize Exhibition, Mall Galleries, London 2011 - Creekside Open, selected by Dexter Dalwood, APT Gallery, London 2011 - Local, Karin Janssen Project Space, London 2011 - RA summer exhibition, Royal Academy of Arts, London 2010 - Dalston Voices, Hackney Museum, London 2010 - Overground Uncovered, Life along the line, London Transport Museum, London 2009 - We Are Open, Centre for the Urban Built Environment, Manchester 2008 - David Gluck Memorial Bursary for Drawing, The Discerning Eye, (1st Prize Winner), Mall Galleries, London 2008 - Nouvelles Oeuvres, Galerie Vendome, Paris 2008 - Regeneration in London, Engaging with Communities, The Building Centre, London 2006 - Expositions du Cinquantenaire, Galerie Vendome, Paris 2004 - Living for the City, Blue Wing Gallery, London 2004 - The Discerning Eye, Mall Galleries, London 2004 - Triple Take, Embassy of Japan, London 2003 - Into the Wilderness, Stroud House Gallery, Stroud 2002 - Drawings for All, Gainsborough's House, Suffolk 2002 - Nexus, East 73rd Gallery, London 1998 - Cheltenham Open Drawing Exhibition, Cheltenham, Berlin, Hull 1998 - Two Artists Kyoto, TAK Building, Kyoto, Japan Artist talks 2012 - Spatial Perception and Visual Memory - Art Meets Robotics, Ideas Matter Sphere, London 2010 - Drawing Dalston, EDAW/AECOM Design & Planning , London 2010 - Drawing Dalston lecture and tutorials, University for Creative Arts, Maidstone 2010 - Phenomena of Change, City & Islington Sixth Form College, London 2010 - Phenomena of Change: Drawing Dalston, Hackney Museum, London 2006 - Visiting lecturer and drawing workshops, School of Architecture, University of East London Residencies 2008 - Construction Artist, Barratt Homes Construction site Dalston Square, London 1998 - Studio Residency Award, The Florence Trust, London Competitions, prizes and awards 2008 - David Gluck Memorial Bursary for Drawing, Mall Galleries, London 1996 - Monbusho Research Scholar in Painting, Kyoto City University of Arts, Japan 1995 - Hatton Prize, John Christie Prize, Sculpture Prize, University of Newcastle, Newcastle