Blog – Pauline Amos

IN PERSON BOOK

In Person: Collage Photograph Ink Blood Poetry: A Presentation of Concealed Moments

‘In Person’ is visceral, disturbing, and purposefully provocative. The words and imagery are laden with life narrative. The world as it is experienced, interpreted and recorded in collage, photographs, words, paint and menstrual blood. The poems and images are documents and records of an action and a time in life. Art as a conduit for a ‘something’ and adding a human experience. Art, as a ‘life force’ put into an order, structure, system, or form and then breaking the orderliness into orchestrated abstractions.

The ‘taking of’ a photograph, capturing a time in life. The performance and action of the one who holds the camera for the ‘taking of’. The performance of the figures within the scene, frozen in film. Captured for a split second, a face, a gesture, a view with a camera to recreate the moment and the presence of someone or something. Art has its own presence. Defining presence; the actuality of presence defines presence in the actual experience. Presence in a performance work, there are two possible extremes; the self as the instinctive and primitive animal with a presence that reacts with fight or flight and the passion of spontaneous and improvised responses. And there is the consciously considered and pragmatic self with instinctive and intuitive rehearsed and prepared interactions and actions. These two places are poles apart, and are on the same spectrum, held in equal importance. The raw, exciting, and passionate instinct interacts with the thoughtful, composed and formulaic. Between these two points of human and animal, focusing on the connection between these two states of being, a tension of the wild and unfettered beast pulling with and against the considered and rehearsed human in the performance. The energy or life force is regurgitated and reused in the performance, painting, photograph. The photograph depicts the wild and the tame. Photographs capture a split-second moment of life. The collaged photographs are embellished with poems and paintings giving the flat printed surface a depth of added emotion and passion.

“We value some artists for what they produce, and some artists for who they are. Pauline Amos commands both. Whatever she does, and in whatever form, is always fearless, emotionally exposed, direct and without so much as a glance to see what a critic, a funding body or a prize committee might be thinking. If real Art is work rather than works, then she’s a true Art-worker.”
Brian Morton, (Scottish) author and broadcaster.

BRANDED BOOK

Branded – the unabridged script.

Click here to buy. Paperback £15. Hardback £25.

BRANDED the unabridged script is in English, with the edited film script translated into Ukrainian and German.
Film stills from the film BRANDED. Drawings and paintings by Pauline Amos.
Essay and background about the script and the film.

BRANDED is the story of an artist called ‘She’ and her defiance, in the face of atrocity, to uphold Art and Freedom.

Set at some time, in the past, present or the future, in an unspecified country, ‘She’ is anonymous, without a presence in the world, the none-existence of a political prisoner. She dreams of her life as it used to be, laughing with her friends and painting in her studio. The sounds of conflict increase as the war comes closer. Knowing She will die, her concern is not for herself as She asks, is this the end of Art?

Horrifying in its depiction of the persecution of artists in repressive regimes, the struggle of being confined as a prisoner of war is contrasted with the beauty of Art, with a joyousness at its heart.

“The images are seared into my imagination; at times it looked like a renaissance masterpiece, beautifully evoked despite the grim story. A woman’s struggle to be free will always get my vote. A testament to art and survival.”
Mariella Frostrup, broadcaster, author, journalist.

“Provocative script and film and entirely relevant to today’s world. Outstanding.”
Tim Spicer, OBE.

“Branded Born Criminal is a powerful testament to the resilience of creativity in the face of oppression, reminding us of the freeing power of art.”
Hani Farsi, Corniche.

“Born Criminal is a Kafkaesque tone poem of startling, unnerving complexity. Beautifully shot but horrifying in its depiction of the persecution of artists in dictatorial nations, it signals a frightening future in which the present-day brutal repression of free minds by dictators becomes global. At times the film is unremittingly grim. Yet its 70-minute running-time seemed over before I had blinked an eye, its paradoxical beauty leaving me thirsty for more: notwithstanding its soul-wrenching subject matter, there is a joyousness at its heart – the joyousness of art. Written, acted, and directed by Pauline Amos, Born Criminal is a triumph.”
Chris Salewicz, author.

BRANDED – BORN CRIMINAL FILM TOUR 2024

BRANDED – BORN CRIMINAL UK FILM TOUR 2024

The upcoming film tour dates of Branded, in support of Ukraine, have been announced. Go to www.borncriminal.com for tickets and more information

26TH FEBRUARY 2024
TOTNES CINEMA

4TH MARCH 2024
PLYMOUTH ARTS CINEMA

6TH MARCH 2024
NEWLYN CINEMA

15TH MARCH 2024
OBAN PHOENIX CINEMA

18TH MARCH 2024
HIGHLANDS CINEMA

27TH MARCH 2024
FACT LIVERPOOL

18TH APRIL 2024
EDINBURGH CAMEO PICTUREHOUSE CINEMA

PRIVATE VIEW – KONFRONTIEREN :16 PAINTINGS: Herrick Gallery

KONFRONTIEREN

:16 PAINTINGS:

Herrick Gallery

26th November – 1st December

private view 27th November

‘NATURAL ORCHESTRATION’ Event

24-28th September

Main Event 27th September

PLEASE RSVP TO: [email protected]

https://paulineamos.co.uk

‘NATURAL ORCHESTRATION’

Pauline Amos painting performance – a durational exhibition in collaboration with The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment at Crossrail Place Roof Garden, Canary Wharf

24 -28 September 2018

[29 August, 2018] Internationally acclaimed artist Pauline Amos will create a unique multi-sensory experience of performance, painting and sound at Canary Wharf between Monday 24^th and Friday 28^th September. Working in collaboration with the renowned British period instrument orchestra, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, and Canary Wharf Group, the installation will be brought to life within the award winning Crossrail Place Roof Garden in the heart of the Canary Wharf estate.

Pauline Amos is a performance and painting artist, who has pioneered a unique style of work. Building on the thinking of artists Kandinsky and Schoenberg who famously extolled the harmony between painting and music in the last century, she curates her work with live performance and music to create a unique experience.

In Amos’ latest work, a collaboration with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment’s Baroque music, Amos reacts to nature, art and orchestration. The painting performance, titled ‘Natural Orchestration’, is Amos’ comment on the increasing disconnect and disrespect shown towards humanity, nature and the animal kingdom.

Amos will respond to the music and given circumstances of the venue over the course of four days. She will create a large scale masterpiece made up of four panels (3 meters by 9 meters in total). Working with a mixture of media, oil paint and charcoal, Amos paints with her hands and body. Each panel will be signed and sold with a video of the performance, with 50% of the proceeds donated to the Orchestraof the Age of Enlightenment Charity.

Amos comments, ‘The paintings are documents and a recording of an event, an action that happened – they are not the work; the action, the performance and the improvised, impulsive moment is the work, where life is.’

The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment will play a full repertoire of Baroque compositions from Bach to Handel and Corelli, offering Amos an accompaniment of passionate and dramatic musical arrangements, to which she will respond on canvas.

This performance follows on from Amos’ unique performance work ‘Pity The Meat’ created for Stolen Space gallery, London last year where she performed ‘live’ over 5 days, creating a 12 meter by 3 meter painting.

Canary Wharf visitors will be able to watch this unique live painting performance, set against a specially curated music composition by the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. Immersed in Amos’ distinctive performance style, the audience can watch the process and creation of the large scale masterpiece.

The durational performance at Crossrail Place Roof Gardens will begin on Monday 24^thSeptember with the Amos painting performance from 10am-6:30pm, building towards a closing event and performance with the Orchestra of Age of Enlightenment on Thursday 27^thSeptember. The finished art work will be available to view on Friday, 28^th September for one day only.

From 24 – 27 September Pauline will be performing live and on Friday 28^th the finished masterpiece will be available for visitors to view in Crossrail Place Roof Garden, Canary Wharf.

About Pauline Amos

British born artist Pauline Amos has a career spanning 28 years. As a multi-disciplinary artist her visual practice covers a wide spread spectrum including drawing, painting, performance, film, photography, sculpture, music composition and installation. She has pioneered a unique style of work, combining live painting performance and music, evolving the work of Kandinsky and Schoenberg, who extolled the harmony between art and music in the last century. Previously she has presented a ‘durational’ performance in Rome at the Opera Paese gallery, producing her renowned Opera Paese painting which was launched at her first exhibition in London in 2005 with a price tag of £1.3m. Born in Liverpool, Amos attended Liverpool art college, BA (Hons) Manchester, PhD Dartington College of Arts.

www.paulineamos.co.uk/biography/

About the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment

Three decades ago, a group of London musicians took a good look at that curious institution we call the Orchestra, and decided to start again from scratch. They began by throwing out the rulebook. Put a single conductor in charge? No way. Specialise in repertoire of a particular era? Too restricting. Perfect a work and then move on? Too lazy. The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment was born.

Since then, the OAE has shocked, changed and mesmerised the music world. Residencies at the Southbank Centre and Glyndebourne haven’t numbed its experimentalist bent. Record deals haven’t ironed out its quirks. Period-specific instruments have become just one element of its quest for authenticity.

Today the OAE is cherished more than ever. It still pushes for change, and still stands for excellence, diversity and exploration. More than thirty years on, there’s still no orchestra in the world quite like it.

©Andrew Mellor

www.oae.co.uk

@theoae

facebook.com/orchestraoftheageofenlightenment

About Canary Wharf Group

Canary Wharf Group plc has overseen the largest urban regeneration project ever undertaken in Europe, designing and building more than 16.5m sq ft of London real estate, which now houses local and international companies and renowned retailers.

The Canary Wharf estate is a major retail destination comprising around 1m sq ft across five shopping malls, including the award-winning leisure development, Crossrail Place, housing one of London’s most stunning roof gardens. It also has world-class, year-round arts and events programme offering over 200 diverse and culturally inspiring events performed throughout the Estate.

Canary Wharf’s new district, Wood Wharf, will provide up to 3,600 new homes, 2.8m sq ft of office space, 380,000 sq ft of retail space and over eight acres of public spaces, squares and parks. There will also be a GP surgery and a two-form primary school for 420 children.

Canary Wharf Group is a wholly owned joint venture between Brookfield Property Partners and the Qatar Investment Authority.

Website: www.canarywharf.com

Instagram: @canarywharflondon
Twitter @CanaryWharfGrp; @YourCanaryWharf;@Level39CW

Media Enquiries:

The Communication Group plc

Natalie Williams / Alicia Lowes

T: 020 7630 1411

E: [email protected]

‘Pity The Meat’ at Stolen Space Gallery London

In a unique work created for Stolen Space gallery London, the internationally acclaimed artist Pauline Amos will perform ‘live’ in the gallery over 5 days, and work on a new painting, 40 feet by 12 feet, as part of her new exhibition ‘Pity The Meat’ 15 – 24 August 2017.

Pauline Amos is a passionate and creative performance and painting artist, who has pioneered a unique style of work, combining it with live performance and music… developing the thinking of artists Kandinsky and Schoenberg who famously extolled the harmony between art and music in the last century.

This is the first time in 14 years Amos has presented a ‘durational’ performance in a gallery… the previous being in Rome at the Opera Paese gallery producing her renowned Opera Paese painting. Amos launched her first exhibition in London 2005, showing the Opera Paese painting with a price tag of £1.3m. Whilst being interviewed, Amos was asked how long the huge painting had taken to make. Amos replied ‘all my life’. After a brief calculation, basing her time on the average hourly wage in the UK, the £1.3m price came about, ‘The value of life is priceless and our time is given a price tag, an hourly rate’. The inflated price, seen as a comment on the commodification of art and the art market, provoked reactions from the press denouncing her vastly inflated prices.

The Amos performance is a multi-sensory experience of theatre, sound and painting. There are no rules, formula or rehearsal. The work is improvised, spontaneous and responding to the environment and circumstances. Amos builds a ‘stage’. The huge sheets of canvas with paint, charcoal and a sound system are in the gallery. A white space Amos fills with her presence, sound and the making of the work. With a unique style of ‘working in the moment’, she places herself within the painting and becomes part of it. ‘The art is the person – the life that is making the work. The paintings are documents and recordings of an event that happened. The performance, improvised and impulsive moment is the work’.

The music for the performance is that of Paz Caplin with whom Amos has collaborated since 1999.

Photo Credit: Barney Edwards

The exhibition will create a surrealist ‘graffiti ambiance’, with Amos’ bold works with street art aesthetic, combined with her ‘Carcass Canvasses’, large oil paintings hung from the ceiling on meat hooks.

In this way ‘Pity The Meat’ brings together two normally conflicting disciplines of the artistic world… an exciting juxtaposition between sophisticated fine art and street art graffiti.

Also presented for the first time at Stolen Space Gallery, in addition to Amos’ original work, will be her new limited edition screen prints, produced in conjunction with Jealous Gallery, and the first vinyl album by Amos and Caplin, also titled ‘Pity The Meat’. Amos comments ‘The music is a further demonstration of process. We turn up, set up and make work, no rehearsals, structures or formulas. Improvised and recorded as it happens, the sounds of guitars, synths and vocals create a moody theatre.’

The durational performance in the gallery will begin on 15 August and will build towards a closing event on 23 August.

‘Pity The Meat’ will be open to the public for 8 days from 15 August, 11am to 7pm with free entry. Stolen Space Gallery, 17 Osborn St, London E1 6TD.

For further information, please contact:

Natalie Williams
Main Telephone: +44 (0)20 7630 1411
E-mail: [email protected]

Pricing A Painting At £1.3m In 2005: The Art Of The Stunt

Artist, celebrity or star – is there a point in being a famous artist? Not unless you want to make money, and even that isn’t guaranteed. The art market is all about money, and increasingly about PR, cross-branding, and combining art in a cross-collaboration between artist and luxury branding.

Today, many works of art are mass produced in a factory where the artist is no longer involved in the process. The art market is a huge business, and much of the work the public can see is what they’re allowed to see. The high end of the cultural industry is organised by people with money and censored by market forces. Someone with wealth and connections, or a gallery that can afford a PR agency has to open the door for the working class, female, black, and transgender artists. Nowadays, work alone is not enough, and artists have to work hard and make use of the system that has developed and exploit it for what it is.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/pauline-amos/painting-art-gallery-pauline-amos_b_11605816.html

Pauline Amos at Hodsoll

An exciting opportunity to view the latest work of renowned artist Pauline Amos has popped up at Hodsoll on Portobello Road. Until 9 July, Amos will be previewing her new work The Human Beast.

Amos’ work combines representational and abstract elements with its sensual depiction of expressive, angst-ridden faces and distorted figurative gestures representing the fight and struggle for freedom, defying oppression or limitation in life or world politics. Her work has won critical acclaim for its bold brushwork on large canvases, conveying anger and despair through her clear and authentic mark-making.

Artists Pauline Amos goes underground in Paddington Green

Pauline Amos’s latest exhibition, PRODUCTION COSTS, goes underground at the Subway Gallery for a solo show that questions the costs of living and the value of life, writes Cassie Smith.

Pauline Amos is most well known for her performance art; for her first high-profile show My Flesh My Canvas, the artist used her body as a canvas, allowing the audience to paint on her. For Pauline, the act served as a commentary on how the world imposes itself upon us. She performed the piece throughout Europe and Asia, and has since become known for putting herself into the centre of her artwork and becoming a part of it.

She is also known for causing an ‘art scandal’ in 2005 when her painting, Opera Paese, the result of a 24 hour painting performance, went on sale in London at a well known private members club for £1.3 million. The price was a comment on the art and commodity market.

Read more: http://www.theresident.co.uk/london-culture-events/arts-music-london/artist-pauline-amos-underground-paddington-green/

Pauline Amos’s Profile on Saatchi Art

View Pauline Amos’s Profile on Saatchi Art. Find art for sale at great prices from artists including Paintings, Photography, Sculpture, and Prints by Top Emerging Artists like Pauline Amos.

Pauline Amos attended art college in Liverpool and Manchester and completed a PhD (2004) titled -: Self(ish) – Fusion Thinking and Practice @ Dartington College of Arts.