Radical Residency

Unit 1 Gallery l Workshop is thrilled to present the result of the Radical Residency, a four-week residency with artists Javier Torras Casas, Yu Ting Ong, Evy Jokhova, Eugene Macki, Paula Baader, Nemo Nonnenmacher, Ant Hamlyn, Julia Court and Diane Chappalley. In the last month, the ten artists have challenged themselves and each others to produce new works. We are delighted to present this first exhibition that displays new paintings, drawings, sculptures and installations.

Javier Torras Casas
The development of mind and brain in relation to our senses is of central importance to human evolution. In his research Javier explores the cognitive and communicative qualities of our bodies and their importance to this. The high degree of neural attention that converges into our hands points to the significance they have in this process. His artworks show a material bond between human bodies and earthy matter. Bronze and clay suggest the continuous biological changes produced in nature as well as the development of human cognitive capacities through the use of hands. The study of the materiality of objects and their connections to the human body has a double aim, to see on the one hand how the habitat shaped individuals, and on the other hand how human interaction with the world triggered the remarkable evolution of their kind.

Yu Ting Ong
Yu works across different mediums such as painting, drawing, video, new media, where geometry and the abstract language of paint are consistent motifs. Those are the ground upon which she explores the correlations and contrasts between the medium and materiality of paint and digital constructions. Her practice contemplates the condition of “flatness” in today’s digital age along with how energy and forms become more fluid and behave differently in the less defined boundaries, spaces and dimensions we are inhabiting in. Yu’s work is a constant re-examination of the spaces in-between; the dichotomies of painting as a value-laden indexical sign, where every brush mark leaves as trace of the artist, which contrasts to the general pervasiveness of digital content sharing in various social, technological and creative dimensions today.

Evy Jokhova
Evy is multi-disciplinary artist whose practice is rooted in the dialogue between social anthropology, architecture, philosophy and art. Working with sculpture, installation, drawing, film, performance and painting on a project-by-project basis, she investigates the creation of social systems, invention of tradition, and how social behaviour can be altered through architectural construction. Engaging with the everyday as well as possible and impossible futures as imagined by architects, city planners, historians and politicians, Evy surveys the disparity between plan and reality using a paired down aesthetic of a muted palette, creating sculptures and performances with a strong focus on materiality, inserting objects into landscape and architectural space and creating large scale multi-media installations.

Eugene Macki
Eugene is a multi-disciplinary artist interested in the idea of making as a developmental process, and a meditative action. He explores the structural relationships through sculpture, drawing, painting, and performance.

Diane Chappalley
It is from sensory experiences; the synthesis and stimulation of new and past perceptions that the painting arises. Diane’s practice is a constant search in the making. A search guided to reach a sense of known, but one that is not quite possible to pin down. She creates landscapes where meaning lies beneath the surface, foregrounding emotion, while perception is disrupted. They are an exploration of the world, made with an impulse of diaristic introspection and intimacy.