The Whitechapel Gallery will present a new commission by London-based artist Andrew Pierre Hart, which will go on display from the 15th February until the 7th July.
Copyright © 2024 Whitechapel Gallery, All rights reserved.
From February, visitors to the Whitechapel Gallery will present a new commission by visual artist and an electronic-music producer Andrew Pierre Hart who explores relationships between sound and painting.
In his work, Hart uses musical techniques such as improvisation, spontaneity and ‘deep listening’ as part of a practice which also encompasses sculpture, mural-making, installation, performance, film and text. For this latest commission, the artist has created an ambient environment that features a site-specific mural, a series of six new oil paintings, a bamboo sculpture, a new sound composition and a film shot in the streets around the Whitechapel Gallery area.
The sound piece is played through a speaker system embedded into a seating area so that the bass line can be both heard and felt physically through vibration, offering what Hart describes as ‘binaural and body-responsive sound and atmospherics’. Meanwhile, this composition forms the soundtrack to the new film titled Free Writers, in which three dancers are shown moving through the spaces of the gallery as well as the streets and bustling market stalls of the nearby Brick Lane and Whitechapel High Street. Images captured in the film make reference to Whitechapel’s longstanding history as a home for migrant and diasporic communities and conveys what the artist describes as ‘the “sites” and sounds of the area: a compound of myriad histories and contemporary life’.
This theme then continues as he then evokes his experiences of the local area in the six new oil-on-canvas paintings.
Talking about the commission he said: “Whitechapel has long been a multi-cultured and multi-religious area… I am interested in all kinds of empowering stories of people’s struggles and standing for their positions against racism. When we walk along these streets today, we also walk past those histories.”
The exhibition will also include three live events, during which the space will be brought to life with dance, electronic music, discussion, screenings and performance.
To find out more visit: https://www.whitechapelgallery.org/exhibitions/andrew-pierre-hart/