Forthcoming Exhibitions                                

           

                  The Wondrous Collection of Encapsulated Time

at 

Salford Art Gallery and Museum

July 14th 2012 - November 4th 2012

 

 

                        For what's on now, see current exhibitions page

 

 

 

Cabinets of Curiosities and Wonder Rooms - Sue Platt's exhibition leaves a powerful and disturbing after-image.

Walking into this very unusual exhibition, the senses are overloaded. The sheer volume of wildly different items on display makes it hard to discern any sense of environmental order.

At the same time, we are invited into a world which is alternately familiar, traditional, scary and unknown. It is a disturbing experience but one which is well worth seeing through.

Anyone old enough to remember the wooden drawers and cabinets that secretively housed items required by those who shopped in gentlemens' outfitters or ladies' underwear shops will have a sense of recognition of the housing for many of these pieces. The contents are another story. Ranging from toys and dolls to religious artefacts, and from the playful to the macabre.

The juxtaposition of these items creates an unnatural and intriguing interaction and invites the viewer to create a story or reason. Comprised mainly of found objects, the resulting collections, framed with glass, are categorised as Cabinets of Curiosities and Wonder Rooms.

Mace, framed in wood and glass, is both menacing and highly decorative, calls to mind wealthy and ogreish, unelected rulers, past and present. In contrast, Shell Grotto with its construction of myriad sea creatures stirs a sense of childhood hiding places and a desire to be somewhere far away.

The artist, Sue Platt, is also a versatile printmaker with a huge variety of techniques to be found within her work: collagraphs and monoprints which look like drawing but are etched; lino cuts, drypoint, other etchings, drawings, rubbings and Japanese papers. Some objects are incorporated using a process called Chine Colle, making a three-dimensional work from a two-dimensional image.

Sue, formerly a teacher of art and design, but now concentrating on researching and exhibiting, also creates her own objects of myth and legend. As she says: "If I can't find a mermaid, then I will make one. My mermaid is quite small and is preserved in a glass jar. It is said to have been discovered at the bottom of thePacific ocean, in the Mariana Trench, the deepest in the world."

This is an exhilharating show that is hard to place in context. It conjures a sense of the unknown and of suspension in time. Above all, it makes a lasting if disturbing impression.

The Vitreum,          Merchant Taylors Girl's School,               Liverpool Road, Crosby  Until 15 December

                       Gayna Rose Madder                            04 December 2011       www.sevenstreets.com

                                                                           

 

Liverpool Daily Post   

 

 The Imaginarium of the Bizarre and the Mysterious

 

Cabinets of Curiosities inspire the imagination is Sue Platt's exhibition at   The Vitreum

Review by Laura Davies

 Objects, prints and books by Manchester based artist Sue Platt will go on display at Crosby's Vitreum Gallery from Friday.

Fascinated by the concept of collections and collecting, she creates wonder rooms and cabinets of curiosities which change and evolve depending on what is exhibited within.

She aims to trigger visitor's imaginations with a range of disparate objects and artefacts.

 Platt says: "I am fascinated by the notion of collecting and display. This has opened up a whole world of research to me and I am constantly on the lookout for curious objects and artefacts that reflect the kind of things that were collected in cabinets of curiosities from the 1600s onwards. As collectors were known to do in those times, if something comes along to be added to their collection, such as a mythical creature, they would turn a blind eye to the fact that a mermaid, for example, was in fact half monkey, half fish covered in tar to preserve it and proudly present it in their cabinets."

She has made her own mermaid, preserved in a glass jar.

The Saddleworth based artist has exhibited widely in theUKand has work in a number of private and corporate collections.

The exhibition runs from November 4^th. To December 15^th. In the Vitreum Gallery, based within Merchant Taylor's Girl's School.

A Universe in Miniature To coincide with The Incredible World of Small Things, Sue will be running a 1 day workshop at the Art House on Saturday the 15th January from 11 -5

• You can now see Victos XIV on the BBC History of the world website

 

          News from Buxton Fringe Festival     

•        Nominated for Best Exhibition 2009
  
•        Nominated for Best Individual Artist 2009

             Review of Theatre of the Unique at Buxton Art Gallery     

                    Artist Sue Platt, from Mossley in Manchester has an interesting eye. Her well crafted quirky collections and creations of found and made objects reveal both wit and intelligence, as well as curiosity and perhaps an interest in the mystical. Quite a few of the pieces include religious imagery from Buddhism, Christianity, Egyptology etc alongside scientific paraphernalia and slightly spooky masks and dolls. There is room to imbue the work with your own meaning, or none.Sue says that when she is assembling the pieces 'a theatre of unique associations is created with each new dialogue and relationship'.Alongside the cabinets of 3D work there are some textured prints and framed pieces. Of these Earth & Spirit and Imago stand out as strong works in their own right whilst the others seem somehow symbiotic with the 3D works.This is a participatory exhibition with a number of 'please open' doors and drawers. There is social comment, fun and a wry sense of adventure about it. Go along and view the world briefly through Sue Platt's eyes. 

Review by  Jean Ball

                             

• Attack of the Killer Book

Unsuspecting artist sits peacefully contemplating The Miraculous Emporium of Amazing Altered Books, completely oblivious to imminent attack of marauding flying book!

 

 

                                                                    Wilbur is 44 this year

• Sue is currently writing a book about the life of Victos XIV. A small sinister character currently residing in a glass and wooden cabinet in Sue's collection.

 

 

Installation of Cabinets of Curiosities,

Victos XIV takes centre stage at Stockport Art Gallery 2007