Flash Forward Pick- Numero 3

Peter Ainsworth, Trying to Photograph a Ball so that it is at the Centre of a Picture, after John Baldessari, 1972-73, 2007

Peter Ainsworth was also included in the Paper, Rock, Scissors show at FF. After a quick google search to find out more about him, I learned that he was shortlisted for the Converse/Dazed (as in Digital) 2010 Emerging Artist award. He was interviewed for the site, and was nothing short of eloquent with each answer and actually rather bohemian- for instance, in response to a question about his family, Ainsworth said: My dad was an exhibition designer and has a fantastically light and fluid drawing style, so I have been aware of the production of art since a very early age. My mum is very scholarly and interested in a wide range of subjects. She taught me how to engage with a conceptual appreciation of art. My elder brother works as a project manager for exhibition installations and my sister is a fantastic puppeteer!

FF exhibited the photographs from his 'Art Handling Re-creations:' a clever series with art historical references. Sometimes, despite whether it should or shouldn't be done (an argument over the lack of critical discourse in photography is for another post), I like to insert photography into the art historical canon. Here, Ainsworth chose various (male) modernist, minimalist and conceptual artists as a starting point for his work. Each photograph is named after these referents. In doing so, I'm reminded of Griselda Pollock's article titled 'Avant-Garde Gambits,' that divides the avant-garde into a point of reference, deference and difference (she was into the Manet/Gaugin- 'Olympia'/'Spirit of the Dead' comparison). Ainsworth's series, while maybe not necessarily typically avant-garde, is nicely framed by Pollock's terms.

The ode to Baldessari is so subtle, but one of my favourites (the first image). While I don't know much about Baldessari, I do like that his work is often underscored by mathematical/scientific processes. In '72, the white-haired artist repeatedly threw a ball in the air in an attempt to perfectly record it at the centre of a film frame. You can read somebody who's wayyy more well-versed on the wonderful Baldaessari here.




Peter Ainsworth, Equivalence VII After Carl Andre, 1966, 2007 (above) and Carl Andre, Equivalent VIII, 1966 (below)