The family house, the flag he carried rolled up under his arm at his father’s funeral, a girl who allowed him to unbutton precisely four buttons on her blouse: scraps of memories from his childhood form the basis of the bizarre magic art of Andro Wekua (Sochumi, Georgia, 1977). A portrait on the occasion of his solo presentation in De Hallen in Haarlem.
Charles Avery (Scotland, 1973) has been working since 2004 on his epic The Islanders, a description in text and images of life on an imaginary archipelago and of the characters who live there. This vast project, which probably will occupy Avery for the rest of his life, can perhaps best be described as a meditation on the making of art and the impossibility of discovering the truth. His work is now shown at the Athens and Lyon Biennal.
Like planets aligning, this summer the big art shows follow one after another: documenta 12, skulptur projekte münster 07, the Biennials of Venice, Istanbul, Athens and Lyon. At one time these big events were the quintessential curatorial experimental playground. But is this still true?
