G39, Mill Lane, Cardiff
Fri 4 Feb-Sat 12 March
words: BETHAN HOCKEY
The final instalment of the Show One of Each season at Cardiff’s g39 gallery, presents new work from artist Maia Conran. Fresh from graduating with a Masters in Fine Art from the University West of England in Bristol, the Bangor-born artist is wasting no time in making her mark on the art scene in Wales, boasting a variety of ackolades, including the Good Ideas Award from Public Art Wales.
Her latest exhibition is made up of installations that explore familiar situations and objects from unusual perspectives. Influenced by her experience of popular cinema and fiction, Conran’s work is dark and minimalist; lightened with the odd touch of humour, and often including references to iconic film moments. The film works for this show deal with spaces that are disconcertingly empty of inhabitants. The libraries and classrooms are bare, the books unread, the seats unoccupied. This creates a sense of familiarity, which is emphasised by an aesthetic concerned with the concept of space.
On describing her latest work, Maia says: “There is a darkly humorous Beckettian quality to my concern with boredom as a paradoxical state in which we wish for a desire. This is explored in recent pieces through the depiction of still moments, use of repetition and changes of pace. I’m interested in creating a forced hiatus – a resistance to the speed and banality of daily life.”
Since 2006, g39’s Show One of Each series of solo exhibitions have aimed to raise the profile of some of the artists g39 considers to be the most innovative and relevant in Wales. Previous exhibitions have featured some of Wales’s most eminent emerging artists, including Bermingham and Robinson, Mike Murray and Simon Holly.
Admission: free. Info: 029 2025 5541 / www.g39.org