CONFERENCE FOR CHRONONAUTS
Moray Art Centre is proud to hosts Edinburgh-based artist Robert Powell, in new surreal exhibition, with support from Moray based artist Gillian Neish, from 1st September - 1st October 2023.
SHOW STATEMENT
Come and explore the arcane and the speculative unearthed through printmaking and collage. There has only ever been one Conference for Chrononauts but some attendees have gone every year of their adult lives. They go to meet chrononauts who travel through time via their clothes, or who have attempted to record every utopia that has ever existed.
Chrononauts discuss buildings where time flows at different speeds through different rooms, they reflect on how quarantine can stick time still and they make plans to retire to Greyghar, the nursing home at the end of time.
Artist Robert Powell and philosopher Alasdair Richmond explore the ideas involved in Alasdair’s work with the philosophy of time travel. Conference for Chrononauts explores philosophical concepts and conundrums in a way that's accessible, engaging and beautiful to look at.
Science hasn’t yet come up with a way to travel through time, but the philosophy of time travel makes sure that all the intellectual problems have been thoroughly thought through for when it does.
ABOUT
Learn more about the artists
Edinburgh based artist Robert Powell employs an encyclopedic exploration of the philosophical concepts and conundrums of time-travel.
Previously he has constructed a suite of etchings showing the history of the world from the very beginning to the very end (in sixteen chapters), a search engine who only wants to talk about itself, and a cross-section sculpture of an entire city. Currently he is working on a large clock that doesn’t tell the time, but it will hopefully describe the nature of time. He has won various awards and his work has been shown extensively at home and abroad and is in many collections.
Gillian Neish has been living and working in Moray since 1998. Originally born and brought up in West Yorkshire, she journeyed North to Moray after completing her Fine Art Honours Degree with Leeds University.
She began teaching Printmaking and Drawing at Moray School of Art UHI in 2002, completing her Master’s in Fine Art at Greys School of Art, Aberdeen, in 2004. She has been teaching Creative Practice, Drawing, Printmaking and Spatial Practice at the University for over 20 years. Neish also facilitates writing circles online and in person following her time spent with Goldbergs teachings.
Her practice begins with a speculative process around a subject using drawing & writing. Printmaking, collage & bookmaking extend narratives, unearthing ideas and supporting herself and others to make sense of the world around them and the place they find themselves. Her collaborations are often interdisciplinary, working with scientists & medical practitioners to create installations & animations, and working with pensioners, students and children to realise creative art projects. Her artist books and works on paper have exhibited in group shows internationally. She has had solo exhibitions in Leeds, Wakefield, Devizes, Orkney and Moray.