David Helmers

06 December - 02 January 2021     Thin Skinned

Link to artist's website

David Helmers is a thinker. He is a philosopher and an academic whose enquiry examines the nature of our experience of objects. Some of which are art-objects and some of those are the objects that he makes. They are simultaneously rigid and diaphanous, made from porcelain fused with a synthetic material and so light that they seem to be floating up from the floor into the space of SLOT.

The idea that connects David’s philosophy to his art is “New Materialism”. This he explains is the appreciation of an object’s intrinsic qualities as opposed to those imposed by the social associations it provokes. He illustrated the idea by considering an Yves Saint Laurent spots coat, you might appreciate it because of its fine tailoring or the entry to a particular social set that it entitles.

In art history this dichotomy was reflected in the high modernism of the mid 20th century when art abandoned ideas of illusion and symbology in favour of fact. The experience of these factual art objects was restricted to an experience of their physical properties. For example, 5 square meters of canvas painted blue hung on a wall invites a physical experience. BUT most importantly I think, that physical experience is more or less the same if the piece of canvas is considered art or not art. In this way art expands our appreciation of the physical world and leads to a deeper understand of it.

Since then the nature of art has changed. The need for narrative has injected a sense of meaning-full-ness into an understanding of visual art objects. In various ways we expect to be able to read them, which I think throws up the dichotomy that David is considering. Perceptively so, as we enter a post-Covid19 world where the comparative experience of both the physical realm and the mediated realm has been starkly and broadly examined. Underlining I think, the mission of SOT – to bring a tangible art experience to the street. To offer an art such as David’s that has not been mediated.

Tony Twigg