Anne Hardy: ‘Survival Spell’
Like a weed growing through a crack in concrete, Anne Hardy is finding ways to survive in this hard, inhospitable world. The British artist’s latest show is based on time spent on a residency in the Texan desert, where the weather-worn detritus of humanity litters the rubble and sand. The gallery is filled with rust and dirt. Wires reach skywards out of foraged scrap metal discs like improvised discarded flowers. Wood, rope and screws lie on a bed of earth. A whorl of rusted cables emerges from a pair of blue jeans, hands made of rocks are splayed in prayer before a lightbulb, its brightness controlled by the weather in Texas. Hardy is treading a fine line between trash and art, crap and concept, but just about pulls it off. You just want more of it, to be enveloped in the environment a bit more, it’s a bit too slight and minimal. But you still get a sense of post-apocalyptic sculpturalism out of it, of art made for heat-soaked dystopias, an exhibition of Mad Max-ian survival in a world that’s falling apart. Hardy describes these sculptures as spells, alchemical potions for this broken society. It might all be crumbling, but there’s still hope, still a weed growing out of the concrete, if you can reach through the cracks.