Rowan Smith

Current Review(s)

'If You Get Far Enough Away You’ll Be On Your Way Back Home'

Rowan Smith at Whatiftheworld/gallery

It took astronaut Neil Armstrong 109 hours, 24 minutes and 48 seconds to reach the threshold that differentiated ambition from outcome. We all know what he did next, or at least what he said the moment he stepped from Apollo 11’s lunar module: 'That’s one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind.' Less reported is the long pause that ensued, during which time Armstrong examined the disturbed soil around his left boot. 'Yes, the surface is fine and powdery,' he said, after planting his right boot down on the Sea of Tranquillity. 'I can kick it up loosely with my toe. It does adhere in fine layers, like powdered charcoal, to the sole and sides of my boots.'

Placed under a semi-circle of glass, Rowan Smith’s work 384,403 Kilometers (2009) presents what appears to be evidence of the 'fine, sandy particles' Armstrong observed during his epochal moonwalk. Raised off the gallery’s floor on a white plinth, Smith’s dark material entrances. 'Is it possible?' one wonders. After a curious investigation of the work’s label, however, it turns out the moon dust is fake. Unlike the stony meteorite on show nearby, real space debris retrieved from a meteor site near Tindouf in Algeria, a work drolly titled Things Fall Down, People Look Up (2009), Smith’s seductive lunar dirt is merely a simulant [sic]. Earth stuff disguised as moon stuff. It is a cunning sleight of hand on the artist’s part.

03 September 2009 - 26 September 2009

Listings(s)

'If You Get Far Enough Away You’ll Be On Your Way Back Home'

Rowan Smith at Whatiftheworld/gallery

Rowan Smith’s second solo exhibition at Whatiftheworld, 'If You Get Far Enough Away You’ll Be On Your Way Back Home', considers the effect that space flight and expansion has had, and continues to have, on the public imagination.

His work reminds us that it was not the close-up view of the surface of the moon that was the pivotal moment of space exploration, but rather the distant view of the earth, as small, whole and distant, that has left its mark on the human psyche.

Although almost entirely devoid of the expected iconography of space travel, Smith’s latest body of work offers us a view of what space travel has meant for humankind, articulating the gaps between past and a projected future, earth and the moon, then and now; the work also reminds us of everything we have had to leave behind as we venture onward towards a brave new world.

03 September 2009 - 26 September 2009

'IF YOU GET FAR ENOUGH AWAY YOU'LL BE ON YOUR WAY BACK HOME'

Rowan Smith at CO OP

Rowan Smith's solo exhibition breezes northwards after its debut at Whatiftheworld in Cape Town in September. The opening on November 11 features a specially-commissioned performance by Joao Orrechia. This exhibition also marks the Johannesburg launch of Smith's catalogue by the same name.

There will be an artist's walkabout of the show on November 14 at 11am.

11 November 2009 - 14 December 2009