"Fellow Artists Fellow Muses" by Agnes Poitevin-Navarre at King's College Cambridge

"Maps have the capacity to open worlds of reality and imagination" wrote Professor Jeremy Black in 'Remarkable Maps -- How Cartography Defined, Changed and Stole the World'. The art practice of Agnès Poitevin-Navarre epitomizes that idea. The exhibition at King's College Arts Centre is a wonderful platform to explore and engage with this conceptual artist's past and new body of work.

'The Art of Being Anecdotal' could be the subtitle of this exhibition that includes the 'Colour Coding' series, a speculative variation on mixed race terminology [In French, a mixed race person is sometime described as 'café au lait'], 'The Reader' [photograph/photogram] and the magnificent 'Fellow Artists, Fellow Muses' installation that was shown last year at the Royal Geographical Society in London. That geo-biographical piece is a celebration of the career of eight fellow women artists [Agnès Poitevin-Navarre, Susan Stockwell, Nina Torp, Gayle Kwon Chang, Yara El Sherbini, Nicholette Goff, Rita Keegan, Cleo Broda]. The location of their shows is recorded as latitude and longitude coordinates and a keepsafe of their presence on this planet is embodied in the hair lock used instead of the bristle of a paintbrush.

This solo show also features new work such as 'Le Fil D'Ariane [Cambridge]', the artist hair embroidered floorplan of King's College Cambridge as well as the newly commissioned 'Proustian Map of Cambridge', a collaboration with Cantabrigians that elaborates on the locals' greatest achievements and pearls of wisdom.

By methodically recording on two maps the replies from the questions related to important life lessons and greatest accomplishments, the artist categorises Cambridge beyond geographical expectations. It is a polyvocal historical document of a sampled group and their life vision. She subverts the tradition of mapmaking by focusing on the experience of people rather than the landmarks.

Agnès Poitevin-Navarre is a conceptual artist interested in the limits of categorizations and semantics. She graduated with an MA from the Slade, UCL, in 1997 and has since been exhibiting locally, nationally and internationally. She works across a range of media but is known primarily for her cartographic and anecdotal work. She uses maps as a shorthand to explore notions of identity, nationality and social codes.

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Travel & Events

Tags:

• fellow artists fellow muses
• art exhibition
• King's College Cambridge
• agnes poitevin-navarre
• hair embroidery
• sculpture
• motherland
• must-see exhibition
• The Cliques
• The Reader
• Land of Achievement
• Land of Wisdom
• Proustian Map

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Below is the review by local art critic Jessica Cherry that appeared in the Varsity magazine, 25th November 2011...

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Jessica Cherry heads to the King's College Cambridge Art Centre to see the thought-provoking and mind-stimulating work of Agnes Poitevin-Navarre

by Jessica Cherry

Friday 25th November 2011, 13:00 GMT

Agnes Poitevin-Navarre is not an artist who paints pretty pictures. She creates thought-provoking and mind-stimulating pieces that can at times render the viewer uncomfortable. The intimacy of the King’s Art Room adds to the sense that everyone can read your inspired thoughts.

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Poitevin-Navarre is experimental with her ideas, and it is this daring that has enabled her to exhibit at the Royal Geographical Society. For this current exhibition, she needed the help of students and inhabitants of Cambridge and the surrounding villages to fill in a “Proustian Questionnaire”, revealing what their greatest achievement was, and what life has taught them.

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Using these answers, she created a map that interestingly shows great differences in outlook between those who live in the centre, and those who live further away. There seems to be a great age-divide, and what can be unsettling is that many of us in the same post-code area have the same thoughts. We may not be as individual as we imagine.

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This individuality is further explored in two “Colour Coding” prints that depict heritage and culture, shown through the differences in skin and hair tones. The artist’s website says “The work of Agnes-Poitevin-Navarre plays with the concept of self and how it is defined through racial/cultural categorisation. In her art practice, she challenges perceptions of cultural, linguistic and racial metissage.”

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This idea stems from Agnes’ French culture, where a person of mixed heritage is referred to as “café au lait”. In reaction to this, she playfully depicts how people could be labelled in the future, with other allusions to food and drink, whether this be caramel or vanilla. It is a topic that can be hard to deal with tastefully, but Poitevin-Navarre succeeds.

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Diversity is also shown in the range of mediums she uses – hair, wood, photocopies, and computer images. Hair is fascinating as she uses it to sew a floor plan of King’s College, reminding us that we become woven into the fabric of Cambridge, just as much as Cambridge will always be a part of us. We can see our physical selves embedded in the architecture, forever a small part of history.

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Who we are now and who we may become in the future is a frightening prospect that we are forced to consider whilst witnessing, and to a great extent, taking part in Poitevin-Navarre’s work. If you want to challenge your mind and consider your heritage, then this exhibition is at King’s College, until Saturday 26th November, free entry.

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Well there is an authentic rustic let's-wander-and-have-a-look at this great exhibition, or even better, let's get on the train to see it in the flesh. Show is on until 26th November. Offer for a touring exhibition welcome!!! ax

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The production values are extremely high...