Jonathan Jones 

Ceal Floyer

Lisson Gallery, London
  
  


It must have taken considerable ingenuity and patience to produce Ceal Floyer's Ongoing Projection, in which a DVD projector faces a white corner and beams a glowing image of a blank, ring-bound notebook, its spine on the meeting of the two walls, the pages turning over every few seconds, revealing another empty, bright sheet. Holiness and emptiness, and the mystery of corners, you might say - if you were feeling generous. Nearby are two televisions showing images of a glass of water and a simmering pot. This piece is called H2O. Again, the associations might be spiritual. Think Zurbaran still life.

What's next? A long black line of elastic divides the wall, looking recessive, like a black crevice. A series of felt-pen blotches on blotting paper are tacked up. Upstairs, some black birds are stuck on the window, as if by an infant school class under the direction of a depressed art teacher.

For more than a decade there has been a taboo on expression in art, an obsession with the minimalist manner. The best exponents of this aesthetic, notably Damien Hirst, made chilliness their subject and brilliantly described a deadly historical moment. The second-rate majority got lost in style, with the result you see here.

Floyer graduated from Goldsmiths in 1994, and this is her first solo show in London, although she has been a constant, whispered presence, a cool name, standing for a rarefied, sensitive minimalism. And this is where it has brought her: to a show that makes you crave dirt and excess and noise.

The press release asks us to admire "Floyer's clarity of thought and the elegantly concise presentation of her ideas". This is art you are supposed to appreciate rather than enjoy. It is art that tells you it is significant. Stuff clarity. What we need is an art that responds to the mess, intricacy and abundance of life, not this tedious evasion.

Until June 29. Details: 020-7724 2739.

 

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