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Review Mar 19 2009 « | »
Cabinet Afrique at the Cell Project Space Inspired by African art and artefacts, this joint exhibition by artists Caroline Achaintre and Ursula Mayer transports us into......

Agnieszka Gratza

Inspired by African art and artefacts, this joint exhibition by artists Caroline Achaintre and Ursula Mayer transports us into the realm of the elemental. Stark white walls in Cell's three exhibition rooms form the perfect backdrop for a small collection of works in a variety of media - print, film, paper and wool sculpture - placed in dialogue with each other.

Drawing on Surrealist montage techniques, Ursula Mayer's film 'The Lunch in Fur/ Le Déjeuner en Fourrure' (2008) is named after Meret Oppenheim's iconic fur-lined teacup and saucer christened by the Surrealist poet André Breton. In a series of spell-binding scenes staging a fictional encounter between Oppenheim herself, Josephine Baker and photographer Dora Maar, Picasso's muse, the film explores the fetishist appeal African objects held for modernists of all ranks. Exotic items such as ostrich eggs, statuettes and chess pieces crowned with cowries are handled by the glamorous female trio exuding an aura of refinement and connoisseurship. Taken together, these pieces make up a 'cabinet of curiosities' gestured at in the title of the exhibition.

A glass cabinet is used explicitly in the final room to showcase three of Caroline Achaintre's delicate paper sculptures mounted on steel. Achaintre's black and white woodcut prints contrast with her stark use of colours in the large wool sculptures reworking masque forms in an unexpected medium. They invite tactile exploration, much like the objects in Mayer's film. Subtle echoes between the two artists' works, perceptible in the choice of motifs and technique alike, make for the overall unity and coherence of this elegant exhibition.

'Cabinet Afrique' is showing at Cell Project Space on Cambridge Heath Rd in Hackney until the 19th of April. Find their web space here.

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