Gareth Moore
As a Wild Boar Passes Water
2008 WITTE DE WITH, CENTER FOR CONTEMPORARY ART EXHIBITION
© BOB GOEDEWAAGEN
Apr 3 to May 4, 2008
Gareth Moore’s exhibition titled As a Wild Boar Passes Water, was presented at Witte de With, Center for Contemporary Art, Rotterdam. The exhibition comprised a new film and multi-part installation inspired by the work of Viktor Schauberger (1885 – 1958). Schauberger was a self-taught philosopher, inventor and naturalist, who developed his theories through the close study of the woods and rivers of his native Austria. “Nature moves everything and creates this movement through various differences in temperature and potential”, writes Schauberger. “Where these intersect, the primordial life-force is born. There are only a very few people who really know how to observe Nature and to notice these small and almost imperceptible differences in motion, temperature, tension and potential” (1936).
Gareth Moore is one of these few people, attuned to notice the small details of the world that are usually overlooked. As he puts it, “I like having a very fragmented art practice, of art that exists in a more dissipated or invisible manner”. He instigates projects in which he can learn something and interact with other communi-ties outside the domain of contemporary art. He makes work that thrives upon confusion to enable the public to discover it unexpectantly, often through some element of choreographed quirkiness.
Moore is intrigued by historical figures who stand outside the mainstream. With this project, he focuses our attention on the writings and discoveries of a scientist whose work was never fully accepted by the establishment, but whose ideas find a resonance in ecological thinking today. “They call me deranged”, writes Schauberger, “the hope is that they are right! It is of no greater or lesser import for yet another fool to wander this Earth. But if I am right and science is wrong, then may the Lord God have mercy on mankind!” (1936). Moore’s works center around Schauberger’s belief that water is the source of all life and an active element whose energy must be harnessed rather than destroyed. They include a sculpture of trousers made from fish leather, a meditative 16mm film, and a barrel containing water collected from a small roadside spring in western Canada and shipped to Rotterdam, from which exhibition visitors may drink. Finally, reaching beyond the confines of the gallery walls, Moore’s project extends into the pages of a local paper, where fragments of Schauberger’s writings were published throughout the exhibition.
At Witte de With, Moore’s works were presented within the framework of Liam Gillick’s solo exhibition, which has imposed an architectural meta-structure onto the gallery spaces. This re-designates which rooms are to be used for the presentation of Gillick’s work and which are to be seen as “institutional zones”, programmed by the curatorial team. Witte de With has chosen to present here the work of other artists, first Manon de Boer, then Keren Cytter, and next Gareth Moore.
Curators: Zoë Gray, Nicolaus Schafhausen
Artist: Gareth Moore
(born 1975, Matsqui, British Columbia, Canada) lives and works in Vancouver. Recent solo exhibitions: CCA Wattis Institute of Contemporary Arts, San Francisco (also as part of the group show Wizard of Oz, 2008); St. George Marsh Denaturalized, Belkin Satellite, Vancouver (2007); Art Perform, Art Basel Miami Beach (2006); Charles H. Scott Gallery, Vancouver (2005). Recent group exhibitions: The Museum, Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin (2008); The Theater of Life, Galleria Civica di Arte Contemporanea, Trento; Door Slamming Festival, Berlin; KölnShow 2, Gallery Daniel Buchholz, Cologne (all 2007). His work was presented in 2006 at Witte de With as part of the group exhibition Street: Behind the cliché. Moore studied at the Emily Carr Institute, Vancouver (2001 – 2004) and the Ontario College of Art and Design, Toronto (1999 – 2000).
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