FTHo

For Jackson, the Urpflanze represents an interesting subject both in and beyond natural science, a model for thinking through transfigurations across social, political and artistic spectrums. Contemporary science likewise imagines the potential to grow or print any form we can envisage, by recasting physical, chemical and biological function as an engineering substrate that can be programmed into being. These emerging technologies present new possibilities for the instrumentalisation of life on a previously unimagined scale.

Jackson's multifaceted work will be installed throughout the ground floor of Flat Time House, the former home and studio of artist John Latham (1921-2006). Her exploration into the Urpflanze is closely aligned with Latham's preoccupation with 'the event'. Within his Flat Time Theory, Latham insisted on 'the event' as the smallest unit of existence. Therefore, all phenomena can be considered as 'event-structures' comprised of a continuous compound manifold of unrelenting change. Common to Latham's works and Jackson's The Urpflanze (Part 2) there is an opening of the boundaries through and between objects, bodies, non-human and human events, sentient and inert material. Jackson's work engages in a dialogue with Flat Time House as a living sculpture and Latham's pre-occupation with 'the event' as a transformative element of infinite potential. 

In the eighteenth century, the development of sophisticated techniques of ceramic production signified a victory of chemistry, culture and capital over formlessness. It pushed the capacity of the material to accommodate highly detailed representations, to radiate colour and sheen, to perform. Like clay, liquid crystals also have a visceral biological and mineral morphology that can collapse into formlessness, whilst harbouring the potential to assume (or emit the image of) any form. The mastery of the material is played out in a desire for the real in high definition, and a longing for the appearance of unknown and fantastical forms. 

Jackson's exhibition extends fairytale themes of absurd disruptions in vegetal scale, from Zola's 'revolutionary' carrot to the fantasies of remediation that science may have in store for us. The work begins in the botanical garden and leads us to the laboratory, from the clay pits to the factory floor, from its own animated voxels to the interior of the screen, and the forms and processes of its own production.

Melanie Jackson has collaborated with writer Esther Leslie on the production of a text that has informed the work and a publication that will be distributed as part of the exhibition.


BIOGRAPHY
Melanie Jackson inhabits different tropes of art making to interrogate possibilities of representation against the engaged practices of the world. She is interested in ways in which thought and affect is conducted through the material, and much of her work has explored this against the context of work, production and the flow of international capital. She is currently investigating the relationships between nature and technology through a series of experiments with fauna and flora, and the technologies available to her. Melanie is a lecturer at Slade School of Fine Art, her solo exhibitions includeThe Urpflanze (Part 1), The Drawing Room, London (2010), Road Angel, Arnolfini, Bristol (2007), Made In China, Matt's Gallery, London (2005). She won the Jerwood Drawing Prize in 2007. Melanie Jackson's commission has been supported by a Wellcome Trust Arts Award and the Slade School of Fine Art. The exhibition is supported by Arts Council England.

Commissioned by the Arts Catalyst.