James Richards: Requests and Antisongs

Upper and Lower Gallery

Entry with Day Membership

In partnership with Bergen Kunsthall and Kestnergesellschaft, Hannover, ICA presents Requests and Antisongs, a solo exhibition by British artist James Richards. In Richards' work, images and sounds are merged into highly affective video works that combine footage from a wide range of sources edited into elegant compositions. His recent projects separate these elements out again, allowing space for multi-channel audio installations that combine sound in a way that is physical and spatial. The video works convene materials according to the silent rhythms and movements of the footage they contain.

In Requests and Antisongs, Richards presents three works which continue an ongoing exploration of the emotive power of appropriated digital video. The works on view are produced separately but conceived as a suite, containing overlapping samples and musical parts iterated or reworked into different forms throughout.

Presented in the ICA Lower Gallery, Crumb Mahogany (2016) is a six channel sound installation that moves across a wide range of genres and musical languages - from rhythmic passages and sections featuring a vocal trio, to sequences built up from field recordings and incidental sound, resulting in a kaleidoscopic and highly cinematic sensorial experience.

Drawing on the same set of vocal recordings, the works Radio At Night (2015) and Rushes Minotaur (2016) are presented in the Upper Galleries. These works combine footage from newscasts, medical documentaries and French erotica as well as the ICA’s own archive of video documentation, into a lyrical meditation on the body as a site for the flow of material and sensation.

An accompanying artist’s book edited in collaboration with Mason Leaver-Yap and published by Sternberg Press will be released in October 2016.

Co-commissioned by Bergen Kunsthall, ICA London and Kestnergesellschaft, Hannover, where the exhibition travels throughout 2016-2017. The exhibition is reconfigured and adapted for the particular architectural environment of the galleries in each institution.

James Richards (b. 1983) is a British artist presently residing in Berlin. Born in Cardiff, Richards studied Fine Art at Chelsea College of Art & Design, London.

Selected group exhibitions include: Less Than One, Walker Arts Centre Minneapolis (2016); Cut To Swipe, MoMA, New York (2015); Saltwater: A Theory of Thought Forms, 14th Istanbul Biennial, Istanbul (2015); Turner Prize, Tate Britain 2014; Speculations On Anonymous Materials, Fridericianum, Kassel (2014); Meanwhile… Suddenly, and Then, 12th Lyon Biennial (2013); The Encyclopedic Palace, 55th Venice Biennale (2013); Frozen Lakes, Artists Space, New York; and Nought to Sixty, ICA, London (2008).

He has been selected to represent Cymru yn Fenis Wales in Venice 2017 for the 57th International Art Exhibition, the Venice Biennale. Recent solo shows include Crumb Mahogany, Bergen Kunsthall, 2016; Radio At Night, Museum of Contemporary Art Bordeaux, (2016); James Richards, Kunstverein München, Munich (2015) and Not Blacking Out Just Turning The Lights Off, Chisenhale, London (2011).

Richards was a recipient of the 2014 Ars Viva Prize for artists and received the 2012 Jarman Award for film and video. He was shortlisted for the 2014 Turner Prize.

Supported by the James Richards Exhibition Supporters Group including the Zabludowicz Collection.