Time and motion studies

John Court - Spacex performance (2012)

Drawing, like performance, is durational, but some drawings make it more obvious that others. Being a bit obsessed with time and motion, I enjoy the way John Court reveals how many hundreds of hours he spent working on the drawings he currently has on show at Spacex, Exeter.

I encounter plenty of artists who share my interest in time and motion as conceptual subject matter, but few who are as concerned about the mundane business of productivity. "I like to feel I have done a day's work," he says. Agree. Though I would baulk at lying for eight hours in a pool of paint in the baking Venetian sun, an activity he recalled in conversation with Andre Stitt at Spacex last Saturday.  "I like to have a look over the edge," he says gently and smiles. I'm never quite clear if he's talking about physical endurance or the edge of a sheet of paper. I suspect both exert an equal pull on him. 

It was a privilege to hear the two of them talking together. We learned that UK-born John lives and works in Finland but doesn't speak the language. In fact, he struggles to read and write his native language. He's profoundly dyslexic and many of the works shown here grow from the impenetrability of the written word. Instead, they make language physical through movement, noise and tactility.  In his hands, language is no longer a transparent container of concepts, it's the stuff of the world. Brilliant.

John Court: The work between the lines
29 September - 24 November 2012  (with a day-long performance on 24 November)
www.spacex.org.uk