20 July 2012
Hannah Kendall – Middlegame for piano
performed by Andrew Matthews-Owen
“In chess there are some extremely beautiful things in the domain of the movement but not in the visual domain. It’s the imagining of the movement or the gesture that makes the beauty, in this case. It’s completely in one’s grey matter.” MARCEL DUCHAMP
Artist and chess fanatic Marcel Duchamp often contemplated and referred to the visual possibilities which arise within the duration of any given game of chess, but mostly discounted its aesthetic value. However, ‘Middlegame’ explores the flourishing visual transitions and potential patterns which occur as the chess pieces become dispersed about the board, seemingly scattered, and gradually deplete in numbers, standing as isolated figures.