Honesty Box

Honesty Box
Rachel Fäth
5th September – 11nd October 2023

Created in relation to a series of self-imposed constraints, and responding to cues taken from the spaces in which they are displayed, Rachel Fäth’s objects and videos reflect upon the instrumental role industrially produced materials continue to play in contemporary life. Recently, she has foregone the use of a conventional studio space, choosing instead to variously make her work in a community welding workshop, the art school in which she teaches, or in this instance, relying upon arrangements made by those inviting her to exhibit.

Glass panes removed from the gallery windows are repurposed as tabletops on which welded steel objects rest. These objects are constructed from scrap material sourced at Glasgow Sculpture Studios, where Fäth occupied a workshop bay for the month prior to this exhibition. Collectively titled I feel soon I will fall into you, they function as armatures that hold pieces of glass the artist brought with her from New York: discarded lab equipment, found where she works in the 68^th Street campus of Hunter College. This combination of elements, obtained in two institutions geographically remote from one another, serves as a record of the journey Fäth has herself undertaken.

Contents of Room appropriates a series of photographs taken by two employees of Middleton Barton Valuation, a company contracted to auction assets from the recently shuttered Centre for Contemporary Arts Glasgow (CCA). Created as an inventory of objects that could be liquidated to reimburse CCA’s creditors, this documentation constitutes a portrait of a key piece of the city’s cultural infrastructure, albeit seen solely through the lens of its perceived financial value as an undifferentiated array of remaindered effects. Stitching together a composite image of a venue that she only visited in person once in 2017, Contents of Room commemorates a divisive event that took place during the first week of Fäth’s recent sojourn, while articulating in negative terms what cannot be captured using such a cynical means of appraisal. 

Less a performative ethic of salvage than a series of tactical responses to the situations in which she finds herself, Fäth gestures persistently draw our attention to the conditions underpinning their realisation.

This exhibition is kindly supported by Glasgow Sculpture Studios and Goethe-Institut Glasgow

Photography: Patrick Jameson