Artists | Simon Linington, Charlotte Walentin

Curator | Dori Deng

Date | Oct 11 to Nov 30, 2024

Room 815, 33 Sichuan Middle Road, Huangpu District, Shanghai

Material transformation is a profound scientific process that remarks the beginning of changes. Life began on our planet earth from the moment when water transitioned from solid icy state to liquid form. When the materials for art started to transition, there are heighten forms of changes happening far beyond a new shape, a new vision — a different way of seeing and sensing.

On the occasion of the relaunch of Gallery OM (previously Object Momento), we proudly present the two-person exhibition that encapsulates the essence of transformation through materiality, symbolising the two stages of this new beginning: trans - form.

Charlotte Walentin, a Swedish artist articulate expansive folded tinted fabric to form structures that respond to architectural space. UK artist Simon Linington, inspired by the sand bottle souvenirs from his beloved island hometown Isle of Wight, fills painting pigments into tubes, creating sculptures that evoke the personal memory of a place and time. Despite their differing generations and unique cultural backgrounds, both artists transform the traditional materials for two-dimensional paintings into three dimensional sculptural forms, offering fresh perspectives on colour and surface in painting through their unique lenses. By dealing with the folding of vast colour surfaces or sculpting structures with dry painting pigment, the two artists converge through their materiality and conceptual approaches in this exhibition, transcending their geological and generational influences.

"Trans-" is a Latin prefix meaning "beyond" or "across" in action; "form" is a verb meaning to conceive an idea in one's mind. Separately, the two artists make gestures that challenge our perceptual way ofunderstanding painting—extending beyond the convention of either colour or surface but defining gravitational structure.

This exhibition invites you to join the transformative journey of the materiality through both Walentin and Linington’s art practices, as they redefine the boundaries of art and materiality.

Text / Dori Deng

About the Curator

Dori Deng is a multifaceted creative, focus in time-based art practice but not limited in the forms of expression. Known as an artist who works with light as the medium, Deng also extended her practice in curate for time-based media. Her dedication to creating lightwork is presented through the forms of light installations, sculptures, and large-scale scenography in modern operas. In recent years, her interest in time-based medium has broadened to curated exhibitions with a focus on process-let artworks. After decade of in-depth experience in art making and production, she subsequently directed Francis Gallery at-large for UK & US global market. Deng continues to expand her vision in time-based media through numerous independent art and curatorial projects, as well as presenting exhibitions and art programme through her new gallery platform. Her latest curatorial projects including duo exhibition by Swedish artist Charlotte Walentin’s textile installation & British artist Simon Linington’s pigment sculptures at Gallery OM in Shanghai, China; solo exhibitions by Italian sculptor & painter Giorgio Petracci, British textile artist Fiona Curran, and Swedish watercolour painter Ylva Carlgren at Space of Time Gallery in Beijing.

About the Artists

Charlotte Walentin (b. 1965) is based in Malmö, Sweden. After receiving her MFA from Malmö Art Academy in 1990, she creates objects that oscillate in between painting and sculpture, item and body, the artificial and the organic, deriving from the characteristics of the material and its presence in the room. The materiality is essential in Walentin’s artistic practice, it sets the context and the logic to the works. She is especially interested in the textile matter, as a material both highly charged and complex in terms of art, craft and as a cultural product, with a reference to the body and the skin as well as the obvious connection to painting.

Simon Linington (b.1983) is a contemporary artist from the Isle of Wight, UK. He has a BA (Hons) in Sculpture from Chelsea University of the Arts, London. In 2010 he was awarded the Emerging Artists Bursary Award by the Royal Society of Sculptors and exhibits internationally. Inspired by the island sand bottle souvenirs that its history traced back to the Victorian time, Linington reinterpret this culture influence with adaptation of using painting pigment to “bottle fill” into sculptures. His unique approach of materiality and the island culture have brought him to the opportunities to create site-specific sculptures around the world. From the City of London to Mexico, São Paulo, and Netherland, his own souvenir to the specific memory and places.