Tash Kahn
Tash Kahn’s practice is multi-faceted. She works with a variety of different mediums that all bleed into each other through a process of recycling and remaking. Each piece spawns countless others, negating the art object as a whole. Using sculpture, Polaroids, installation, film and collage, she documents the history of everyday life by recording the debris of the present. Kahn seeks out other people’s rubbish and collects objects she is drawn to, ready to be archived or recycled into something else.
She is interested in how people engage with art, the conversations it generates and how it makes them feel.
Kahn has exhibited both nationally and internationally, with a recent project in Mumbai that saw her work with architects and writers to investigate the domestic space. In 2014, she co-founded the visual-arts project DOLPH, and has helped facilitate 22 exhibitions, making partnerships with two Lambeth primary schools, UAL Wimbledon, The Royal College of Art, as well as numerous artists in the UK, New York and Berlin. DOLPH provides an alternative way for the community to engage with contemporary art, as well as being an invaluable learning and networking resource for artists. She is also a freelance editor for Penguin and Sluice Magazine.
Selected Exhibitions
Talking Heads, Stone Space, London (2019)
Sluice Refresh, M100, Odense, Denmark (2019)
Backyard Sculpture, Domobaal, London (2019)
Modern Finance, Thamesside Studios Galleery, London (2019)
SqW:Lab, Mumbai, India (2018 & 2019)
Citizen, Swiss Cottage Gallery, London (2018)
The Mechanical Reproduction of Dust, Stand4 Gallery, NYC (2018)
Lion Eating Poet In The Stone Den, 18 Malden Road, London (2016)
Asymmetrical Intersections, SHIM, NYC (2016)
DOLPH: The Directors, DOLPH, London (2015)
Skim, ASC Gallery, London (2015)
Capital, cast and found concrete, 2015
Salvaged Systems Series, found objects, concrete, Polaroids, approx 15cm x 15cm each, 2019
Time At Hogchester Arts
Residency period - August 2020
I haven’t done a residency since 1994 so it felt slightly strange that my first one since would be during a pandemic. Hogchester, however, is in the middle of nowhere, a wonderfully quiet place surrounded by fields with a view of the sea. I was greeted by Chantal on arrival (as well as the pigs, the chickens and the goats) and she showed me around her studio and the yurt – my home for the duration. I loved the yurt. It’s in an incredibly peaceful spot bordered by two streams and is completely away from everything. Just me and the spiders. I developed a new, quiet routine, waking early and wandering across the field for coffee and a shower before taking myself (and often Chantal’s dog Piper) for a walk around the 75 acres of the farm. I wanted to see how my ‘urban-inspired’ practice would shift in the presence of nature. I took polaroids every day and picked up things that caught my eye – moss-covered twigs; random old socks; smooth stones. I have collected ‘finds’ for a while now, usually odd-looking things I find on city streets, and I wanted to collate a ‘physical’ record of my time in Dorset.
Afternoons would be spent at the beach with Chantal or in the studio. I developed a love for The Spittles, a beach in Lyme Regis that offered up old metal with every new tide and cliff fall. I collected bits of pipe and old pliers; spikes and roundels; coloured bits of crockery and weird-shaped pebbles. There was always too much to carry and the journey back to the car was always peppered with many sit-down stops. One day on Charmouth beach I found four dead jelly fish. Beautiful transparent blobs that I had to take back to the studio and do something with. I had mixed results.
I enjoyed working in the studio with Chantal, learning new processes and putting the world to rights. I cast pebbles in plaster, deconstructed the polaroids I’d taken during the day and added to my growing collection of finds. Hogchester was a wonderful place to decompress and immerse myself in nature. The residency gave me the opportunity to completely switch off from London life, with no distractions. Things became more colourful, senses were heightened. It was an amazing experience and I can’t thank Chantal enough.
