The Objects are Watching is a new solo exhibition at Art Seen in Nicosia by Clare Burnett, opening this Thursday and running until the end of May. The London-based artist’s showcase is curated by Maria Stathi and is accompanied by a commissioned text by Pavlina Paraskevaidou.

“Clare Burnett’s work is a response to people, places and histories, unravelling narratives and associations across different times and landscapes,” writes Paraskevaidou. “Past and present are intertwined through colour, form and material into objects that reflect the movement of people. Her research for the current exhibition led her on a journey, from studying the Cyprus Collections at Neues Museum in Berlin and the Pushkin Museum in Moscow, to travelling around the island, learning from people and observing the surroundings.

“The artist scours Nicosia’s supermarkets,” Paraskevaidou adds, “trails to remote places in the mountains to find the copper mine and Red Lake of Mitsero and digs the earth of the buffer zone, unearthing stories and collecting materials which she incorporates in her work. Minerals, oxides, clay and earth, which the artist uses to make her own pigments, fabric, paper pulp and plastic, weave their way into her drawings, sculptures and ceramics.”

Fascinated by flags, archaeology, the stories behind artefacts, the island’s diaspora and ordinary objects throughout history and today, the artist incorporates varied creative expressions in her showcase. Central to the theme is the exploration of how objects journey across time, geography and history, tracing displacement, excavation and restitution.

Through clay sculptures, contemporary works, watercolours and other art forms, Burnett juxtaposes ancient forms with everyday contemporary materials and proposes a collective and poetic reflection on memory, material culture and layered narratives, while remaining critical and observant of their movement throughout history.

“All materials carry the same value for the artist,” continues Paraskevaidou, “who dismisses ‘art world’ hierarchies of value. This is exemplified in her use of plastic, paper and clay as an equal of other ‘precious’ materials. The homonymous series The Objects are Watching is a stack of bowls, buckets and other readily available plastic objects under layers of papier-mâché.

“Reconfigured into anthropomorphic sculptures, they stand tall, like totems of contemporary consumerism or harbingers of an ecological disaster. “Like the household terracottas of the past, today’s everyday plastics bear witness,” the artist writes “watching over our actions and lives until they too become the archaeology of the future.”

The The Objects are Watching will remain open until May 27 while an opportunity to meet the artist and go on a guided exhibition tour is available this Saturday at 11.30am

The Objects are Watching

Exhibition by Claire Burnett. April 23-May 27. Art Seen, Nicosia. Opening: 6pm-9.30pm. Monday, Wednesday, Friday: 4pm-7pm. Saturday: 11am-1pm or by appointment. Tel: 22-006624. www.art-seen.org