We Are For The Dark

We Are For The Dark is a site responsive intervention by contemporary artists Kate McDonnell and Nicola Turner. Their assemblages, sculptures and installations retrace invisible memories left by generations of former inhabitants at one of Hackney's oldest buildings.

Both artists explore the darker sides of the human condition through an uncanny palette of ephemeral materials and ambiguous forms. With Turner’s works speaking to the fragility of the body and McDonnell’s to the fragility of the mind, their collaboration contemplates the notion of death as a life-affirming force.

Monumental yet incomprehensible creations ooze down walls and staircases, bulging shapes engulf furniture and spill out of crevices - where children once may have played hide and seek in their Georgian family home, or where former prisoners were given shelter during the building's time as a women's refuge.

Tendrils creep into the building's gloomy basement where Clare Whistler and Jim Blackburn add movement and sound to one of Nicola Turner's immersive installations.

The exhibition will be open for three days only from 8-10 September, 11am to 6pm, with performances during Friday's Private View (Friday 8 September, 6-8pm) and from 11am-1pm and 3-5pm on Saturday and Sunday.