Tyler Mallison: The Rise of Ei*

About

In this presentation, Mallison continues his intuitive approach to abstraction, working sensitively with materials through a controlled sensibility and conceptual frameworks that embody the context of their creation: inner questions, external forces, processing and labour. The title of the show reflects the artist’s personal journey over the past four years and offers critical provocation and click-bait—with ‘Ei’ coined from economic inactivity (1)— in a playful nod to the cultural strategy of mainstreaming techno-capital productivity concepts like EQ (emotional intelligence/quotient) and AI (artificial intelligence) to push people further, faster, better. 

The subtle surfaces of NTIME (2020-ongoing) operate in a register at odds with our digitally conditioned, overstimulated bodies and lenses, confounding both the eye and image-capture algorithms with their barely-there presence. Unlike previous works recruiting visual attributes of colour and texture from source materials like data corruption (Word Fails Me, 2017) or global supply chains (Prime Arcadia, 2015-17), this marks a significant shift towards exploring the potential of traditional art media and engaging more directly with the canon of painting—breaking down polymers and signifiers in real time, as only a chemist-cum-artist might do.   

In parallel, the twists and turns of Networks (2019-22, 24) has been another site of focus off-screen, throughout this same period of pensive and frenetic development. According to the artist, they are simultaneously a: 1) memory of queer youthful craft circa 1980s, 2) gesture of gratitude to artists past and present, 3) relic of a speculative dystopian future, 4) painting and drawing, 5) record of labour, 6) dumb object, 7) potential waste, of material, time, energy. 

It's no coincidence that these works are now staged in an empty house in Elephant & Castle, itself economically inactive, in an area actively redefining itself through ambitious regeneration and progressive social narratives at odds with the conditions faced by many of its local inhabitants. The empty domestic shell amplifies feelings of precariousness and lends an air of idle productivity and uncertainty, not unlike the original site of production in his studio in Old Street. Is this space one of hopeful renewal, laboured stasis or fraught regression? 

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In his words, ‘beyond these pictures of nothing and broken networks exists a tangled web of contradiction. Allow yourself to sit with them, as have I. Just notice without judgement. It's as much about painting, as it is about everything. What you see is what you can and cannot see (2).’ 
 

1. The British government asserts that 'economic inactivity is holding Britain back.' According to the Office for National Statistics, about a quarter of people of working-age—nearly 11 million people—do not currently have jobs. About 1.5 million are classed as unemployed, meaning they are unable to find a job. The rest are considered to be economically inactive, with the number in this category rising.

2. This last statement is in response to the minimalist maxim ‘What you see is what you see’ from American painter and sculptor Frank Stella (1936-2024).

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PRIVATE VIEW: Saturday 14 September, 2-6pm

Show Extended — continues until 6 October, by appointment F-Su (contact via email: info@tylermallison.com or Insta DM @TylerLDN)