John Wynne The Flux & I at Gazelli Art House

Anyone who visited Newspeak: British Art Now at the Saatchi in 2010 cannot fail to remember John Wynne’s monumental work, Installation for 300 Speakers, Pianola & Vacuum Cleaner 2009 (see video here on Vimeo). The undisputed star of the show it consisted of a giant gently writing vacuum cleaner hose pumping air to (from?) a pianola which in turn, seemingly randomly, activated never-repeating sounds played via a giant pile of loudspeakers. These enigmatic sounds filled the gallery and echoed around the Saatchi. It was at once monumental, minimal and immersive using sound and sculptural assemblage to explore and define architectural space and to investigate the borders between sound and music.

I was immediately therefore drawn to Gazelli Art House latest show – an exhibition of three new site-specific works by John Wynne. You enter immediately into the heart of the first work, Installation for high & Low Frequencies 2014. The whole room reverberates with both a high pitched ringing and a deep vibration. Is it a sound or rather a feeling? The effect is visceral and disturbing enough for some gallery visitors to immediately turn back and head out of the gallery looking somewhat unsettled.

Strangely this repulsive effect probably indicates success – questioning our relationship with the sounds and the internal space. Wynne certainly presents the viewer with a subtly unsettling merge between the external business of our daily urban lives and the apparent refuge of interior space.

In another work upstairs a 6 minute sonic loop played in a totally blackened space. Again it provoked an unease as the ability to use ones vision during the experience meant a total immersion in the sound that span around you.

Also showing are the works of Yoojin Jung whose works similarly are within the galleries curatorial theme of 2014 – that the only thing constant in life is change. Calm and reflective they provide a worthy counterpoint to John Wynne’s rather more provocative works.

John Wynne & Yoonjin Yung The Flux & I until 29/06/2014. Gazelli Art House 39 Dover Street London W1