Aram Saroyan, Lighght (1989), All images are by Osman Can Yerebakan for Art Observed.

Aphasia, a brain dysfunction resulting in the failure of comprehension of language, is the starting point of Lisa Cooley’s summer group show Itself Not So.  Curated by staff member Rachel Valinsky, and titled after a poem by Susan Howe, the selection grabs this condition as a metaphor for the disconnect between mind and speech, examining the possible fractures causing intellectual and emotional failures regarding the self. The exhibition argues that, with the corruption of the harmony among sound, thoughts and speech, a possible chaos and detachment brings an individual’s functionality to a standstill. Both intellectual and emotional, social and biological, this turmoil challenges the autonomy of those inflicted. (more…)

Alfred Jensen, Twelve Events in a Dual Universe (1978) ©ARS, NY and DACS, London 2013, Photo: Linda Nylind, Courtesy Hayward Gallery

Currently on view at the Hayward Gallery at Southbank Centre in London is a new exhibition of work entitled Alternative Guide to the Universe, a compilation of works by artists who taught themselves their crafts, focusing on work that offers a new perspective on our socially accepted conventions of artistic practice and cultural perception.

Lee Godie. Lee and Cameo on a chair… (early to mid 1970s), © the artist, Courtesy Richard and Ellen Sandor Family Collection

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