Spoiled Spores

The LAB Gallery is pleased to present Spoiled Spores, an exhibition by recent Goldsmiths graduate Avril Corroon. Dublin City Council Visual Arts Bursary Award Winner 2019. This exhibition builds on Corroon’s award winning MA degree show earlier this year which presented a series of over 30 artisan cheeses made by the artist. Perfectly aged, these apparently high end luxury cheeses are one of kind, each with a unique name, Katie, Alan, Sophie etc. Drawn in by ideas of cheese boards and seasonal condiments, we discover Corroon’s film, which reveals the process of the production, but also an unexpected and deeply disturbing backstory. This juxtaposition is Corroon’s real success, luring us into an apparent cheese mongers, only to reveal a start commentary on the living conditions of occupants of rental accommodation, including her own, where mould samples have been taken as the basis for these supposed Camemberts and Gorgonzolas. 

A second film work, Latte Art, considers the labour roles that subsidise the arts, referencing the well-worn path of the aspiring actor in LA, Corroon describes the ‘inspiring’ tasks of using her compositional skills to prepare the café tables for an important event and intersperses under cover footage of her waitressing experience with highly instagrammable renditions of old masters recreated in food, such as Edvard Munch’s iconic, The Scream. Spoiled Spores, through autobiographical tales, takes local and personal experiences in London and Dublin to draw critical attention to some of the most urgent global issues of our time, housing and precarious labour. 

Artist Biography 

Avril Corroon works with moving image, performance and sculpture to explore situations where precarious conditions have become every-day. She re-presents these instances in a satirical and absurdist form through juxtaposition and elaborate visual narratives. Corroon graduated with an MFA from Goldsmiths University in 2019 and BA with NCAD in 2014. Recently she received the 2019/20 Goldsmiths Award, granting a year’s rent-free studio with Acme in London. She has exhibited and screened work at Lux, Enclave, The Old Operating Theatre, Seventeen Gallery in London, Temple Bar Gallery, the Irish Film Institute. Hotel Maria Kapel (NL) Platform Arts and Catalyst Arts Belfast. She has participated on residencies in The Basque Country with Bitamine Faktoria, Hotel Maria Kapel in The Netherlands, Temple Bar Gallery & Studios and Fire Station Artist Studios in Dublin.