Streams of Story
Until May 21; Tramway

William Kentridge
Until May 13; Glasgow School of Art

Karla Black
Until May 19; Mary Mary, 6 Dixon Street

Francis McKee has a dark side. The affable director of Glasgow International is responsible for an exhibition at Tramway which stalks you from the moment you cross the threshold.

Streams Of Story (a phrase borrowed from Salman Rushdie) promises to bring us a digital renaissance in the ancient art of storytelling. It doesn’t really live up to that promise, but gives us something far more sinister instead. The gallery is shrouded in a darkness punctuated only by the occasional light, video and doorway. For a space so large it does a great job of making you feel claustrophobic.

You are greeted at the door by The Pomegranate, a video by Palestinian artist, Jumana Emil Abboud. The fruit’s blood-red seeds are ritually pressed back into its flesh, one by one. You are pressed, close up, against this uncomfortable vision, evocative of human pain.

Nearby, a free-standing wall is blank but for one small DVD by Finnish artist Sanna Kannisto. Again, the camera is forced right into the action. A cricket is placed into a small glass box with a praying mantis, and it’s only a matter of time before the poor insect is chewed to death, legs still kicking. The expanse of white wall to either side of the video adds to the sickening sense of entrapment. There is no escape for the cricket, or for you.

The theme continues in Kannisto’s exquisite photographs of exotic wildlife specimens, the workings of their cages and supports left visible. These find a direct echo in the work of American artist Chloe Piene, in whose videos people behave like caged animals. Her beautiful, wiry drawings suggest sexual acts between human and animal skeletons, their basal instincts filling the bony frames with life.

McKee’s original intentions are rediscovered upstairs in the project room, where two videos are so story-based that they become the exception rather than the rule of this show. In fact, thinking back a year, McKee’s selection from the Jumex collection was far better suited to the yarn-spinning theme. It’s a good show, but Streams of Story is a far cry from Jackanory.

The busy McKee also had a hand in bringing William Kentridge’s work to Glasgow School of Art. The renowned South African artist represented his country at last year’s Venice Biennale, and two of those works are on show here.

Having worked in theatre, opera and puppetry, Kentridge brings showmanship to his animated films. This is particularly obvious in the installation, 7 Fragments For Georges Méliès, a homage to the Victorian magician who first developed “trick films” as part of his stage act.

In the seven silent films, Kentridge steps in and out of charcoal self-portraits, falls from pretend ladders, un-draws pictures, and chases his coffee cup around a table. The creative process is playfully unpeeled, the artist’s backwards movements projected in reverse.

A more conventional Kentridge animation is screened in the second of two black box spaces. Tide Table is the ninth in a series of films which the artist began in 1989, tracing the struggles of post-apartheid South Africa. Kentridge’s principle character, the white property tycoon, Soho Eckstein, dozes on the shoreline while the AIDS crisis brings images of the dead and dying washing out of the waves.

The strength in Kentridge’s work is in its ambiguity, and in the beauty of the charcoal drawings as they cumulatively redraw and erase themselves out of existence. These haunting aspects are missing from the 7 Fragments, but wholly present in Tide Table. A hypnotic back-catalogue of Kentridge’s films plays almost as an afterthought in the corridor; despite the less-than-ideal viewing conditions, it’s worth a visit in itself.

This year’s Gi sees a new gallery space for Mary Mary, with a show by Karla Black. The artist has made the elegant space her own with three works, each hovering quietly on the brink of collapse.

A big fold of cardboard stands near the entrance, crumpled and sagging. Heavy under the weight of a reluctant coat of paint, the invertebrate will surely soon droop to its knees. A precarious fold of sugar paper shares the space. Creased, stained, torn and crunched, it dangles from a network of ribbons; glass and lumps of powder littering its curves.

The work in the second room steals the show, covering the floor in white plaster powder. The precise, geometric shape echoes the line of the walls, leaving a margin around the edges where you can walk. On closer examination, you begin to see detail: a spattering of nail varnish here; a polythene bag breaking through the surface there; slices of concealer stick scattered around.

Traditional artists’ materials are mixed in Black’s works with toiletries and cosmetics, the stuff of women’s private moments made monumental. Girly paraphernalia infiltrates deep into the masculine realm of Abstract Expressionism. Face paint stakes its claim as a legitimate artistic material, and far from being aggressive about it, Black wins the argument by whispering in skin-tone pinks.

With a few exceptions, the Glasgow International packs up and goes home tomorrow. Like last year, it has had its catalogue of hiccups. In my travels I encountered shows which failed to open in time; a stubborn fire alarm refusing to shut up; a crucial light bulb missing and no one available to change it; and a terrified attendant cowering, isolated, in pitch black conditions.

If the Glasgow International is to compete on the international circuit, it has to raise its game. With the new biennial Gi, the challenge for Francis McKee is to capture the Glasgow’s creative DIY spirit while injecting some organisational stability.

There’s no doubt that the Gi’s strength lies in the unexpected treats buried in the corners of the programme; little gems from artists such as Mark Neville, AR Lamb, Miranda Whall, Jonathan Scott, Marcus Coates and Karla Black. These shows are crucial beads on the necklace, but the big must-see diamonds are missing. That’s why McKee has given himself two years preparation time, to chase the big names, and the big money. If he can pull that off, the Gi will be something very special indeed.

Catrìona Black, Sunday Herald 30.04.06