Time Out. Sept 23-29 1999
Rebecca Feiner. Foundry (Upcoming)

Rebecca Feiner mixes the confessional style of Tracy Emin with the objectivity of American conceptualist, Joseph Kosuth.
Pages reproduced from the artist's diary share space with enlarged copies of dictionary definitions. The diary entries hint at a harrowing history of child abuse. They also record a moment of self-empowerment, of a growing determination to expose her hidden history; the show's title is 'Speak Out or Consent'. Overcoming her own inhibitions was not the only obstacle: a previous version of the installation was trashed by members of her family and this piece comes with the protection of a legal injunction.

Given the subject matter, debating aspects of its presentation might seem academic, except that obvious care has been taken in juxtaposing images and text. Photographs show a suburban street, a pretty child grinning at the camera and a young woman. In one family snap, the faces of two adolescent boys are highlighted; alongside it is Feiner's handwritten text implicating two of her brothers as perpetrators of the abuse. The ordering of the information is powerfully achieved not as an appeal for sympathy, but as an excercise in the politics of presentation. The effect would be greater still without the overly theatrical elements. There's a bath behind bars (the 'bathroom was the only door in our house with a lock on') and sounds of heavy breathing emanating from a blackened room. Nonetheless, Feiner's installation is effective and has been achieved in spite of obvious personal risk.

Mark Currah