Larder is pleased to present the solo exhibition Melonball by London-based Canadian artist, Daniel Taylor. The exhibition features a new series of wall reliefs and sculpture by the artist. Taking its name from American composer, Raymond Scott’s 1963 song “Melon Ball Bounce”, the exhibition imagines a post-nuclear future influenced by the anxieties and eccentricities of the bygone ‘Atomic Age’ era. While Scott’s song innocuously asks “What makes the melon ball bounce?”, the exhibition draws a comparison between this refrain and nuclear bomb anxiety. As is typical in the artist’s practice, Melonball draws on a diverse range of references including Queer theory, post-nuclear architecture and design, Ancient relief carving, 90s cartoons and low-cost factory-made products. The exhibition continues Taylor’s use of recurring characters and loosely structured narratives in his practice.

Influenced by British-Australian writer and scholar, Sara Ahmed’s 2006 Queer Phenomenology, Taylor employs a non-linear narrative to draw on ideas around Queer deviation, disoriented lineage and being ‘off-center’. This is most explicitly embodied through the recurring character of the snail which the artist posits as a Queer icon. Continuously displaced and carrying its house on its back, the snail is depicted as living a nomadic and bohemian lifestyle. Taylor describes the snail’s constant trail of slime as intimacy, deposit and discharge, its residue reflecting disclarity and mess.

The tension between storytelling and narrative disclarity is played out through the artist’s use of wall reliefs in the exhibition. Although the reliefs operate within a series, no clear narrative trajectory is established and the story’s timeline remains obscured. Loosely following the characters after some sort of nuclear disaster, scenes of scientific experiment and research are merged with domestic and morning routines such as fixing bed hair and getting coffee. These scenes are suggestive of a continual flux between low and high energy, depicted as both bodily fatigue and nuclear disaster.

In contrast with materials used in traditional wall relief and sculpture, Taylor deliberately utilizes low-fi and industrial materials such as styrofoam, expanding foam and oil-based gloss house paint. Like the snail’s slime, the use of these low stature substances reflects the artist’s interest in bodily and material residue as holding disruptive and subversive qualities.

-

Daniel Taylor (b.1986, Prince Edward Island, Canada) lives and works in London, UK. Taylor received a BFA from Nova Scotia College of Art and Design (N.S.C.A.D.) (2011). His work has been presented in exhibitions at Ginsberg, Lima, Peru (2021); 650mAh, Hove, UK (2019); Airy Yamanashi, Kofu, Japan (2019) and Arbyte Studios, London, UK (2019).


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, Incoming Transmission, 2022. Styrofoam, foam coat, high gloss oil-based paint, 10 x 15 inches.


Daniel Taylor, Neon Lights, 2022. Styrofoam, foam coat, high gloss oil-based paint, 11 x 15 inches.


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, Going, 2022. Styrofoam, plaster, acrylic paint, varnish, 25 x 10 x 25inches.


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, That’s Not My Name, 2022. Styrofoam, foam coat, high gloss oil-based paint, 21 x 24 inches.


Daniel Taylor, Nerve Center, 2022. Styrofoam, foam coat, high gloss oil-based paint, 11 x 15 inches.


Daniel Taylor, Research, 2022. Styrofoam, foam coat, high gloss oil-based paint, 10 x 15 inches.


Daniel Taylor, CCTV, 2022. Styrofoam, foam coat, high gloss oil-based paint, 11 x 15 inches.


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, Bed Head, 2022. Styrofoam, foam coat, high gloss oil-based paint, 13 x 9 inches.


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, Just Happy To Be Here, 2022. Styrofoam, plaster, acrylic paint, varnish, 24 x 9 x 24 inches.


Daniel Taylor, Melonball, 2022. Installation shot.


Daniel Taylor, Passed Out, 2022. Styrofoam, plaster, acrylic paint, varnish, 22 x 28 x 15 inches.

Photos: Evan Walsh