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- The Guardian,
- Wednesday August 16 2000
Another cool, slight offering from Inverleith, this time in the form of text-based work by Californian artist Lawrence Weiner. He once said that art is always presentation, "never an imposition," and so it is here. Scraps of meditative words are written in charcoal letters on the walls, in Offline font (a blank line running through each character).
"Found due to its nature after any given time" is the main elliptical thrust, all illusion of precision (finding) and yet vacancy (at any given time). There are big, weird symbols on the walls too, a little like the male and female symbols in science. Wandering through the galleries is like being on a trail for meaning, one which erases itself as you approach. There's a military quality to the lettering and symbols too which gives the otherwise laid-back atmosphere an edge. That too erases itself pretty quickly.
Weiner is known for having placed phrases outside of institutional contacts (on beer-mats, escalators, songs) and the gallery tries to claim some radical points too because it is "sited within a public garden". So is Buckingham Palace. I'd like to see what Weiner would scribble on those walls.
• Till October 29. Details: 0131-248 2983.
