Category Archives: London

London: Static ‘Modern Muses’

September 26, 2018 butterfly 1 Comment

Since 2006 London based artistic duo STATIC, made of Tom Jackson and Craig Evans have been producing bold original work abstractly exploring duality and conflict through figurative assemblages.

Mixing stencil and spray paint with vivid collages with feathers and glass, lego, mother of pearl inlays; STATICs aesthetic is as dynamic as it is intricate.

Blending pattern with portraiture, their signature style is heavily influenced by modern ‘tribes’ and mythologies.
Mixed media creations primarily examine perception with colours and shapes seemingly suspended through the use of layered materials.
Through iconic signs and symbols charged with their own histories, STATIC are looking to challenge the viewer to examine their own cultural identity.

Their new exhibition ‘Modern Muses’ features four layered glass originals, a series of hand painted multiples that accompany the originals and 10 hand painted multiples featuring their signature Chinook Chandeliers.

Check their social media as they will also be running competitions to win this week.

STATIC – M O D E R N M U S E S
@ Robi Walters Gallery
12 Ingestre Place, London W1F 0JF
27th – 30th September 2018

London

London: Conor Harrington ‘The Story of US and Them’

September 24, 2018 butterfly 3 Comments

Irish born painter Conor Harringtonreturns to London with a new solo exhibition “The Story of Us and Them” at HENI Gallery in London. Fascinated by art history, Renaissance and the Baroque era, Conor Harrington continues to explore patriotism and contemporary social political themes, combining classical oil painting techniques and graffiti influences.

The exhibition features 12 new large scale works featuring two fictional male figures dressed in ornate baroque uniforms fighting each other and brandishing their bright coloured flags as weapon.

The viewer is immediately transported in this semi fictional tale, through bold red and blue vibrant colours, while the energetic brushstrokes accentuate the feeling of drama and movement.
Duality is an omnipresent theme : realism vs onirism, a sense of political division occurs through the use of colours, flags.
Conor Harrington’s painting techniques have also evolved with more loose paint gestures, the use of solvent and extinguishers to create some blurring effects while some elements of the composition are in focus with intricate details such as the uniforms or expressions of the faces.

“The works are set against a background of a fictional nation state and feature two so-called ‘blind patriots’ engaged in combat,” the gallery says. “By using predominantly red and blue in their apparel and the flags they brandish, Harrington draws on the various political and cultural connotations associated with this pairing to make a comment on society today.”

View the full set of pics here

Conor Harrington: The Story of Us and Them
14th September — 13th October 2018

HENI Gallery
6-10 Lexington St, London W1F 0LB

London, Street, streets

Streets: Aida Wilde – Less Homes 4U

September 22, 2018 butterfly 2 Comments

London based artist AIDA WILDE continues her interventions denouncing the rapid gentrification of London’s iconic and creative areas like Hackney Wick.
Her powerful text based street interventions incorporate social media terminology as a tool for activism.

Earlier in September, during the Art on the Streets conference, she presented her work about the gentrification of Hackney Wick, the curation of the Lord Napier project for Hackney Wicked ( from Shithouse to Penthouse), and A Hackney Wick Funeral, uniting countless artists in homage to Hackney Wick’s vibrant artistic past.

Croydon, a borough located south of London, often nicknamed ‘Cronx’ due to its infamous and controversial reputation, from Kate Moss to the 2011 London Riots, has been undergoing a lot of real estate development and revitalisation in a bid to change its image and attract new crowds.

In the city center many of the local shops have now closed to give way to big brands and so on.

For the Croydon Rise Festival, a street art festival curated by Monoprixx, Wherethereswalls and Rise Gallery, aimed to become the largest free open air museum in Europe, Aida Wilde decided to create a bespoke shop front window namely apt ‘Less Homes 4U’.

Using her signature vibrant neon pink dotted wallpaper and black block text imagery, Aida Wilde continues to denounce the gentrification process.

Team Pic by @Wherethereswalls

Together with her glamorous assistants Aida pasted up bold messages on the shop window:

‘LESS HOMES 4 U’
‘IT’S OUT WITH THE HIPSTERS, IN WITH THE YUPSTERS’
‘ENOUGH IS ENOUGH’
‘LONG DRAMATIC PAUSE…’
‘AFFORDABLE HOUSING FOR NO ONE’

A sign next to the window indicates ‘WHERE ONLY THE 1% COUNT’, with the O being strategically stroked off.

In parallel in the Rise Gallery, the public is invited to add notes to Aida Wilde’s installation ‘My mother’s aspiration for me was…’

London

London: Banksy at the British Museum

September 4, 2018 butterfly 1 Comment

Back in 2005, Banksy installed this ‘cave painting’ titled ‘Peckham Rock’ in one of the galleries of the British Museum without permission, and without anyone noticing.
He gave it a fake identification number and label, and it remained on the wall for three days before the Museum was alerted to the prank via Banksy’s website.

This time the British Museum has invited Banksy back to the Museum to ‘officially’ exhibit the hoax piece in the upcoming ‘I Object‘ exhibition opening on 6 September 2018, highlighting the history of dissent and protest around the world.

More info on the British Museum website
http://britishmuseum.org/whats_on/exhibitions/i_object.aspx

I Object
6 September – 20 January 2019
British Museum
London

London, Shows

London: Hope to Nope – Graphics and Politics 2008-2018

July 8, 2018 butterfly

We are pleased to be part of the latest exhibition at the London Design Museum ‘Hope to Nope – Graphics and Politics 2008-18′.

Design can influence public perception, but great design can change it. From campaign designs to protest symbols, ‘Hope to Nope: Graphics and Politics 2008-2018’ explores the impact of graphic design in political and social movements over the last ten years.

Alongside traditional posters and banners, the exhibition charts the rise of digital media and social networking, which have given graphic iconography an extraordinary new reach. The political events featured include: the 2008 financial crash; the Barack Obama presidency; the Arab Spring; the Occupy movement; the Deepwater Horizon oil spill; the Charlie Hebdo attacks; Brexit and Donald Trump’s presidency.

The exhibition is structured in three distinct sections: power, protest and personality – which explore how design is used in politics to change public perceptions.

‘Power‘ starts off with the Obama campaign’s unofficial, but hugely popular, ‘Hope’ poster by Shepard Fairey, which is later compared to the failings in the design of the Remain campaign’s materials. It also features examples of Brandalism subverts advertising posters from 2015 Brandalism ad takeover in Paris (covered) with VW spoof ad by Barnbrook and Curfew Zone by Dr.D.

Regarding UK politics, the Power section highlights the Union Jack flag made with fragile tape by Sarah Boris, which was featured during several marches against Brexit in 2016 as well as designs from the RemaIN campaign.

Examples show how graphic design is used by the establishment to assert national and political authority like the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, or used by its opponents like Soviet posters which were turned into a gay rights campaign and Dread Scott’s flag in support of the Black Lives Matter movement.

A large graphic timeline dissects the gallery, charting the role of new communication technologies such as Facebook and Twitter in global events of the last decade.

Protest displays graphic design by activists and demonstrators. The largest section in the exhibition, it includes newspapers from the 2011-12 Occupy London camp, an umbrella used during the 2014 Hong Kong ‘Umbrella Revolution’ and a 2m-high replica of the inflatable duck from the 2016 protests against Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff. This section also looks at the 2015 Je Suis Charlie and Peace for Paris marches, as well as responses to the 2017 Grenfell Tower disaster with the 24 hearts initiative by Sophie Lodge, demonstrating the important role played by graphic design in channelling anger and creating solidarity.

An installation film by Paul Plowman evokes the experience of public protest, combining hastags, forage and images from five protests : #womensmarch, #grenfell, #turkey, #catalonia, and #southafrica. These demonstrations cover diverse political viewpoints, from fighting for democracy to calling for justice, and emotions ranging from solidarity to fierce anger.

The final section, Personality, examines the graphic representation of leading political figures. Donald Trump’s trademark features are caricatured across the covers of more than 50 international magazines, including The Economist, TIME and Der Spiegel.

As we approach the ‘Nope’ of the exhibition we are faced with a scary and entertaining animation: an animatronic (mis)fortune telling machine tells and distributes messages by the new US President. This is the work by Nathaniel Lawlor, Andy Dao, Jon Barco and Bryan Denman.
‘With the over-saturation and bombardment of Trump in the news cycle, we saw how easy it was becoming for people to tune out the banter of these soundbites and Facebook headlines, so we thought—what better way to remind people of their gravitas than by showing them this could be their actual future?”