Art curator and film director, Simon Rumley, interviews artists Hugh Mendes and Gordon Cheung about their forthcoming exhibitions this month. To listen to the podcast, click here, or save the file to your computer / device, by right clicking the link and selecting ‘Save as’. More information about the exhibitions can be found below.
The Alan Cristea Gallery will stage an exhibition of new works, Gordon Cheung: The Light that Burns Twice as Bright, from 14th September to 5th October. Cheung’s artistic vision is fuelled by an anxious reflection on the current state of affairs in capitalist societies. In response to the hegemony of neo-liberal ideology and the spiralling internal logic of the markets, he invokes prophetic visions of the impending end of our civilization: epic, sublime but terrifying revelations of post-apocalyptic landscapes, set against the backdrop of stock prices. He cross-references cultural, mythological, political, religious and artistic allusions to capture the ‘desert of the real’: a hyper-real cyberscape of toxic undertones and noxious glows, complete with rampaging fauna, paranoiac hallucinations of collapsing architecture and techno-psychedelic Biblical apparitions.
Gordon Cheung: The Light that Burns Twice as Bright, 14th September – 5th October at the Alan Cristea Gallery, 31-34 Cork Street, London W1. Tel: +44 (0) 207 439 1866. Opening hours: 10am – 5.30pm Monday – Friday, 11am – 2pm Saturday. Website. More information about Gordon Cheung can be found at his website.
Throughout human history there have been certain moments and events that have affected global consciousness in such a profound way that the world stands still. On the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 attack, Hugh Mendes looks back over his personal record of the period and the aftermath presented through painting, drawing and original newspaper clippings. This memorial exhibition represents a selective history of the last decade and how it has been described to us through the media. Transcribing newspaper articles, the paintings filter the information we receive on a daily basis to give us only hints at what is happening. While having a focus on the fall out of the 9/11 attacks, we also catch a glimpse of what else is considered newsworthy. Exercising his own journalistic integrity, Mendes presents his potted history of the last decade, showing the devastating alongside the more trivial. A painting of Farrah Fawcett’s obituary sits alongside a clip referencing the 9/11 trials. Nothing is too extreme or too banal. We are given facts but out of context. It is Mendes’ own personal newspaper.
Hugh Mendes 9/10/11 Memorial Exhibition, 9th September – 1st October at the Kenny Schachter / ROVE Gallery, Lincoln House, 33-34 Hoxton Square, London N1 6NN. Opening hours: Monday – Saturday 10am – 6pm and by appointment. Website. More information about Hugh Mendes can be found at his website.
