TRAPPED NEW PAINTINGS BY CAT PHILLIPPS
TRAPPED
MARTELLO STREET STUDIOS 1st JUNE – 4th JULY ’24
E8 3PE LONDON FIELDS, HACKNEY
With uncanny timing, as seen on streets all around the country the younger half of kennardphillipps, Cat Phillipps has gone feral and attacked the subject with a ferocity unseen in painting in over half a century.
TRAPPED promises large scale works and a view on a process never seen before whilst somehow echoes come to mind of great troublemakers and masters in art down through the centuries.
Enter the studio for a wild and intelligent reset to help propel you through these generally dismal days. Come and have the wax wiped from your eyes.
open Saturday/Sunday 12-6pm | 10-4pm weekdays | by appointment | ring the bell
free entry and plenty for sale
Defaced;Money,Conflict,Protest exhibition Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, 2022
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge included Study for a Head XIV in their exhibition Defaced:Money,Conflict,Protest
Continuum, Cello Factory, London, 2022
Politics in Art exhibition MOCAK, Museum of Contemporary Art, Krakow 2022-23 Studies for a Head
ArtMonthly review / Julian Stallabrass
ArtMonthly_Julian Stallabrass review
From The Edges of Conflict exhibition James Hockey Gallery 2021 Massacre of The Innocents
Americas Greatest Hits , EXILE gallery
With the exhibition Americas Greatest Hits the London-based artist duo kennardphillipps are responding to the rise of right-wing populism, not just in Austria but around the globe. The fragility of democracy and the dangerous undercurrents of current political speech and institutional violence stand at the center of this exhibition produced specifically for, and in response to, EXILE’s space and close location to the seats of power of the current right-wing ÖVP/FPÖ government.
Entering the wooden, ground floor space of the gallery a large, almost wall-sized image is depicting a pictorial night shot of the brightly-lit Austrian Parliament building flying the Austrian flag. On the opposite wall hang three individual banners showing red-white-red colored horizontal stripes, as in the Austrian flag. All works are printed on extremely thin dust sheet not intended for printing on and appear smeared if not at times obliterated. Between the wall works a record player is playing a single track, manually set on repeat.
The image of the Austrian parliament building with its panoramic perspective and scenic lighting could be sourced from countless amateur tourist smartphones or stock-photography websites. It’s generic but well-composed pictorial quality is only ruptured by the fragility of it’s own printing material which yet again seems to enhance the image’s appearance as almost skilful and, to a degree, oddly painterly. As a combination of perspective, lighting, scale and technique the work refers to a particular genre of large-scale representational painting found in most buildings of socio-political powers aiming to underline the owner’s or institution’s importance and, as a final goal, their longevity.
Installed on the opposite wall are three banners depicting the colors of the Austrian flag. These seemingly life-size representations of an actual flag seem to allure to all too common nationalist sentiments felt not only in Vienna but across many cities and countries. Only loosely attached to the gallery’s wooden wall onto wooden bars, their vernacular identity reminds uncomfortably of traditional Trachtenvereine, nationalist Burschenschaften or patriotic party congresses. Though here, the pictorial and painterly smears of the image of Parliament have turned into tracks or traces diluting the distinct color blocks of most national flags. The red color at top and bottom quite literally bleeds into and across the center white. The unabsorbable ink is looking for ways or channels to attach itself onto a hostile surface not meant for such purpose. A simple technological failure metaphorically questions national identity and individual socio-political responsibility.
Central in the ground floor space is the evolving, process-based work that gives the show its title. In response to kennardphillipps’ artwork the album sleeve Americas Greatest Hits lists all unarmed fatalities of US police shootings since 2015. London-based intermedia artist Mukul has initiated the recording of an LP as a memorial to the victims. This initial edition contains a single track produced using the police body cam recordings of violence perpetrated against citizens who were neither armed nor attacking.
Images and audio together form two aspects of an environment in which visitors are invited to reflect upon the current crisis of our democratic institutions in relation to the global rise of right-wing populism. It is a reminder that history can all too easily repeat itself if we do not learn from it.
EXILE
Elisabethstrasse 24
1010 Vienna, Austria
kennardphillipps exhibition Finnegans Woke RUA RED, Dublin 2019
virtual tour created by Martin Dunne, @SeeBigPhotography
Finnegans Woke, RUA RED, Dublin 2019
Installation Photos: Kasia Kaminska
