“Be beautiful and shut up”
This week
💦 passion and freedom
💦 galleries, riding and clubbing
💦 Diet Coke as social hollowness
Events
It is WARM and we’re back, bitches. Taking the scenic route between shows on the hop this week, we’ll be dreaming of soaking up the long-ass evenings after the clocks go forward at the weekend. This week is all about interdisciplinarity as we bop from Modern Forms’ talk to Prem Sahib’s new performance at Somerset House; from Hairy Mary’s studio sale to Sean Roy Parker’s Monday opening at Piccalilli!! Ciao, Chickens!
🧊 20 March | 6-8pm | With Urgency (Daria Blum, Guendalina Cerruti, and Mary Stephenson), Ilenia [Shoreditch High St]
🧊 20 March | 6:00pm | Screening: Albert Oehlen’s “van G”, Curzon Mayfair [Green Park] | Free tickets here
🧊 20 March | 6:30pm | Today, Tomorrow: The Future of the UK’s Art Scene? (Talk presented by modern Forms) [Bond Street]
🧊 20 March | 6-8pm | Sophie Mei Brikin and Elli Antoniou: A Brief Interval - Spills Within, The Split Gallery [Bethnal Green]
🧊 21 March | 7/9 pm | Prem Sahib: Alleus, Somerset House [Temple] | Tickets here
🧊 21 March | 6-8pm | Judith Bernstein: TRUTH AND CHAOS, Emalin [Shoreditch]
🧊 22 March | 6-9pm | Slugtown: Our Teeth Are Reefs, Collective Ending [Deptford Bridge]
🧊 22 March | 6-9pm | VALHALLA, Harry Hugo Little and Frederik Jorsk, Shipton [Hackney Wick]
🧊 22 March | 5-7pm | A group show where the theme is dog., Opposite Rodeo Gallery, 12a Bourdon St [Bond St]
🧊 24 March | 12-4pm | Hairy Mary Studio Sale [Gospel Oak] | Free, tickets here.
🧊 25 March | 6-10pm | Sean Roy Parker: Man of Kent, Piccalilli [Sydenham]
Exhibition of the Week
Gina Fischli: Love Love Love, at Soft Opening, until 6 April, info here.
Recently on Reddit we learned that, for centuries, the only way to get your hands on a Borzoi – or Russian Hunting Sighthound – was if a Tsar gifted you one directly. Bred by nobility in Russia since the 16th Century, Borzoi were designed to look gorgeous, and to hunt and kill wolves for sport. (Wild). While researching these darling longbois we discovered that when the Russian proletariat overthrew the ruling elite, they slaughtered the borzois as well ! as “symbols of the class that kept them” according to this frivolous 1991 NYT piece.
The harrowing story of the borzois returned to us as we surveyed Gina Fischli’s show Love Love Love at Soft Opening. A column of lumpen pets dominates the space: dogs, cats, rabbits – constructed from plaster, mesh wire and textiles. Such kitsch representations of familiar domestic and urban animals! we exclaim.
Brought together on a runway threading throughout the gallery, the positioning of static animal sculptures establishes a tension with the viewer, reversing the traditional catwalk format by inviting the spectator to approach. One way of looking at the sense of contrivance and performance given shape by Fischli’s mode of display is in relation to Theodor Fontane’s 1892 novel, Frau Jenny Treibel, which opens with a description of a small dog. As a placeholder for human experience, the ‘pooch’ represents the artifice of bourgeois society. Seemingly unconcerned with the sentimental, but rather with the grotesque, Love Love Love is critical of a certain human drive that results in the callous use of animals as status symbols and emotional props, portraying them as crippled victims of overbreeding; existing to accessorise.
Perhaps Fischli is commenting on our propensity to confuse love and oppression... There are links to be made with the seriousness of artistic ideals, wryly undermined by this show. If there is a critique of the mechanisms and repercussions of human desire and artistic aspiration at the centre of the work, the question is raised: can art be a malignant force?
As Fischli’s sculptures spotlight the absurdity of human-animal relationships, so they can be understood as an ironic commentary on the lack of nuance in the market’s treatment of art. As the exhibition text says, ‘Much like the pageantry of dog breeding or fashion shows, galleries and arts institutions prioritise entertainment and aesthetics—but at what cost?’...x
Hot Links
🐳 “Rossellini just started ‘a little experiment with sheep’ at her farm” – spittle loooves an interview where you can sense a lil tension between the interviewee and interviewer, and this one in Vogue is a cracker, including a brilliant moment where Isabella Rosellini snaps at Lulu Garcia-Navarro for asking about men too much… Also covering sheep, legacy and the parallels between whales and post-menopausal women, it's a real lesson in grace and diplomacy
🐎 “Ms. Philo sighed and stared at the wall” – Babe, new Phoebe Philo interview just dropped !! The ever illusive Philo gives a characteristically straightforward interview, deadpan focusing on the launch of her eponymous brand. We obviously enjoyed reading that her office ‘contained not a single personal item’ and learning her hobbies include ‘baking, galleries, riding, and clubbing’’ #same
‼️ “There are so many passive paintings, I can’t stand it” – In a double edgelord convo, Jamian Juliano-Villani speaks with Jordan Wolfson for Gagosian Quarterly and says ‘I view myself as an idea orphanage’ while revealing her favourite artists are Mike Kelley, Robert Gober and Richard Artschwager… Now they’ve talked the talk, will they walk the walk and collab?
😈 “a gloriously horny bit of business” – For ArtReview, Philippa Snow asks “Would you kill for Kristen Stewart?” as she reviews the hotly-anticipated queer horror of the spring, Love Lies Bleeding. It’s steamy, sweaty, gory and gruesome, and we can’t waiiit to see it!
💩 “Trauma bonding is the experience of being siblings, I realise, which is why everyone who’s ever worked for Louise Blouin is my forever family” –Hot off the revenge press: Janelle Zara names and shames Louise Blouin as part of her very entertaining Frieze LA diary and we love to see it x
Add-to-cart
28 March can’t come soon enough ! We cannot wait for Jonathan Buckley’s new Fitzcarraldo novel to be released. The plot spotlights a self-made businessman and art collector who vanishes from his palatial home in the Scottish Highlands. The blurb describes it as a ‘work of strange and intoxicating immediacy, exploring wealth, the art world, and the intimacy and distance between social classes.’ Gee, feels like it will hit close to home! Available to pre-order here.
Parting Shot
An entertaining letter in this week’s New Statesmen Diary... Rosie writes in about her ‘very tall’ husband Alexander who was spotted while riding on the tube by Wolfgang Tillmans, who then asked to permission to photograph him, before later meeting up with prime minister-elect Keir Starmer (apparently, the author heard this from a ‘friend’). So many questions. We can only imagine the tension in Rosie’s house, wondering if Alexander’s portrait will end up in Tillmans’ next solo at Maureen Paley? And what was Wolfgang supposedly doing with Starmer…? Shooting the next cover of Arena Homme +? We hope so!!
xxxx