A giant, golden urn ‘Le Vase Abominable’ dominates this
exhibition of recent work by Adel Abdessemed and matches the height of the
artist. Strapped to the base are a series of gas tanks and explosives with a
digital clock counting down to zero. It is a confrontational object marrying craft,
luxury and danger. Operating as an absurd self-portrait, the object embodies both
aggressor and victim. An ostensibly ‘Orientalist’ and desirable artefact is
transformed into something to fear. This satirical thrust characterises the
rest of the works on show and they are invested with historical and
contemporary resonance. The exhibition does not illustrate a reassuring ‘hybridity’
across cultures but rather produces jarring encounters expressed in diverse
media such as drawing, assemblage and animated film.
A series of smaller vases made of clay, salt, rubber, gold
and marijuana sit on empty ammunition boxes like trophies of war rather than commodities
or vessels. This thematic interest in aggressive acquisition and projection of
power permeates the exhibition. And upstairs we meet a rendition of a naked
child running from horror, ‘Cri’, which
appropriates an iconic scene from the Vietnam and translates it into opalescent
blocks of carved ivory. Despite the gallery’s assertion that the ivory is ethically
sourced, it is still a gory representation of human agony using a material associated
with illegal animal slaughter. Naturally this confers an added frisson to the
figure. Subtlety is neglected and instead Abdessemed sets up intentional
provocation.
Charcoal drawings of singular unidentified soldiers achieve
a universal summation of modern warfare. These young men hide beneath their
uniforms and equipment, exempt from responsibility, appearing life-size as if
standing a few metres away in real time and space.
As a nod to the host city, the artist has a made a drawing
of the historic British, throne housed in Westminster Abbey. It represents
archetypal power, faceless and unaccountable, casting a long shadow across a
bleak landscape.
Abdessemed demonstrates technical skill and wryly addresses contemporary
anxieties about the instability of the modern world. The exhibition manages to
feed a prevailing paranoia and unease, but what’s missing is any confident ethical
or political position. Instead, he tends to fall back on mocking subversion to
achieve a rather theatrical and ultimately ephemeral effect.
No comments:
Post a Comment