Tag Archives: exhibition

Burtynsky: OIL, Photographers’ Gallery

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I was impressed when my younger brother told me he was spending his Saturday visiting an exhibition. Amazed by his proactivity I joined him on his mission into central London.

The Photographers’ Gallery just off Oxford Street reopened in May after an eighteen month refurbishment. This space is the country’s original independent gallery devoted to photography and the top two floors of the building are currently exhibiting Edward Burtynsky’s epic photos examining our dependence on oil.

The images depict landscapes affected by oil distribution and extraction – vast, often ugly views captured exquisitely by Burtynsky. The immense works are so detailed they look almost velvety in texture and are as awe-inspiring close up as they are from a distance. This Canadian photographer tells a story through each individual picture. Through “aerial views of oil fields and highways ribboning across the landscape, derelict oil derricks and mammoth oil-tanker shipbreaking operations, we are confronted with the evidence of our dependence on this finite resource.” They are very still and poignant photographs, people are almost entirely absent from the images creating a curious atmosphere and perspective.

Burtynsky has travelled the world to find these unique expansive spaces that show the rarely seen effects oil has on our planet. Aside from being utterly spectacular photographs, this exhibition is a lesson and reality check from which we could all benefit.

Continues until 1 July. Free entry. Visit website here.

It is worth visiting the shop downstairs too for weird, wonderful and rare film, cameras and books.

Damien Hirst, Tate Modern

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The new Damien Hirst exhibition at Tate Modern is essentially all about dots, death, decay and diamonds. Thinking back through the collection every piece seems to fit into one of these dramatic categories.

Forever making a statement, Hirst’s work aims to shock and surprise and though I can sometimes be cynical of this (generally) overrated artist, I was impressed with the display and variety in the Tate’s exhibition.

The show is the first major survey of Hirst’s work to be held in London and features the most famous and controversial works from throughout his career. Born in 1965 in Bristol, he grew up in Leeds and while studying art at Goldsmiths, achieved recognition from the exhibition Freeze, which he curated in 1988. He became known for his daring and provocative works such as the shark suspended in formaldehyde, ‘The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living’ 1991.

Perhaps the most disturbing pieces in this show are the poor animals chain-sawed in half to create symmetrical parts. Set in tanks of formaldehyde the organs are still and serene, now merely an object replacing life. In one of the first rooms a recently detached cow’s head is skinned, raw and bloody on the floor, flies swarm around, it is foul and yet captivating. It is called ‘A Thousand Years’ (1990) and supposedly captures a whole life cycle.

The organised pill cabinets are perhaps the most aesthetically satisfying and pleasing pieces in the show. Colour coordinated tablets sit on thin silver shelves as part of a huge work. ‘Lullaby, the Seasons’ (2002) is really quite beautiful, layers and layers of multicoloured pills, medicine as art soothing the eye just as it remedies our ailments.

There is some excitement to be had in the installation ‘In and Out of Love’ 1991. Guests are invited into a specially maintained humid enviroment where white canvases embedded with pupae hatch and live butterflies flutter freely amongst the visitors. Again Hirst touches on themes of life and death, beauty and cruelty. In the adjacent room colourful pictures are made by dunking dead butterfly wings in paint.

The final rooms show Hirst’s more recent preoccupation with money, wealth and specifically diamonds. Pieces holding thousands of pounds worth of meticulously arranged glittering diamonds sparkle unlike anything you have ever seen before. It is like entering a chest of jewels, and doesn’t feel real. These opulent works revisit old ideas but now in an entirely new form.

Whatever your preconception is, the Damien Hirst is definitely worth seeing, even if just to fuel your curiosity.

Exhibition continues at the Tate Modern until 9 September, book here.