When finding out there was a penis museum in Iceland, Vagina Museum founder Florence Schechter was curious whether a vagina museum existed. After finding out it didn’t she decided that if nobody else would create one, she would create one! The museum held several pop-ups around the country including “Exhibitionist” and “Is Your Vagina Normal?” and was given its first permanent residence at Camden Market in October 2019. It debuted its first exhibition Muff Busters: Vagna Myths and How to Fight Them, which drew on the importance of knowing about gynaecological anatomy and how it works whilst debunking myths about vaginas.

The museum was left without a home for a while after its lease at Camden Market ended, but has now been able to find a new home located at ENTER in Bethnal Green. This space is three times larger than their previous location and also includes a performance space, cafe and working space. In preparation for the launch of the new venue, a campaign titled “Neighbours” has been introduced to  East London. It consists of 16 posters of artwork that combine known establishments in the area with a play on knowledge and the anatomy of vaginas. Furthermore, the new location launches with a new and improved version of their exhibition Periods: A Brief History. The exhibition takes us on a journey through history right up from ancient times until the 21st century and gives us insight and information on myths, legends, cultures and customs. The exhibition also has interactive features such as a wall in which you can add your thoughts on what the future of periods will be like, and a whiteboard where you are encouraged to draw how people in ancient times would have menstruated. It also includes visuals such as how period products such as the period belt from previous centuries looked. On top of this exhibition, there is a permanent exhibition with basic knowledge about the vagina. It’s a space including visuals on the anatomy, the “clit wall” which showcases all the different and varied ways a clitoris can look, and information on vagina-related issues.

On top of educating and stomping out stigma and sensationalism associated with vaginas, the vagina museum makes sure to be inclusive and welcoming to all and this is felt whilst on the premises.

The Vagina Museum reopened on 19th March 22, it is free admission and open to people of all ages and genders.

www.vaginamuseum.co.uk 

Reviewed by Lian Lakhope. Lian is a MA Global Media and Communications student at SOAS and a volunteer writer for Abundant Art. Lian has written for a number of different publications, mostly about music, culture and film and she is enthusiastic about expressing her passion for creating art and media.

If you prick us, do we not bleed?  by Ali Cherri, current Artist in Residence at The National Gallery, introduces cabinets of curiosity into the heart of the Sainsbury Wing, containing assembled fragments and sculptural installations. These allow us to discuss how histories of trauma can be explored through a response to museum and gallery collections.

Born in Beirut in 1976, Ali Cherri is the second Artist in Residence at the National Gallery. His residency is part of the National Gallery’s new Modern and Contemporary Programme launched in collaboration with the Contemporary Art Society, and in partnership with the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum, Coventry to display new work in their spaces. The programme connects the world’s most innovative artists with the nation’s iconic collection.

Starting with research into the Gallery’s archive, Cherri has uncovered accounts of five National Gallery paintings that were vandalised while on display-The Virgin and Child with saint Anne and the Infant Saint John the Baptist, Leonardo Da Vinci (1499-1500); The Madonna of the Cat, Federico Barocci (1575); The Toilet of Venus, Diego Velasquez (1647-51); Self Portrait at The Age of 63, Rembrandt (1699); The Adoration of the Golden Calf; Nicholas Poussin (1633-4). Presented in five vitrines reminiscent of early museum displays and surrounded by Renaissance paintings that depict wounded figures and suffering, Cherri’s installations appear like relics, mortal remains of what these works once were, of what they could have been. As we see in The Madonna of The Cat, after Barocci (2022), the affliction has repercussions on the little goldfinch that baby Jesus playfully clutches in his hand in the original painting, slashed by a knife in 1990. The bright red markings around his beak, which are thought to come from a drop of blood that fell from Jesus Christ as he carried the cross to his crucifixion, now become the emblem of the living wound inflicted by the blade that tore him from his innocence, rendering him lifeless under the crushing weight of a porcelain cast of a hand sculptured by the Lebanese artist.

Cherri’s works are yet to find peace after the mutilations suffered. They are still vulnerable, made of clay or changed into something else “to become beastly”, as in the case of the golden calf depicted in Poussin’s work that was vandalised with spray paint. Cherri chooses a lamb that dies from severe birth anomalies to represent the metamorphosis. By translating each injured work into a series of objects partially castigated and handicapped, the artist reminds us that we are never truly the same after experiencing violence.

The exhibition reveals the role played by the public’s highly emotional response to these aggressions, finding that newspaper articles would describe the damages as if they were lesions inflicted on a living being, even referring to the conservators as “surgeons”. This humanization of artworks and the overwhelming urge to heal, hide and alleviate their pain is implicitly addressed in the title which recalls Shylock’s words at the beginning of the third act of Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice: “If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?”, highlighting how the collective response to trauma and violence is the trauma itself. Through the use of mixed media that recall certain aspects of each painting, he envisions a new life for them following the assaults, and he invites us to reflect on the decisions we make about how we display trauma and to what extent we are willing to cope with the aftermath.

The exhibition brings into question the ‘politics of visibility’ which, as John Berger had already amply expressed in Ways of Seeing (1972), identifies within the image a political effectiveness that ties directly to relations of power, that is the relationship between what we see and what we know. Do the ways in which these artworks have been damaged influence the way we look at them? How far did the damages contribute to turning these works into masterpieces? The desire to tell the stories of these five paintings is certainly dictated by the need to rethink the role of a museum in times of crisis. Equally intuitive is the choice of exhibiting his works in vitrines, to contrast the very nature of the original paintings and the place where they are currently exhibited. The glass that separates the visitor from the artworks thus acts as a shield against possible attacks that can further alter the essence of the original works, preserving them in the safe and circumscribed space of the cabinets as collectible items. But it is also a symbol of the frailty that characterizes them and the vulnerability which they are exposed to, under the prying eyes of those who observe them with curious sympathy.

Cherri’s interest in the aesthetics, practices and politics of classifications and collecting in museums emerges in the staging of this exhibition and the decisions we make about how we experience, and to what extent, we accept trauma within museums.

16^th March-12^th June 2022, Sainsbury Wing, Room 57-58-59, Free admission.

More information at nationalgallery.org.uk

Danielle Dean’s multi-channel video installation, Amazon, focuses on exploitation, isolation and labour, in the latest instalment of Tate’s Art Now series. 

Dean’s multimedia work is placed in a dark room behind heavy wooden doors. Four portrait television screens stand staggered in the foreground and a large landscape screen stands in the background. Potted plants are dispersed between them – luscious green leaves with bursts of bright pink occasionally illuminated by the glare. On the large screen, the ‘assistant’ stands in front of a painted backdrop, staged like the protagonist in a 1930s movie. In fact, the whole scene is reminiscent of the Wizard of Oz – illustrated landscape, melodic voices, underlying sense of unease in every scene. 

Amazon investigates the changing nature of labour in an increasingly neo-liberal economy. Responding to Dean’s research in the archives of the Ford Motor Company in Detroit, the video starts in Fordlandia, a city founded by Henry Ford in 1928 in the Amazon rainforest. Initially built to control rubber production, Ford enforced brutal working hours and mistreated workers, resulting in a mass rebellion and the eventual abandonment of the site in 1934. This failed production line is paralleled with footage of individual accounts of workers from ‘Amazon Mechanical Turk’ (AMT), the e-commerce company Amazon.com’s labour-crowdsourcing marketplace. At AMT hiring a worker is as transactional as buying a printer. 

In the video installation, the workers are confined to individual screens, in their individual homes, sometimes engaging with one another but always remote. They account stories of their employment, each required to complete ‘human interaction tests’ in order to train artificial intelligence algorithms. Completing a role that will eventually assist in their own obsolescence, they answer questions to enable computers to accurately mimic human interaction. Consequently and echoing the revolt in Fordlandia, the workers become increasingly frustrated. Vines creep in and insects buzz around them. They bat them away with rolled-up newspapers. Are the workers rebelling or becoming defunct, grown over? It’s hard to tell.

Often, Amazon sits between reality and a sort of collective hallucination – this liminal space reflecting the almost-human computer software the workers are developing. A heavy combination of surreal and sinister, Dean’s work draws you in and keeps you focused until the end. It is a deeply concerning exploration into our capitalist futures and very real present, where workers are increasingly alienated and mechanised. The only hope is radical action, letting nature reinhabit the factory. 

ART NOW: Danielle Dean, ‘Amazon’ is showing at Tate Britain until 8th May 2022. It is free to enter and was curated by Nathan Ladd, Assistant Curator of Contemporary Art, Tate.

Art Now Danielle Dean Amazon / Tate Photography (Jai Monghan)

On the nights of the 5 and 6 March, the stage of the Barbican was taken over by a joyous army of over 100 dancers, as the hip-hop company Boy Blue celebrated its 21st birthday with its show “A night with Boy Blue”. Everything from the music, talent, choreographies, creativity and rhythm of the evening were irresistible to say the least, although none of it compared to the sense of community and festivity that emanated both from the stage and the audience. Most dance moves were followed by roars of cheerful exclamations by the public, as even the dancers would encourage each other on stage. The show managed to beautifully encapsulate the entire spirit of hip-hop in a two-hour show, and deserved every second of the standing ovation it received at the end.

The magnetising energy of the show was already clear from the opening, a collective dance routine that retraced the main years and performances of Blue Boy. The dynamic vitality of people going on and off the scene, improvising solos, cheering and high-fiving created a cadenced flow that combined beautifully with the compelling light work and rhythmic digital music. This followed with various choreographies that experimented with different sounds, costumes and styles, jumping from dreamy existentialism to funky comedy in the bat of an eye. Despite the multitude and variety of dancers, soundtracks and choreographies, the dances combined perfectly and succeeded one another with great brio.

In addition to the herculean energy of the show, what stood out the most was the variety within the show: not only with the performances, which offered a pattern of different themes, ambiance and music but also with the performers. Seeing a spectrum of dancers of all ages, gender, sizes and race was extremely refreshing and showcased the mentality of inclusion and accessibility that is typical of hip-hop. Even young kids were given a chance to perform, and the dance of the five youngest dancers of the team to the beat of famous TikTok dances was particularly heart-warming.

The evening was hosted by the founders of the MC and musician Michael ‘Mikey J’Asante and choreographer Kenrick ‘H2O’ Sandy, who occasionally interrupted the show to make sure everyone was having a good time. It was clear how much work and passion had been put into their project and the efforts made to develop hip-hop in the UK. The evening was not only a performance but a real experience of immersion in the culture of hip-hop, a culture of movement, freedom, inclusivity and enjoyment at its purest state.

Check out other Barbican events at: https://www.barbican.org.uk/whats-on/theatre-dance 

Boy Blue Photo: Phil Robertson

Reviewed by Céline Galletti- Celine is a volunteer writer for Abundant Art. Originally from France and Italy, she follows her passion for writing and art by studying Comparative Literature at UCL, London. As an international student living in London, she is determined to fully experience and understand the city’s vibrant arts scene, and be a part of its creative storm.

“Cockroach” is Jacksons Lane’s new show that ran on two consecutive nights on the 3rd and 4th of March. Chloe Mantripp’s one-woman show created a perfect mix of dance, music, acting and physical performance to build a hybrid form of storytelling that kept the audience invested throughout. It felt less like a monologue and more like a conversation that the character was having with us, whilst nonchalantly brushing her teeth or doing her hair. With her seemingly careless and ironical tone, she addresses a range of subjects going from complex socio-political subjects to deeply psychological themes.

Our heroine is a prostitute with a gritty sense of humour who welcomes us in what seems to be her home. Half-woman, half-insect, repugnant yet seductive in her red underwear set: we are conflicted on whether we are repelled or intrigued. We are put in front of a particular segment of our society, where a living being is used and forgotten by everyone and is condemned to rot in filth like a literal cockroach. Mantripp flirts with the limits of the disgusting and uses it as a shock factor, as she pulls a used condom out of her hair, pours shampoo directly into her eye and happily rolls in the dirt. However, the character is still somehow endearing, as her cheerfulness, humour and simplicity add a light-hearted appeal to the play.

The expressivity of Mantripp’s performance principally comes from the extreme physicality and energy that she showcased. Her narration was punctuated by energetic dances, acting bits, impressive physical stunts and an extremely touching final hair hang performance, hair hang being a form of aerial dance where the performer is hung by their hair. This performative aspect of the play has to do with Jacksons Lane’s role as the leading supporter of contemporary circus in the UK. The character could be summed up as a sort of sad clown that juggles between the pathetic, the tragic and the whimsical.

Mantripp’s performance carried the show from start to finish engaging its audience in the exploration of the journeys of the abandoned and the neglected.

Check out Jacksons Lane’s upcoming shows at jacksonslane.org.uk

Photo credit: jacksonslane.org.uk

Reviewed by Céline Galletti- Celine is a volunteer writer for Abundant Art. Originally from France and Italy, she follows her passion for writing and art by studying Comparative Literature at UCL, London. As an international student living in London, she is determined to fully experience and understand the city’s vibrant arts scene, and be a part of its creative storm.

2020 marked the 500th anniversary of Raphael’s death (1483–1520) and London’s museums responded to the occasion with events and exhibitions celebrating one of the most influential artists of all times. The British Museum dedicates this exhibition to the elaborate drawings of the Italian High Renaissance master and traces his influence through the works of his pupils.

The 29 works on display- 14 made by Raphael himself- highlight Raphael’s development as a draughtsman and his journey from the provincial scene of Urbino in central Italy, to establishing himself as the dominant painter, architect, and all-round artistic designer at the Papal court in Rome. To accompany the works of Raphael, there is a selection of pen and brown ink drawings by his talented students- Perino del Vaga, Polidoro da Caravaggio, Giulio Romano, Giovanni Francesco Penni, and Tommaso Vincidor- who continued to draw with a similar inventive approach enlightened by a humanist spirit. The exhibition offers a historical insight into Italy between the 15th and 16th centuries. It reiterates the central role that the Church and the various lordships of Italy have played not only in the professional success of the artists and intellectuals but above all in realising that ideal of a culture’s vision of itself, which is only typical to the Renaissance. Recurring themes addressed by the artists of the time were religious iconography – The Virgin and Child, the Resurrection of Christ, or the Entombment of Christ-, the call to antiquity and classic culture, including historical references to Ancient Greece and Rome interpreted according to the dictates of a modern and Christian taste, the study of nature and of Man. Practical exercise on drawing, through the study of life and from copies and models, was considered the most important element of the student’s curriculum.

Raphael was able to explore these ideas and then direct his studio and school to realise them in a wide variety of media. This clearly emerges in the works of Giovanni Francesco Penni, who played a key role in Raphael’s productive workshop, including making final designs for paintings, some based on preliminary sketches by his master, and completing some of Raphael’s commissions after his death in 1520, alongside his colleague Giulio Romano. Many of his paintings and drawings, such as The Dormition of the Virgin (c. 1511), were previously attributed to Raphael. In-depth studies on the technique and stylistic precision have refuted the authorship of the works. Despite being incredibly skilled, Penni failed to establish himself as an independent artist after Raphael’s death. His works however are a clear testimony to the incredible opportunity that the school offered to its students, many of whom became acclaimed artists and were courted by the noble and wealthiest families of Italy. Such is the case of Giulio Romano whose works were highly appreciated by the ruling Gonzaga family in Mantua, partly because of his stylistic deviations from High Renaissance classicism which helped define the late 16th-century style known as Mannerism. In his drawing A frieze with acanthus and animals (c. 1540-146), used as a model for a stucco decoration for the ducal palace, the decorative concepts typical of Raphael’s painting are amplified in forms that appear to be affected by gigantism.

Renaissance artists were not only worried about the subject but also about the execution – what was painted and the style in which it was painted. To this extent, close observation of nature, particularly human anatomy, and the application of scientific principles to the use of perspective and light (‘chiaroscuro’) undergo significant developments. Unique importance was given to the representation of the human figure and was considered the most qualifying aspect of the artwork.

Raphael visibly changed his harmonic and soft vision in the figurative, expressed in the graceful beauty and elegance of the Virgin’s face in his studio for The Virgin and Child (1509) which became bold and accentuated, with flashy views, plays of light and shadow and nocturnal lighting. This dramatic twist becomes self-evident in the drawings for Raphael’s final painting the Transfiguration, which represents the head of an apostle and that of St Andrew (c. 1518) where the attitudes of the characters are charged with vigour and a new expressive dynamic.

Raphael knew in depth all the pictorial experiences of his period – from the constructiveness of the Tuscan painters to the colourism of the Venetian ones -, and this gave him the opportunity to reconcile the calm and simple elegance of his early works in the style Perugino, with the power of the sixteenth century sculptural mature style. One of the most remarkable drawings displayed in the exhibition is Raphael’s David (1505). Raphael makes a free copy of Michelangelo’s David, adapting the figure to a viewpoint which in real life would be impossible from any one angle.

Central to Raphael’s success as a draughtsman was his brilliance in analysing and absorbing the work of his contemporaries, most notably Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) and Michelangelo (1475–1564), without compromising the poetic spirit that reigns in his own works, and that he transferred to his students.

2 February – 15 May 2022

Daily: 10.00–17.00

Room 90a

Free, just drop in.

For more information visit:

https://www.britishmuseum.org/exhibitions/raphael-and-his-school-drawing-connections

Raphael(1483-1520) David, after Michelangelo c. 1505 Pen and brown ink, over traces of lead paint / Photography Rachele Nizi

Reviewed by Rachele Nizi- After completing her MA in Reception of the Classical World at UCL, Rachele joined Abundant Art as a creative writer. Her British and Italian origins have inspired her to want to study Art History and European Literatures, with an interest in the afterlife of antiquity in the Western tradition.

Affecting, funny, pertinant — after a sold out run in 2019, Small Island, the play adaptation of the late Andrea Levy’s novel, has returned to the National Theatre.

Small Island sees the lives of the three main characters entwined as they navigate love, war and discrimination. Queenie (Mirren Mack), the daughter of Lincolnshire pig farmers and Hortense (Leonie Elliott), a schoolteacher in Jamaica, both marry as a means of escape. Over the course of three hours, the multifaceted characters are introduced one by one, linked by a desire to improve their futures, but controlled by their circumstances.   

At the break of the Second World War, the third protagonist, Gilbert (Leemore Marrett Jr) and Queenie’s husband, Bernard (Martin Hutson) enlist in the armed forces to support the United Kingdom. The sound design in this part is jarring; air raid sirens, bombs detonating, verbal abuse. We follow Gilbert as he experiences both racial discrimination and comradery.  

Somehow, the second half of Small Island is even more intense. After serving in the war, Gilbert and his new wife, Hortense are sold a dream of endless possibilities in post-war Britain. However, upon arriving in the ‘mother country’, they are met with hostility. The protagonist’s paths cross in London where, due to governmental neglect and entrenched racism, Hortense and Gilbert are forced to rent a tiny bedsit in Queenie and Bernard’s house. After returning home from a period of absence, Bernard, the epitome of ignorance and misguided fear, is the most hostile of all. The exchanges between the characters here are shocking, they cause unease to radiate through the theatre. Throughout the performance, the entire cast delivers powerful and emotive performances, however, in the second half Leemore Marrett Jr shines through, captivating the audience with his every word.

Katrina Lindsay’s sets are also spectacular, fluidly transformed in seconds by subtle details. Jars of sweets on shelves ascend from the ceiling to place Queenie in her Aunt’s corner shop and wheeled-on, multi-story staircases bring us into her townhouse. At several points, a large white sail, projected with archival footage, is stretched across the width of the stage. As the actors board HMT Empire Windrush in Small Island, we see clips of real people doing the same in 1948 – reminding us that this is far from just a story. 

Small Island is an incredibly accessible introduction to the horrendous acts by the UK government to the ‘Windrush generation’. This gut-wrenching reality is palpable in every scene. However, Small Island is also full of humanity, resilience, warmth and laughter. Ultimately, it speaks of the power of forging connections at the bleakest of times.

Small Island is running at the National Theatre until 30 April and tickets are available here.

Leonie Elliott in Small Island at the National Theatre – Windrush (Johan Persson)

Ativador Windows 7

It is a wide-known universal rule that art has always reflected its environment. It both models and is modelled by its geographical era, historical period and movement, acting as a “magic mirror” that reflects the truths of its society. As such, Barbican’s “Postwar Modern”’ exhibits artworks spanning from 1945 to 1965 that transport us in the world of post-World War II Britain, giving us an insight into one of the most chaotic periods of British modern history. Angst, fear, loss and hope: the exhibition skilfully brings back to life the spirit of an entire epoch through the expression of its artists.

The project of cramming two decades of art within one exposition is undoubtedly an ambitious one, especially considering the abundance and divergence of ideas, techniques and sentiments of the time. However, the Barbican exhibit manages to guide us through it with perfect organisation, without over-categorising anything and by leaving space for expression for every singular artist. You will find a multitude of different arts, going from painting to sculpture, videos, photography, collages and architecture. Even more varied is the quantity of different themes that are addressed: politics, poverty, the Holocaust, the fascination for robots and the future, gender, sexuality, love, consumerism, etc.

Historically, the postwar period in Britain was punctuated by events such as the Cold War, the crumbling of the British empire, mass migration, the Nuclear Dawn, material destruction and rationing from the War and countless shifting social dynamics. Individuals found themselves struggling with disbelief in authority and loss of meaning. Those who didn’t fall into total nihilism managed to pursue a quest for renewal in a desire to forge a better future, in a surprisingly hopeful vision that I wasn’t expecting to find in such a context. Having received an Italian education in History, I am familiar with a much gloomier vision of postwar, which was a period of extreme poverty and decline for many European countries. I can therefore relate to the admiration of Jewish artist Frank Auerbach who saw London as “a wounded city at the cusp of rebirth”, facing a promising future despite the trauma of war.

Overall, the red thread of the exposition is the shared experience of the artists, although their responses and means of expression are extremely varied. The pilot of war Nigel Henderson recreates his distant and elevated point of view of the war seen from the skies. Eduardo Paolozzi’s dark and twisted artworks express a giant internal void left by the war. Sylvia Sleigh’s representations of her lover Laurence Halloway in cross-gendered clothing defies the boundaries of gender expression. The paintings of the married couple Jean Cooke and John Bratby engage in a domestic war that expresses the suffocations of traditional marriage. Frank Auerbach, Leon Kossoff and Gustav Metzger use thick layerings of paint to convey their experience as Jewish immigrants fleeing European Nazism in London. Eva Frankfurther and Shirley Baker use photography to show the lives of Londoners from a compassionate and humoristic point of view. If I were to describe everything that marked me, I could go on for pages.

If you didn’t know your history, you definitely will at the end of this exhibition. An experience of discovery for younger generations, of remembrance for older ones, and of appreciation of art and history for everyone. Get your tickets at: https://www.barbican.org.uk/whats-on/2022/event/postwar-modern-new-art-in-britain-1945-1965.

Photography credit: Barbican gallery

Reviewed by Céline Galletti- Celine is a volunteer writer for Abundant Art. Originally from France and Italy, she follows her passion for writing and art by studying Comparative Literature at UCL, London. As an international student living in London, she is determined to fully experience and understand the city’s vibrant arts scene, and be a part of its creative storm.

At the National Gallery’s ‘Virtual Veronese’ exhibition, you gain the best experience from a virtual reality headset of Paolo Veronese’s painting ‘The Consecration of Saint Nicholas’. This was commissioned in 1561 as an altarpiece to hang in San Benedetto al Po, the abbey church of one of the largest and most important Benedictine monasteries in Europe. This is a unique project where visitors are able to see the painting in its original chapel in the church of San Benedetto and explore its beautiful frescos and architectural magnificence as it was.

This experience provides you two guides when exploring the painting – you can choose either Andrea Asola, Veronese’s patron and abbot of San Benedetto al Po, or Dr Rebecca Gill, the curator of Virtual Veronese. The two guides let us explore how the painting would have been seen in its original setting in 1562. With Rebecca as my guide, I experienced Veronese’s painting and the frescoes that decorate the chapel’s walls. The historical figure of Abbot Asola gave me an insight into why he commissioned the altarpiece and the troubles facing his monastery at the time. This method is more appealing than traditional exhibitions as it adds layers of sound and video rather than content only. Virtual Veronese enables us to deeply understand the background, meaning and emotion of the painting.

Virtual Veronese surrounds the viewer within an enclosed virtual space created by an accurate scanned 3D model of the chapel and tells its story using volumetric video actors. When the church bell rings, visitors can walk around the church immersed in the story of art. The digital experience is accompanied by a recording of Gregorian chant, performed by Veneti Cantores. The piece of music is taken from a choral book that was produced at San Benedetto al Po in the 1560s. The music that visitors hear is the same as that performed by the monks nearly 500 years ago. The background score transports us to old times and the original setting through the medium of virtual digitalism. This is a path-breaking project showing how existing art can be combined with new ideas to produce a valuable new experience.

This experience lasts just under eight minutes, and subtitles are available in English, French, German, Italian, Spanish and traditional Chinese. After the experience, visitors can visit Room 9 in the National Gallery to see the painting on display. This free digital experience can now be booked in twenty-minute ticketed sessions available from the gallery’s website:  https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/exhibitions/virtual-veronese

National Gallery visitors in headsets in the trials for the Virtual Veronese experience; Photo © National Gallery, London

Reviewed by Jiajing Yang. Yang is a MA Documentary-Fiction student at UCL and a volunteer writer for Abundant Art. Yang has written several different articles on the WeChat platform and Zhihu website, mostly about film and literature, and she has published a romantic novel based on ancient China. 

As a greenhouse of creativity, the artist’s ‘studio’ has always been regarded as a place veiled in mystery. Uncovering the ‘veil’ as such in various directions beyond our expectations, The Whitechapel Gallery presents its new special exhibition ‘A Century of the Artist’s Studio’ from 24 February to 5 June 2022.

Bringing together works from over 80 artists and collectives from various continents, including Africa, Australasia, South Asia, Europe, the Middle East, North and South America, the exhibition features modern icons such as Francis Bacon, Louise Bourgeois, Pablo Picasso, Egon Schiele, and Andy Warhol, in addition to contemporary figures such as Walead Beshty, Lisa Brice and Kerry James Marshall.

With 11 sections, this large-scale exhibition highlights various themes such as ‘performing the studio’, ‘the collective studio’, ‘the studio as installation’ and so forth, in order to present a riot of colours reflected in the artist’s studio as a prism. Through the exhibition, the artist’s studio becomes a workplace for genius artists, then transfers into a cage that encloses the mental agony and pain of creation, and even morphs into a stage and an artwork in itself. For example, behind the wall near the entrance which displays photos of Picasso posing in his studio, Nikhil Chopra’s la Perla Negra: Plaza de Armas stands in silence to greet visitors. This studio-like cage or a cage-like studio is made for the 2015 Havana Biennale. In this cage on the Plaza de Armas, Chopra painted what he saw through the bars on public view. Observing unfinished brushstrokes, messy surroundings such as wrinkled fabrics and paint boxes covered in dried paint, visitors are presented with a juxtaposition, or a contrast, between Picasso standing in an imposing manner with his finished masterpieces and an absent artist with only his unfinished paintings locked away in a cage.

The artist’s studio can also become a space to embrace wounds and tears. ‘The collective studio’ section introduces visitors to an arpilleras embroidery work produced by female artists’ workshops that took place illegally behind closed doors during the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile. Domestic craft activities helped the women artists to document the injustices of the regime; some of them even used the very clothes of those who had been imprisoned or ‘disappeared’, as a gesture of mourning, protest and resistance.

The malleable concept of ‘studio’ also leaves physical traces. Several sections in the exhibition, such as ‘the secret life of the studio’, ‘the intimate studio’, and ‘a day in the life of the studio’, give visitors the opportunity to get a closer look at the studio as a physical space. By exploring Darren Almond’s The Remnants(Freud) and its depiction of the enlarged image of fabrics that were used in art creation, or Francis Bacon’s brushes and paint boxes solidified with dried paint, visitors are offered a glimpse into the behind-the-scenes art-making process. In these studio spaces indexed by the mess of making, one can imagine how artists sometimes scatter paints in a passionate manner like Jackson Pollock, or follow personal routines to serve as a creative ‘worker’ rather than an artist as indicated in Lisa Milroy’s A Day in the Studio, or even adhere to mechanic orders to spend and record time by adapting seemingly meaningless acts like Tehching Hsieh in his One Year Performance.

In addition to the artworks, the exhibition provides a series of ‘studio corners’ that recreate the actual environments where great art has been produced, allowing visitors to get a more realistic feel for the studio space. Most importantly, by juxtaposing modern icons with contemporary artists, the exhibition transcends 100 years of time and asks what has changed and what has remained in the concept of ‘studio’, or even ‘art’.

To explore more about the exhibition, please visit: https://www.whitechapelgallery.org/exhibitions/a-century-of-the-artists-studio-1920-2020/

Image Credit: Kerry James Marshall, Untitled (Painter), 2008, Acrylic on PVC panel in artist’s frame, 73 x 62.9 cm. Collection of Charlotte and Herbert S. Wagner III. © Kerry James Marshall. Courtesy of the artist, David Zwirner London and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York. Photo: Steve Briggs. Image From The Whitechapel Gallery

Sun A Han is a volunteer writer for Abundant Art. Originally from South Korea, she discovered her passion for art at the age of ten, by encountering Picasso’s masterpiece – “Guernica”. She is currently pursuing a master’s degree in Art Theory and Philosophy at Central Saint Martins. As a writer, she aspires to write about art that heals the soul, touches the heart, and gives voice to the oppressed.