Societe Perrier | Surrealist Art Exhibition Modern Panic Opens in Hackney
Modern Panic IV features work from 60 provocative modern artists from around the world
By: Tristan Hanks
Modern Panic, a surrealist art exhibition already in its fourth instalment, which takes place at Apiary Studios in Hackney.
Curated by London artist collective Guerilla Zoo, Modern Panic IV showcases a multitude of cutting edge contemporary artists from all around the globe.
As well as paintings and sculptures there will be installations, body art and live performances on the opening night with a focus on controversial and provocative works.
Société Perrier met up with the show’s curator James Elphick for an in-depth chinwag concerning leftfield art, surrealism and the merits of shock value in the art world.
What can we expect from the fourth instalment of Modern Panic?
Alongside 60 provocative modern artists from around the world, I’m very pleased to present rare comic art by visionary surrealist cult film maker Alejandro Jodorowsky, who’s coincidentally just released his first film in 23 years. Cuban artist Erik Ravelo, the man behind United Colours of Benetton’s UnHate campaign which featured doctored photos of world leaders kissing, is showing his controversial portraits of lost childhood which have been banned and blocked by social media. The brilliant work of Paris-based Paul Toupet’s breath-taking darkly surreal sculptures, Spanish artist Celia Arias’s profane embroidered creatures, and the not-to-be-missed miniature microchip masterpieces of USA-based Yuri Zupančič, among many many others!
How will the live art aspect work?
Performance and Live Art is a key artistic genre in the art world and has been on the rise within popular culture, partly due to the work of iconic artists such as Marina Abramovic and the Tate Modern’s Tanks project space, but also as a reaction from contemporary artists with the disillusionment of conventional artistic mediums. At Modern Panic IV we are dedicating several evenings to an array of international and powerful new Live Artists. ‘Panic Sermons’ will feature the work of six young live art’s practitioners on each evening in front of an initiate crowd. The work varies; from Colombian Andrea Meneses Guerrero’s beautiful movement-based journey, to body artist Victoria Gugenheim’s live painting and physical endurance work of Phil Bedwell and Hellen Burroughs. On the opening night of Modern Panic IV we will also feature several live art performances from Italian electro-shock hacker artist Francesca Fini, alongside the work of Tom Bresolin, Amy Kingsmill and others.
Is the show a response to more sedate exhibitions in London?
To some extent Modern Panic is a response to the work that has become the norm in contemporary art. Walking into many commercial galleries more often than not the work is trying to fit some unfortunate ‘bankable’ criteria, leaves no lasting impression on its viewers, and generally escapes the mind moments after exiting the gallery. Modern Panic is an exhibition designed to provoke a reaction in the viewer, to show them what they find acceptable or not in themselves and to leave them with the aftermath of their thoughts and an entire gallery of images ingrained and tapping away at their subconscious.
What does a piece need to be labelled Surreal?
Surrealism was a movement started in the 1920s and inspired Absurdists, Dadaists, Viennese Actionists and various Avant Garde artistic practices. Its influence was far reaching and can be seen in the work of Salvador Dalí & Antonin Artaud’s “Theatre of Cruelty”, to the Beat Generation writers and film makers such as Alejandro Jodorowsky & David Lynch. The art forms of these visionaries all have a very hallucinatory, dream-like, fantastical and unusual quality about them, which is the resolve of trying to connect the “contradictory conditions of dream and reality” – essentially enabling the subconscious to express itself! The work on display at Modern Panic connects to the roots of the surrealistic 1960′s Panic Movement (of which it is inspired by) with modern artists who are in touch with their subconscious and able to provoke viewers with the lost art of dreaming & the truths of reality.
Is shock value necessary to fit into the remit of Modern Panic?
It’s very difficult to shock a generation who have been brought up on endlessly distressing local and world news, over sexed television shows and violent first/third person computer games. This art exhibition is about more than controversial art. It’s about work that has a message, some of it powerful in a political sense and some of it strangely surreal. It has always been down to the artists of the times to remove the veil from the public’s collective field of vision and reveal things in a way they can truly contemplate. I would recommend this great short documentary film of the last Modern Panic exhibition in 2012, which details the concept of ‘art as a liberating force for the mind’ and features interviews with last year’s artists – https://vimeo.com/65934475
Modern Panic IV takes place at Apiary Studios, 458 Hackney Road, E2 9EG from 8-11 November.
Modern Panic, a surrealist art exhibition already in its fourth instalment, which takes place at Apiary Studios in Hackney.
Curated by London artist collective Guerilla Zoo, Modern Panic IV showcases a multitude of cutting edge contemporary artists from all around the globe.
As well as paintings and sculptures there will be installations, body art and live performances on the opening night with a focus on controversial and provocative works.
Société Perrier met up with the show’s curator James Elphick for an in-depth chinwag concerning leftfield art, surrealism and the merits of shock value in the art world.
What can we expect from the fourth instalment of Modern Panic?
Alongside 60 provocative modern artists from around the world, I’m very pleased to present rare comic art by visionary surrealist cult film maker Alejandro Jodorowsky, who’s coincidentally just released his first film in 23 years. Cuban artist Erik Ravelo, the man behind United Colours of Benetton’s UnHate campaign which featured doctored photos of world leaders kissing, is showing his controversial portraits of lost childhood which have been banned and blocked by social media. The brilliant work of Paris-based Paul Toupet’s breath-taking darkly surreal sculptures, Spanish artist Celia Arias’s profane embroidered creatures, and the not-to-be-missed miniature microchip masterpieces of USA-based Yuri Zupančič, among many many others!
How will the live art aspect work?
Performance and Live Art is a key artistic genre in the art world and has been on the rise within popular culture, partly due to the work of iconic artists such as Marina Abramovic and the Tate Modern’s Tanks project space, but also as a reaction from contemporary artists with the disillusionment of conventional artistic mediums. At Modern Panic IV we are dedicating several evenings to an array of international and powerful new Live Artists. ‘Panic Sermons’ will feature the work of six young live art’s practitioners on each evening in front of an initiate crowd. The work varies; from Colombian Andrea Meneses Guerrero’s beautiful movement-based journey, to body artist Victoria Gugenheim’s live painting and physical endurance work of Phil Bedwell and Hellen Burroughs. On the opening night of Modern Panic IV we will also feature several live art performances from Italian electro-shock hacker artist Francesca Fini, alongside the work of Tom Bresolin, Amy Kingsmill and others.
Is the show a response to more sedate exhibitions in London?
To some extent Modern Panic is a response to the work that has become the norm in contemporary art. Walking into many commercial galleries more often than not the work is trying to fit some unfortunate ‘bankable’ criteria, leaves no lasting impression on its viewers, and generally escapes the mind moments after exiting the gallery. Modern Panic is an exhibition designed to provoke a reaction in the viewer, to show them what they find acceptable or not in themselves and to leave them with the aftermath of their thoughts and an entire gallery of images ingrained and tapping away at their subconscious.
What does a piece need to be labelled Surreal?
Surrealism was a movement started in the 1920s and inspired Absurdists, Dadaists, Viennese Actionists and various Avant Garde artistic practices. Its influence was far reaching and can be seen in the work of Salvador Dalí & Antonin Artaud’s “Theatre of Cruelty”, to the Beat Generation writers and film makers such as Alejandro Jodorowsky & David Lynch. The art forms of these visionaries all have a very hallucinatory, dream-like, fantastical and unusual quality about them, which is the resolve of trying to connect the “contradictory conditions of dream and reality” – essentially enabling the subconscious to express itself! The work on display at Modern Panic connects to the roots of the surrealistic 1960′s Panic Movement (of which it is inspired by) with modern artists who are in touch with their subconscious and able to provoke viewers with the lost art of dreaming & the truths of reality.
Is shock value necessary to fit into the remit of Modern Panic?
It’s very difficult to shock a generation who have been brought up on endlessly distressing local and world news, over sexed television shows and violent first/third person computer games. This art exhibition is about more than controversial art. It’s about work that has a message, some of it powerful in a political sense and some of it strangely surreal. It has always been down to the artists of the times to remove the veil from the public’s collective field of vision and reveal things in a way they can truly contemplate. I would recommend this great short documentary film of the last Modern Panic exhibition in 2012, which details the concept of ‘art as a liberating force for the mind’ and features interviews with last year’s artists – https://vimeo.com/65934475
Modern Panic IV takes place at Apiary Studios, 458 Hackney Road, E2 9EG from 8-11 November.
