exhibition

Among the Believers

Madeleine Strindberg

17.Sep.04 - 31.Oct.04
Wed-Sun 12-6 or by appt

Contemporary Art Projects
20 Rivington St
London EC2A 3DU
020 7739 1743
info@caprojects.com
www.caprojects.com
Tube Old Street, Liverpool Street, Shoreditch / Hoxton

Among the believers is an installation of paintings made in response to events that have dominated news coverage for the past two years: the invasion of Iraq by coalition forces and its violent, unresolved aftermath.

The source material is derived from newspaper treatment of the war. Images are then adulterated and transformed in unexpected ways that strip the original photographs of their bland over-familiarity: towering helicopters are embellished with fairy lights and laconic, often ironic headlines from the travel section; lit by a lurid neon glow, the wreck of a bus takes on a monumental identity completely divorced from the object it may once have been; dehumanised soldiers metamorphose into teddy-bear-like creatures. These transgressive aesthetics conjure a visual anarchy in which sentimental pathos is pitched against raw visceral pain. By transmuting clearly recognisable political events into scenes from a comic-book misadventure, Strindberg's works emphasise the paradoxes and discongruities of the subject matter and challenge viewers to re-examine their assumptions and beliefs.

Madeleine Strindberg lives in London and studied at the Royal College of Art. She was artist in residence at the National Gallery, held an Abbey Scholarship at the British School in Rome in 1996, and won the 1998 Jerwood Prize for Painting. She has exhibited widely in Britain and abroad, and in April 2003, she participated in the Sharjah International Biennale, United Arab Emirates.

Publications Madeleine Strindberg - Among the Believers, 2004

 

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