exhibition

Teenage Kicks

Artists Jemima Brown, David Hancock, Alex Mcquilkin, Daniela Wolfer

10.Oct.07 - 11.Nov.07
wednesday-saturday
£ -, - advance, - concession

Private View, 12.Oct.07, 18.00-21.00

Curators Ken Pratt, Melanie Moreau

Vegas Gallery
64-66 Redchurch Street
London E2 7DP
07726750762 / 02077294819
hello@vegasgallery.co.uk
www.vegasgallery.co.uk
Tube Liverpool Street, Old Street, Aldgate East, Shoreditch / Hoxton

THE PROJECT
Teenage Kicks is the new episode of FAMILY VIEWING, a project initiated by the artist Jemima Brown during 2005. She proposes as a starting point a collaborative model of working that falls between the traditional processes and divides – or at least the representation of these – between artists and curators. These groupings or ‘families’ of artists and curators will work together to produce projects or ‘episodes’. In effect, each episode becomes a snapshot or family album of the family dynamic created by Jemima with each new family: a new configuration of artists and a new curator for each space hosting the project

“I need excitement oh I need it bad/And it's the best, I've ever had”
-The Undertones (1978)

Vegas gallery, as part of the edgy Brick Lane area, couldn’t be a better choice to welcome the new episode of Family Viewing “Teenage Kicks”. Initiated by the artist Jemima Brown during 2005, and as part of her practice, Family Viewing is a broad interpretation of the idea of ‘family’. Each episode invites artists and curators to become a snapshot of the family album. The artists selected today cover a full range of media and practices, proposing miscellaneous interpretations about the puberal world, the search for a unique social identity, and its consequences within family and society.

In order to test their limits, in the grand tradition of rebellion and provocation, teenagers look for challenges. They have a flashy sexuality with Daniela Wolfer, play disturbing lolitas with Erica Eyres, and sexual fantasies with Jemima Brown. They can abuse and be abused. Theatrically excessive, they veer from comic to tragic in a matter of moments. David Hancock’s painting or Alex McQuilkin’s video recreates melodramatic scenes expressing an intriguing duality between beauty and destruction; as well as Ari Versluis’s mute video of a frenetic dancer.

Their desire to be someone special can be mixed with the one for fame and recognition. Warhol’s prophecy has created a cult for individualism through celebrity and stardom, who seems to be the only way to uniqueness. Teenage is a posing time. They want to be fashion icons with Klaus Wanker, rock stars with Luc dondeyne. Their rite of passage are various, yet similar. Dean Chalkley reports their youth and excitement, where despite getting messy or dirty, they remain kind of sweet and innocent.

Not to forget they are fragile. They are searching for clues to their identity within a society where dysfunctional families are common, with ageless and disoriented parents who compete with them in the search for happiness. Ivan Jones’s work thrives on this tension with a sense of foreboding and claustrophobia.

Since the beatniks and the hippies, the gap between generations seems to be reduced. Though everyone remembers the angst of being a teenager, we also long for their excitement and their dreams. And perhaps, as Teenage Kicks suggests, in a society where hedonism and individualism are treasured, are we not more fascinated than disturbed by them?