- Venue
- Flowers East
- Location
Considering this latest show at Flowers East is all about junk, consumer waste and rubbish, they’ve managed to keep the gallery space looking remarkably spick-n-span.
Featuring work from both established and emerging artists, 'Says the Junk in the Yard' is a landfill of different media, including video, photography, painting, sculpture and, well, actual pieces of rubbish.
Much of the work on show has a definite Duchampian feel; Peter Blake has put his understated collection of found kitsch clutter on display and Stuart Haygarth’s impressive work, 'Spectacle', is a huge tiered chandelier made up of 1020 pairs of old prescription eyeglasses.
Other artists have chosen not to get their hands quite so dirty and simply opted to mimic that desirable landfill look. For instance, on first glance, Susan Collis’ piece, 'Better Days', appears to be a dustsheet splattered with paint, but on closer inspection you’ll notice that it’s actually a canvas embroidered with multicoloured thread. While Gavin Turk’s piece, 'Nomad', is a pristine bronze replica of a tramp’s dirty old sleeping bag.
This exhibition is packed with work. In fact it’s too full and much of it doesn’t seem to know why it’s there. What the curators should’ve done is separate out all their paper, metals, glass and plastic rather than just lumping it altogether in the same bin – naughty, naughty.
Nevertheless, 'Says the Junk in the Yard' contains lots of juicy morsels and I recommend you just have a good rummage around until you find something tasty – a half eaten cheese sandwich perhaps?
