New exhibition invites artists
to beg, steal, and borrow

14 Feb 2020

   

A new London exhibition curated by Professor Jean Wainwright and featuring artwork by Gavin Turk, Ori Gersht, and Yinka Shonibare CBE alongside distinguished artists from the University for the Creative Arts (UCA) opens later this month.

Wainwright is a Professor of Contemporary Art and Photography at UCA, as well as an art historian critic and an internationally recognised Andy Warhol expert. She has curated an exhibition titled Beg, Steal and Borrow, showcasing how artists scavenge, remix, and recreate using what is already there to fashion new work and create new debate.

“Art is timeless, but art is also provisional, one iteration of an idea giving way to another: Raphael and Diego Velázquez to Édouard Manet, Andy Warhol to Sturtevant, Walker Evans to Sherrie Levine, and in our digital age, these iterations are becoming far speedier,” explained Professor Wainwright.

Gavin Turk. Pop Head, 2011, Acrylic paint on canvas © Courtesy of the artist

The works in the exhibition are unique and multi-layered yet, bear trace or reference to the other artworks or contemporary issues, from art history to archival material, colonial history to online bullying. There are collages and sculptures, large canvases, photographs, appropriated collections and videos.

In our age of digital acceleration, copyright laws are currently under huge pressure because of the availability of digital imaging devices, smartphones, the accessibility of computers, the rise of social networking sites. This means that at ever-increasing speeds online work can be copied, shared, parodied and memed in seconds.

Ori Gersht, On Reflection, Material B02, 2014. Archival Pigment Print. © Courtesy the artist and Yancy Richardson Gallery, NY

“We are exposed to so many often fleeting, visual influences,” explained Professor Wainwright. “For many artists appropriation is about addition or reinterpretation, so that the new creation is unique, yet contains within it copies or traces of the original.

The artists featured in the exhibition include Philip Colbert, Haley Morris-Cafiero, Yinka Shonibare CBE, Ori Gersht, Melinda Gibson, Stuart Hilton (UCA), Birgitta Hosea (UCA), Steffi Klenz (UCA), Simon Patterson, Andreas Schmidt, John Stezaker, Gavin Turk, Jessica Voorsanger (UCA).

Jessica Voorsanger. Andy Warhol (Amanda Root) 2010, Inkjet Jessica Print, © Courtesy of the artist

Beg, Steal and Borrow opens on 26 February and runs until 7 March at the Bermondsey Project Space, 183-185 Bermondsey Street, London, SE1 3UW.

The Private View will take place on 25 February.

To learn more about the exhibition and programme of Round Table Discussions, visit the Bermondsey Project Space website.

To learn more about studying at UCA, visit the course pages.