The Urethra Postcard Art of Gilbert & George at White Cube

“We are the most disturbed people we have ever met”. This statement was carefully written, rewritten and signed by the artistic duo 13 times. Then the 13 postcards were arranged into a square with a single postcard in the middle, an arrangement they state symbolises the urethra and is a direct reference to Charles Webster Leadbeater, who incorporated the symbol into his signature. Leadbeater was a follower of Theosophy and an author on the occult; his career was also haunted by rumours of peadophilic crimes. This tickling of the line between provocative and shockingly inappropriate is typical of the pair’s work.

The majority of the postcards in the exhibition are not made by Gilbert & George; they are a collection of London’s touristic postcards and call cards, apparently collected from phone booths. Mesmerizing patterns formed by the composition of Union Jacks are juxtaposed with photos of a man’s tight backside and the curious advertisement: "i'll drag you round my posh flat by your nuts, you filthy vetch".

The deliberate combination of these two points of focus: the garish side of tourism and the sex market, blend to form a bizarre view of contemporary London. White Cube claims that Gilbert & George describe ‘with utmost clarity, poignancy and intensity, the unifying experiences of being alive in the modern world’. While it is impossible to claim that tourism and sex are not a part of our modern consumerist society there is little here for the common person to relate to. Audiences at White Cube explore the postcard collection, squealing with shock and delight at the explicit call cards, however I suspect that Urethra Postcard Art will not remain long in their minds, after they emerge from the Gallery back into pristine St. James’s.

The exhibition at White Cube, Mason's Yard closes on 19^th February 2011.

'La Tempesta' in Mime

Chocolate cakes and tape cassettes swinging from a washing line, a kangaroo wearing boxing gloves and dying clowns, an industrial robot and audacious nude performers, aerial acrobatics and melodramatic musical strains; these are just some of the theatrical treats enjoyed at this year’s International Mime Festival in London. The festival is difficult to typify. It is difficult, in fact, to typify what precisely mime is today; it seems that silence is no longer a prerequisite. Some of the performers in this year’s festival would look at home in the Cirque du Soleil, while others lack not only such acrobatic skill but also the concentrated physical control associated with traditional mime.

I went along to the ICA, to see the Italian duo Anagoor perform Tempesta. The company define themselves as a ‘theatrical project’. Tempesta took as a point of reference, and as a namesake, Italian Renaissance painter Giorgione’s work La Tempesta, although they make reference to several of his works.

During the performance, the two performers move slowly around the stage, traveling in and out of a large constructed glass box. They repeatedly dress and undress, emerging and disappearing in the mist created by a smoke machine. Layers are built in smoke, flesh, and cloth, alluding to the slow evolution of the painting process. In sparse moments of clarity the figures pause in the pose of a Giorgione figure. Playing on two portrait-shaped video screens are images of the performers; snippets of the outside world. The performers mirror their filmed selves as if willing themselves into this exterior reality. The ambiguity of their interaction recalls the ambiguity of Giorgione’s painting – the nature of its subject is still debated.

Mysterious or simply pretentious? Intense and atmospheric, or boring?  I would say that Tempesta occupies a grey space in-between these labels. Such an enigmatic nature welcomes personal interpretation with open arms. But it also risks not conveying any message with conviction.

Tempesta uses theatre to recreate a painting and one must ask the question: why? Watching Tempesta is indisputably a very different experience to sitting in front of a painting for an hour but there is a niggling sense that, in spending so long exploring the nuances of Giorgione’s artworks, Anagoor have forgotten to relate it to their own world; consequently the themes and issues engaged with in Tempesta lack the bite of the contemporary.

Anagoor are on tour in Italy until the 20^th February.