Art Monthly 474: March 2024

Contents

Nicole Wermers, from the ‘Reclining Female’ series

Interview

Invisible Labour

Nicole Wermers interviewed by Ellen Mara De Wachter

I have been interested in different ways of interacting with architecture for a while, and maintaining and cleaning it is the most direct and yet totally underappreciated way to do so.

Chris Ofili, Requiem, 2023

Feature

Grenfell

Morgan Quaintance argues that Chris Ofili’s mural for the victims of Grenfell Tower at Tate Britain was compromised from the start

Chris Ofili’s rendering moves the Grenfell Tower fire out of the realm of the real and places it in the metaphorical zone of allegory, and shifts Khadija Saye from the conscious intentions and actions of her life to that of saintly, one-dimensional martyrdom.

Peter Fischli & David Weiss, How to Work Better, 1991/2023

Feature

Levelling Up?

Laura Harris exposes as a sham the government’s plan for a so-called ‘Renaissance’ in the regions

The regional inequalities that continue to scar the UK, and the other social inequalities that deepen them, are, and have always been, in direct opposition to the interests of art in general – that is, art as a vital part of life, rather than a growing part of the economy.

Dora Budor, Passive Recreation, 2024

Profile

Dora Budor

Tom Denman

Dora Budor urges us to attend to the intrusive mechanisms of control – often dressed up as care – ingrained within the built environment, and thereby to outwit such mechanisms that entice our unthinking obedience.

Editorial

ACE About Face

ACE’s recent updated guidance to its regularly funded National Portfolio organisations, warning them that political statements could potentially cause ‘reputational risk’ to ACE, was ominous in its vague, open-ended wording which implied that in future the funding of organisations working with artists who engage with political issues could be at risk.

This is dangerous territory for art in general and for art magazines in particular: art magazines are critical by definition, regularly publishing views with which the editorial staff may not agree, which is why most magazines, including Art Monthly, carry a disclaimer.

Artnotes

ACE Review

Current culture secretary Lucy Frazer has ordered a full review of ACE to decide whether it is fit for purpose; the current home secretary has made it a jailable offence to scale war memorials; a new report details the damaging extent of government cuts to museum and gallery funding; the House of Lords debates the value of the arts; protesters target the British Museum and Tate Modern; cultural figures are forced to resign across Europe; plus the latest on galleries, people, awards and more.

Obituary

Carl Andre 1935–2024
Michael Archer

Zayd Menk, 4.3.2…, 2022, ‘New Contemporaries’, Camden Art Centre

Exhibitions

When Forms Come Alive: Sixty Years of Restless Sculpture

Hayward Gallery, London

Penelope Curtis

VALIE EXPORT: Retrospective

C/O Berlin

Mark Prince

Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley: THE REBIRTHING ROOM

Studio Voltaire, London

Hannah Hutchings-Georgiou

Agata Madejska: Grand Habitat Horror Vacui

Flat Time House, London

Maria Walsh

Ed Webb-Ingall: A Bedroom for Everyone

Peer, London

Peter Suchin

Jacqueline Poncelet: In the Making

MIMA, Middlesbrough

Virginia Whiles

New Contemporaries

Camden Art Centre, London

Adam Heardman

Richard Grayson: W.S.I.N.

Matt’s Gallery, London

Will Jennings

Condo London MMXXIV

various venues

Paul Carey-Kent

Andrew Black, On Clogger Lane, 2022

Film

Andrew Black: On Clogger Lane

Chris Townsend

The film contrasts an imagination of communal identity with the alienating effects of modernity on a sparsely populated rural landscape.

Luke Conroy, Unfolding, 2023

Film

International Film Festival Rotterdam

Rachel Pronger

The resulting video by Luke Conroy is a broad parody of the self-annihilating individualism inherent in the language of self-care; take a moment to breathe deep while the world burns.

peter campus, from the ‘myoptiks’ series

Film

peter campus: myoptiks

Chris Meigh-Andrews

Despite his choice of medium, peter campus considers himself to be a painter and, insofar as his interest in the control and manipulation of light, colour and composition is central to this recent work, the films are also about movement – the containing, control and manipulation of time and motion.

Bocar Niang giving a performance in 2023

Reports

Letter from Tambacounda

Agnieszka Gratza

The ceremony was a showcase of what the future griot museum could be, if Bocar Niang and his collaborators can succeed in pulling it off.

Bojan Stojcic, 36 Proposals for A Public Monument, 2023

Reports

Letter from Bosnia-Herzegovina

Jon Blackwood

The diasporic longing to return home has brought others back to confront the challenge of maintaining a contemporary art profile from their city of origin.

Keith Haring in front of his Unfinished Painting, 1989

Artlaw

This Is Not by Me

Henry Lydiate

Completion of works has long been a contentious issue for artists and their estates after death, which statutory moral rights seek to address not only via the integrity right, but also coupled with further rights to claim or deny authorship.