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 surprise, surprise exhibition tour
 to access audio and video on collective you need real player.A real who’s who at London’s ICA. We all make assumptions. It’s inevitable. When you look at an artwork you come with a whole backlog of beliefs and knowledge based on an artist’s past work - their nationality, their name, the information given to you on the label. But the ICA’s version of a summer blockbuster is full of artwork that shakes up the preconceptions you may have. Pig by Dinos Chapman and Two Blind Mice by Chris Ofili. There’s an amazing range of names in this show – a virtual who’s who of contemporary art. But looking at the works on the walls you wouldn’t know who created what. This exhibition is purposely obtuse. It brings together atypical pieces from artists such as Doug Aitken, Matthew Barney, Jake and Dinos Chapman, Martin Creed, John Currin, Takashi Murakami, Cindy Sherman, Anish Kapoor, Andreas Gursky, Wolfgang Tillmans, Larry Clark, Raymond Pettibon… the list goes on. There are no labels on the walls (though thorough reading of an accompanying catalogue can attribute each piece). Instead, the focus is on what’s on the walls. It’s a real temptation to hum Cilla Black’s theme tune as you wander around the show. (Art tarts will also enjoy the guessing game, trying to put names to pieces.) The work is often totally unexpected. Damien Hirst’s wooden collage; Paul McCarthy’s almost subdued Gucci mannequins; Rodney Graham’s modernist abstract paintings titled Picasso, My Master.  Red Sienna by Peter doig and Hirt by Neo Rauch. Sometimes you can see a connection with the themes running through someone’s work, though the expression is often unusual. Larry Clark’s found footage of a teenage boy re-enacting his anal rape on daytime TV talk shows sits well with his predilection with teen angst, sex and violence. Takashi Murakami’s trio of gold and silver minimalist panels look at Japanese culture, but in a very different from to his hyper-pop signature style. It’s refreshing not to be given a whole pile of information to absorb as well as the artwork. Surprise, Surprise forces you to actually look. Just expect the unexpected.
Francesca Gavin
Surprise, Surprise is at the ICA, London, until 10 September 06.
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 jake & dinos chapman interview jake & dinos chapman review jake & dinos chapman review john currin review takashi murakami review cindy sherman review anish kapoor review larry clarke interview damien hirst review thomas demand review paul mccarthy review chris ofili interviewbooks  books and comics archive Author interviews and reviews from 2002 to 2008. games  games archive Gaming features and weekly columns from 2002 to 2008. |
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