Identity theft has become a very topical fear in our contemporary society due to Internet hacking and the fraudulent use of discarded financial documents. It involves various types of impersonation and scams that the media claim are very common everyday occurrences. As a deterrent people are encouraged to become more vigilant by using document shredders and to be constantly on their guard for suspicious emails. Security specialists have even proposed the introduction of a national database and I.D. system that contains personal biological digital data such as iris scans and dental records. But the idea of substituting identity with such fixed, precise and infinitely transferable data doesn&rsquo;t seem to be an accurate reflection of who we really are. In fact it&rsquo;s not possible to literally &lsquo;steal&rsquo; someone&rsquo;s identity since identity has no physical existence. Identity relates to various aspects of an individual - appearance, personality character, feelings, intelligence, and behavior. Using the term identity theft as its title this exhibition presents a selection of artists who investigate commonly held assumptions about identity through stereotypes, gender and ethnicity. There&rsquo;s a tendency to assume that identity is a fixed ideal &ndash; something very specific rather something quite abstract, ambiguous and transient. It is perhaps significant that the word identity has a similarity with the word &lsquo;identify&rsquo;. As part of the process of understanding, human beings feel a need to classify, generalise and simplify other people&rsquo;s appearance and personality traits - fix them in a stable and stabilizing identity. This can lead to cultural stereotyping where someone from a particular ethnic background is identified with its traditional cultural traits that often unwittingly render them with a clich&eacute;d identity. In some cultures it is believed that to photograph someone is not only to steal their identity but their very soul. The &lsquo;shaping&rsquo; of identity, includes elements that are geopolitical, ethnic, class, gendered, generational, institutional, or personal. This exhibition explores how much fact and how much fiction goes into such representations of identity, it could be argued that all art objects concern themselves ultimately with identity, either explicitly or implicitly. Some artists might portray themselves with multiple identities representing already existing stereotypes. They can also blur fact with fiction by appropriating the identity of others like a celebrity or becoming their alter ego and might also copy another artist&rsquo;s signature style or even usurp their actual works. Art helps to shape the identity of its maker, subject, and audience. This exhibition aims to address some of the transformed meanings of the concepts of art and identity and how socio-political forces and art-historical critique influence the production of visual art in an era dominated by the rapid globalization of culture. Participating artists (proposed/confirmed):- Alice Anderson, Sam Buxton, Jake &amp; Dinos Chapman, Filippo Ciavoli, Tom Gallant, Stephane Graff, Sanam Khatibi, Gonkar Gyatsu, Ximena Garrido-Lecca, Alastair Mackie, Wangechi Mutu, Whitney McVeigh, Sandra Setzkorn, Chiharu Shiota, Gavin Turk

Identity Theft

Identity theft has become a very topical fear in our contemporary society due to Internet hacking and the fraudulent use of discarded financial documents. It involves various types of impersonation and scams that the media claim are very common everyday occurrences. As a deterrent people are encouraged to become more vigilant by using document shredders and to be constantly on their guard for suspicious emails. Security specialists have even proposed the introduction of a national database and I.D.

I8 gallery, Reykjavik, open their Winter Show in December of 2010, featuring Gavin Turk's .

The Winter Show

I8 gallery, Reykjavik, open their Winter Show in December of 2010, featuring Gavin Turk's .

Something Like This at Park Ryu Sook Gallery was Turk’s first solo exhibition in Korea, which featured about 20 of Turk’s most representative works including sculptures, paintings, silkscreen works and a video. 

One of Turk’s earliest best-known sculptures, Pop (1993), was on display: a life-size waxwork self- portrait in which Turk adopts the identity of Sid Vicious singing ‘My Way’ in the pose of Elvis Presley, as depicted by Andy Warhol. In Pile (2004), a painted bronze sculpture of a pile of garbage bags, Turk explored the way in which a work of art is conferred with iconic status and value. 

Turk has always been interested in the way fame and celebrity affect the understanding of art and the position of artists. Included in the exhibition were museum-scale canvases depicting the artist in the personae of Che Guevara, Evlis Presley and Joseph Beuys, all in the style of Andy Warhol. Turk borrows from the history of art and at the same time references contemporary popular culture, exploring the power of artists while questioning the uniqueness and inherent value structure of the creative process.

Something Like This

Something Like This at Park Ryu Sook Gallery was Turk’s first solo exhibition in Korea, which featured about 20 of Turk’s most representative works including sculptures, paintings, silkscreen works

Gavin Turk’s En Face series travelled from CAC Malaga to be presented at Almine Rech in Paris. The series consists of a collection of 72 clay busts created in an interactive performance that took place at the artist’s London studio in April of 2010. 

For The Bust Party, as it was known, Turk invited a group of people to manipulate the still wet clay of the busts in order to transform them into Surrealist “Exquisite Corpse.” In doing so, the artist had folded the public into the creative process, giving them the chance to add their own mark to a work in process.

The result was En Face, a title derived from French which Turk used to create a play on words describing a situation in which the viewer is confronted with a work of art and is capable of extracting and re-printing his or her own personal mark directly onto it.

The exhibition questioned the role of art, artists and its viewers. Turk’s intention was to suggest the idea of art as authorless, the result of a collaborative effort by a group of people whose involvement was – in this case - not just limited to the interpretative task of looking at the work.

Also notable are the titles that Turk had given to each of the busts. These were all anagrams of his own name, again, commenting on the value of authorship and identity. These titles included Raving Kut, Gavring Tuk, and Gun Irk Vat (all 2010).

En Face 

Gavin Turk’s En Face series travelled from CAC Malaga to be presented at Almine Rech in Paris. The series consists of a collection of 72 clay busts created in an interactive performance that took place at the artist’s London studio in April of 2010.

En Face (Paris)

An exhibition of a dozen challenging sculptures by contemporary artists, selected by Tony Hayward, that examine the significance of weight and touch in visual objects.

Gavin Turk,  To Take Away, 2004, Painted bronze, 86 x 75 mm

An exhibition of a dozen challenging sculptures by contemporary artists, selected by Tony Hayward, that examine the significance of weight and touch in visual objects.

Heft: Weight and Touch in Contemporary Sculpture

Les Bikes de Bois Rond were commissioned by Commissions East as part of the Fleet project. Turk produced 20 bikes in response to Andre Cadere’s Barre de Bois Rond, a transportable wooden staff consisting of 21 painted wood segments. Turk exhibited a dozen of his transformed bikes in the Artconnexion space and also organised and led a bike tour, in Lille, as part of the exhibition.

The bikes were also used for two bicycle excursions on the Essex and Suffolk coasts in July of 2010 and two exhibitions at Landguard Fort, Felixstowe, and St Mary’s at the Quay, Ipswich, later that summer.

Les Bikes de Bois Rond

Les Bikes de Bois Rond were commissioned by Commissions East as part of the Fleet project. Turk produced 20 bikes in response to Andre Cadere’s Barre de Bois Rond, a transportable wooden staff consisting of 21 painted wood segments. Turk exhibited a dozen of his transformed bikes in the Artconnexion space and also organised and led a bike tour, in Lille, as part of the exhibition.

In June of 2010, CAC Malaga presented Gavin Turk’s&nbsp;En Face series, a collection of 72 clay busts created in an interactive performance that took place at the artist’s London studio in April of 2010. 

For The Bust Party, as it was known, Turk invited a group of people to manipulate the still wet clay of the busts in order to transform them into Surrealist “Exquisite Corpse.” In doing so, the artist had folded the public into the creative process, giving them the chance to add their own mark to a work in process.

The result was En Face, a title derived from French which Turk used to create a play on words describing a situation in which the viewer is confronted with a work of art and is capable of extracting and re-printing his or her own personal mark directly onto it.

The exhibition questioned the role of art, artists and its viewers. Turk’s intention was to suggest the idea of art as authorless, the result of a collaborative effort by a group of people whose involvement was – in this case - not just limited to the interpretative task of looking at the work.

Also notable are the titles that Turk had given to each of the busts. These were all anagrams of his own name, again, commenting on the value of authorship and identity. These titles included Raving Kut, Gavring Tuk, and Gun Irk Vat (all 2010).

En Face

In June of 2010, CAC Malaga presented Gavin Turk’s En Face series, a collection of 72 clay busts created in an interactive performance that took place at the artist’s London studio in April of 2010.

En Face (Malaga)

Group exhibition curated by Keith Coventry

Peeping Tom

Group exhibition curated by Keith Coventry

As a major event of British participation in the 2010 Shanghai Expo, the British Council will work in collaboration with the Shanghai International Culture Association and the Minsheng Art Museum in exhibiting 90 art works of contemporary British art by 39 established artists in China. With the title The Future Demands Your Participation: Contemporary Art from the British Council Collection, the exhibition of the best pieces of contemporary British art will be held in the Minsheng Art Museum in Shanghai from January to March 2010 with later tours to other cities in China.

As one of the most well-known prizes, the Turner Prize has encouraged many contemporary British artists with outstanding artistic achievements. Among the 39 artists participating in this exhibition, there are 11 Turner Prize winners and 22 Turner Prize nominees including Damien Hirst, Anish Kapoor, Mona Hatoum and Steve McQueen, which will make this exhibition an extravagant feast of contemporary British art.

Andrea Rose, Director of Visual Arts in British Council, said, “these art works are as valuable as Rolls-Royce cars, and like multi-purpose off-road vehicles, they carry the achievements of British art to different places in the world. Visual art has been flourishing in Britain after the Second World War and there has been a passionate need of seeing these art works around the world. Thanks to the British Council Collection, we are able to present the British innovative ideas and achievements to the world in the fastest and best way.”

The Future demands Your Participation (2)

As a major event of British participation in the 2010 Shanghai Expo, the British Council will work in collaboration with the Shanghai International Culture Association and the Minsheng Art Museum in exhibiting 90 art works of contemporary British art by 39 established artists in China. With the title The Future Demands Your Participation: Contemporary Art from the British Council Collection, the exhibition of the best pieces of contemporary British art will be held in the Minsheng Art Museum in Shanghai from January to March 2010 with later tours to other cities in China.

The Future demands Your Participation

Sur le dandysme aujourd'hui attempts to show how many of the concepts and strategies developed by nineteenth-century dandies can be found in the work and attitudes of certain contemporary artists, and how the iconography and themes of the literature of dandyism are still significant.

Sur Le Dandysme Aujourd’Hui

Sur le dandysme aujourd'hui attempts to show how many of the concepts and strategies developed by nineteenth-century dandies can be found in the work and attitudes of certain contemporary artists, and how the iconography and themes of the literature of dandyism are still significant.