Gavin Turk
dal 21/6/2006 al 16/9/2006
Segnalato da
21/6/2006
Gavin Turk
Schloss Eggenberg, Graz
A drunken sailor, a crushed polysterene cup with the dregs of tea, a match, used and thus worthless. He takes his place as yet another "Hall of Fame" figure in addition to such icons as Che Guevara, Sid Vicious, or Joseph Beuys. Turk is once again playing with his own identity as he slips into the skin of a fictitious self.
Last Year in Eggenberg (The Paradise Show)
A drunken sailor, a crushed polysterene cup with the dregs of tea, a match, used and thus worthless - welcome to paradise!
Gentleman Jim takes his place as yet another "Hall of Fame" figure in addition to such icons as Che Guevara, Sid Vicious, Elvis Presley or Joseph Beuys positioned by the British sculptor Gavin Turk. Turk is once again playing with his own identity as he slips into the skin of a fictitious self. Anyone who knows this artist and his work will recognise grotesque self-portraits in these life-size figures, expressions of a Utopia, a dream or a nightmare. The search for happiness in ideal worlds and in the here and now, illusion and the real blend into each other, become a metaphor for the absurdity of reality and one’s own existence.
Moreover, Turk shows an alternative version of paradise, that is complemented through "lost" and forgotten objects, relicts, at the interface between everyday and ideal worlds: a crushed polystyrene cup with the dregs of tea, the drink of civilised British culture, stuck to the bottom as a cliche'; a match, used and thus worthless - thrown away, already declared to be dead, which Gavin Turk not only brings back to life, but on which he confers immortality. The equivocal symbols of civilisation are sublimated and refined by Gavin Turk, in that he casts them in bronze only to deprive them then once more of their material value, by painting them to appear realistic.
Image: Gavin Turk, Gentleman Jim, 2005. Automat und verschiedene Materialien in einer Vitrine 214,5 x 100 x 100 cm
Schloss Eggenberg, staterooms, arcade passages and the courtyard
Eggenberger Allee, 8020 Graz
Opening hours: Tue - Sun 10am-5pm (guided tours only!)
Guided tours: Tue - Sun 10, 11, 12 am, 2, 3, 4 pm and by prior arrangement