With: Jemima & Dolly Brown / Gordon Cheung / Leo Fitzmaurice / David Hancock / Owen Leong / Andy Magee / Rui Matsunaga / Richard Meaghan / Stuart Semple / Hannah Wooll / Dawn Woolley / Isabel Young.
Curated by David Hancock & Richard Meaghan
For the Liverpool Independent Biennial 2006, David Hancock and Richard Meaghan have curated an exhibition that invigorates the idea of portraiture in the 21st Century. The artists selected will explore the historical significance of portraiture as a way of defining our times. Portraiture is an arts historical legacy, giving us a valuable insight into the figures that populated particular periods. A good portrait gives a sense of personality and allows us to empathise with someone lost to time, yet it seems in the past the genre has mostly focussed upon the great and the good. In this exhibition the artists aim to focus upon society as a whole, from the celebrity to the disparate, from those neglected in the past to those who haunt the realms of the imagination.
As a port, Liverpool was a gateway to the North of England and is responsible for the cultural make up of Cities across the North West. In a way this exhibition reflects the city’s heritage, parodying its unabashed neglect for values that we hold so dear today, and yet the exhibition aims to draw parallels with our contemporary ability to disregard these values as and when it suits us. Therefore, within the framework of some of the work, ideas of imperialism are incorporated alongside comments on materialism, consumerism, alienation, globalisation and the cult of celebrity.
The Exhibition will be on the 6th Floor of Gostin Buildings, Hanover Street and run concurrently with the Liverpool Biennial as part of the Independents.
Opening Times: 13 Sept - 26 Nov 2006 / Mon-Sat 10-5pm
6th Floor, Gostin Buildings
Hanover Street - Liverpool