Avery Singer

Free Fall

★★☆☆☆

On until 22 December 2023

It’s officially no longer “too soon” for mediocre 9/11 art. Singer’s installation mimics the lobby and office spaces of the World Trade Center which she remembers from visiting her mother at work. This could be a trauma theme park but is instead an excuse to show off a handful of paintings of characters associated with the attacks. The stylised photorealistic canvases have titles that suggest deepfakes and are elaborate in their making: a 3D artist, a model maker, and a make-up specialist are involved. 

Singer has the benefit of ‘lived experience’ to defend her method but the content and extravagance of this production in central London are puzzling. This show would be better without the baggage of the artist’s personal story and even better without the Twin Towers altogether. The qualities of the image and Singer’s idiosyncratic construction of her subject are enough to deal with the event’s excess.


notes and notices are short and curt exhibition reviews. Read more:

Victor Man: The Absence That We Are at David Zwirner ★★★☆☆

Victor Man

The Absence That We Are

★★★☆☆

Man’s colours are only a small nudge of the wheel from Tretchikoff’s infamous portrait of the Chinese girl.

Willie Doherty, Remnant at Matt’s Gallery ★★★☆☆

Willie Doherty

Remnant

★★★☆☆

Doherty’s tragipoetic timing can be masterly.

Medusa at Union Gallery ★★★☆☆

Ada Bond, Rebecca Davy, Karen Densha, Sam Owen Hull, Hilary Jack, Rachel Goodyear, Evita Ziemele, et al.

Medusa

★★★☆☆

Interpreting a tale this grotesque, ugly, and venomous will take thousands of years

Open Group, The Polish pavilion in Venice ★★★☆☆

Open Group

Repeat After Me II

★★★☆☆

The applause was rapturous. A sense of tragedy, however, was altogether missing.

Trevor Yeung, Hong Kong in Venice ★★★☆☆

Trevor Yeung

Courtyard of Attachments

★★★☆☆

This fishbowl universe is easy sea comfort but ultimately no sushi.

Pablo Bronstein, Cakehole at Herald Str ★★★☆☆

Pablo Bronstein

Cakehole

★★★☆☆

Bronstein falls into the late evening stupor of the cheese trolley, the oyster tray, and… the Mars bar.

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