France-Lise McGurn

Strawberry

★☆☆☆☆

On until 2 October 2024

“Preferring to work quickly and intuitively”, as the gallery handout informs us, McGurn has created the visual equivalent of elevator music. Indeed, to paint these figures of young, often naked women cannot have demanded more than a weekend. The formula which McGurn follows, however, is exacting. Her template was perfected by scores of commercial illustrators and street caricaturists through years of market research.

The pastels are twee. The baby deer outline which shows up on two canvases isn’t bizarre enough to put the rest in some contrast. Against this gallery interior’s opulence, these paintings aren’t even a plausible study of kitsch.


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

Tesfaye Urgessa, The Ethiopian Pavilion in Venice ★★★★★

Tesfaye Urgessa

Prejudice and Belonging

★★★★★

Urgessa’s figures are contorted in love, death, or merely life.

Mike Kelley, Ghost and Sprit at Tate Modern ★★★☆☆

Mike Kelley

Ghost and Spirit

★★★☆☆

The challenge of curating a retrospective of a career as rich as Kelley’s is to build a narrative that both lay audiences and art historians can believe. Wood packs the show and pleases neither fully.  It’s remarkable that any artist’s…

Terry Winters: Along the River at Modern Art ★★★★★

Terry Winters

Along the River

★★★★★

A creationist science born out of oil.

Theodore Ereira-Guyer, Jandyra Waters: We Lost Lots of Beautiful Things at Elizabeth Xi Bauer

Theodore Ereira-Guyer, Jandyra Waters

We Lost Lots of Beautiful Things

★★★★☆

The human mind is mimetic – all art is representation.

Anna Glantz, Lichens at Approach ★★★☆☆

Anna Glantz

Lichens

★★★☆☆

The clues that Glantz leaves on her surfaces are also traps. There are either too many or not quite enough to follow or fall into. 

Women in Revolt! at Tate ★★★☆☆

Women in Revolt!

★★★☆☆

There’s a room for female labour, a corner for childbirth, one for black women, and a section for lesbians. This is as close to nuance as Tate gets today.

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