James Welling and Bernd & Hilla Becher

★★★☆☆

On until 19 April 2025

Not taking the Becher’s name in vain was once the sole Düsseldorf school commandment. Welling trained elsewhere and, besides, his claim on typology is also a decades-long story. Yet this two-venue paring of the three photographers’ deadpan architectural meditations is a dead giveaway of Welling as a mere imitator.

Perhaps. The Bechers recorded industrial phenomena with such restraint that their lens critique was evident in even a single snapshot. Welling’s veneration of brutalist concrete – his lens turns to Washington’s infamous HUD building now outlawed under Trump’s classical architecture edict – borders on a fetish by contrast. But if one no longer needs to look at Bernd and Hilla’s grain silos, Welling’s quasi-opportunistic fixation leads to fresher discoveries.


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

Ghada Amer, QR CODES REVISITED—LONDON at Goodman ★★☆☆☆

Ghada Amer

QR CODES REVISITED—LONDON

QR CODES REVISITED—LONDON

★★☆☆☆

This invites a game of proofreading, in hope that Amer maliciously inserted a greengrocer’s apostrophe into de Beauvoir’s mind.

Jenkin van Zyl, Dance of the Sleepwalkers at Edel Assanti ★★★☆☆

Jenkin van Zyl

Dance of the Sleepwalkers

Dance of the Sleepwalkers

★★★☆☆

Ring 1 for “Grief”, and it’s flat 7 for “Garbage”.

James White: Every Corner Abandoned Too Soon at Anthony Wilkinson ★★★★☆

James White

Every Corner Abandoned Too Soon

Every Corner Abandoned Too Soon

★★★★☆

Paint that does this to a pile of plastic coat hangers contends with any reality.

Esteban Jefferson, May 25th, 2020 at Goldsmiths CCA ★★★☆☆

Esteban Jefferson

May 25th, 2020

May 25th, 2020

★★★☆☆

This exhibition is a warning to would-be propagandists: trust art at your peril.

Ignacy Czwartos, Polonia Uncensored, Venice ★★☆☆☆

Ignacy Czwartos

Polonia Uncensored

Polonia Uncensored

★★☆☆☆

Czwartos’ painting proves little and his sign-writer’s hand loses art history’s bet.

Simon Moretti et al, Hereafter at Swedenborg Society ★★★★★

Simon Moretti et al.

Hereafter

Hereafter

★★★★★

A Platonic hierarchy of forms rules this enigmatic exhibition.

×