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:

Tyler Eash, All the World’s Horses at Nicoletti ★★☆☆☆

Tyler Eash

All the World's Horses

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★★☆☆☆

The artist must choose which ground is best ceded.

Onyeka Igwe, history is a living weapon in yr hand at PEER ★★☆☆☆

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history is a living weapon in yr hand

history is a living weapon in yr hand

★★☆☆☆

The Mavericks wanted a weapon, Igwe leaves them a toy.

Alia Farid, Elsewhere at Chisenhale ★★★☆☆

Alia Farid

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Elsewhere

★★★☆☆

There is no answer in the work. Its cause and the object become enmeshed in a bland, exoticized mess. 

Claire Fontaine: Show Less at Mimosa House ★★☆☆☆

Claire Fontaine

Show Less

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★★☆☆☆

Repeat these mantras enough, and the lie becomes art.

Bhenji Ra, Biraddali Dancing on the Horizon at Auto Italia ★☆☆☆☆

Bhenji Ra

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Biraddali Dancing on the Horizon

★☆☆☆☆

Such work was once a mere grift. Now, it is an outright stitch-up.

Megan Rooney, Echoes & Hours at Kettle’s Yard ★★☆☆☆

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Echoes & Hours

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★★☆☆☆

For all this bravado, Rooney’s compositions offer only a very surface experience of abstraction.

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