Ksenia Pedan

Revision

★★★★☆

Curated by Adomas Narkevičius
On until 19 November 2023

Pedan’s paintings would rather be anything but. Their surfaces, rendered on board that looks as if attacked with an angle grinder, betray little. They hang above eye level, as though to discourage close inspection. The gallery, likewise, isn’t like a gallery. Lengths of electrical cabling cross the walls without reason. Crude boxing conceals the radiators and budget light fittings shine directly into the visitors’ eyes.

But a false wall that oddly covers an altar on which a bird abandoned its nest reveals that all this is a shoddy cover-up, a botched renovation in which the builders cut corners before rushing off to their next job. Everything’s a little sub-standard in that way one begrudgingly gets used to but can never truly overlook.

Even the paintings use the pseudo-neutral palette and form of a mid-range interior design catalogue that rejects lasting meaning. But their marks slowly become discernible: a dense forest, a pile of bones, an hourglass turning dust to dust. In this eerie environment, they demand reverence and reward it with stories of death and disaster that resist any rushed renewal.


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

What Is It Like? at Arebyte ★★☆☆☆

Anna Bunting-Branch, Choy Ka Fai, Damara Inglês, Katarzyna Krakowiak, Lawrence Lek, Kira Xonorika

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What does it feel like for an intelligence to be artificial?

Mohammad Ghazali, Trilogy: Then… at Ab-Anbar ★★★★☆

Mohammad Ghazali

Trilogy: Then…

★★★★☆

Repetition and framing are photography’s greatest tricks.

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

Onyeka Igwe

history is a living weapon in yr hand

★★☆☆☆

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

Yo Nishimura: Dislocation at Sadie Coles ★☆☆☆☆

Yo Nishimura

Dislocation

★☆☆☆☆

Dislocation was once the stuff of excitement. Today, it barely recognises its own homelessness.

Nicole Eisenman, What Happened at Whitechapel Gallery ★★★☆☆

Nicole Eisenman

What Happened

★★★☆☆

There’s a Bosch hellscape dedicated to Trump and a whole “basket of deplorables” polishing their guns in a prepper cell.

When Forms Come Alive at Hayward Gallery ★★☆☆☆

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★★☆☆☆

This exhibition cannot decide if it’s a tourist attraction or a serious examination of sculpture’s relationship with movement.

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