Marc-Aurèle Debut

ON REPEAT

★★★☆☆

On until 1 August 2026

Are gays okay? The question’s rhetorical, of course. Debut’s installation chases orgiastic exuberance to stave off the realisation that the carnival is long over. A pile of used men’s underwear — collected, one imagines, from a mere month’s worth of sexual encounters — hangs off laundry racks as if in a fetish club. An emoji-like graphic arrangement shows what the garb’s owners may get up to were they assembled within penetrating distance. Mechanical club beats blast on repeat, sustaining this cycle without reprieve.

Until 6pm, that is, when the gallery closes. Debut and his lovers spend their nights sleepless, imagining the courage to snap out of this cycle. They admit this much, wrongly believing this confession alone might save them. Pity, then, that they can’t make art out of it.


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

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Their mouths were full of bumblebees

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Isaac Julien: All That Changes You. Metamorphosis at Victoria Miro ★★☆☆☆

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All That Changes You. Metamorphosis

★★☆☆☆

An idle fancy is detached from here and now, which already shows signs of ageing.

Prem Sahib: Kin at Phillida Reid ★★★★☆

Prem Sahib

Kin

★★★★☆

Animal pity turns into animal cruelty, and bang, the mutt’s a goner.

Yi To, Terminal Lucidity at Project Native Informant ★★★★☆

Yi To

Terminal Lucidity

★★★★☆

All evidence erodes eventually.

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

Simon Moretti et al.

Hereafter

★★★★★

A Platonic hierarchy of forms rules this enigmatic exhibition.

Yorgos Prinos, Prologue to a Prayer at Hot Wheels ★★★★☆

Yorgos Prinos

Prologue to a Prayer

★★★★☆

Prinos’ frames are precise, tight, and formal, as though the street were his studio.

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