Ada Bond, Rebecca Davy, Karen Densha, Sam Owen Hull, Hilary Jack, Rachel Goodyear, Evita Ziemele, et al.

Medusa

★★★☆☆

Curated by Mike Chavez-Dawson
On until 22 March 2025

There is a mode of curating a group show which takes a title so literally that one suspects a hashtag search was engaged in its preparation. This one half-falls under Medusa’s spell: Ziemele’s chick-lit cover oils and Goodyear’s bedtime scare story watercolour are too straightforward as reflections from the myth and reveal little about who beheaded whom. Densham’s bijou gold ceramics are twisted-pretty but inconsequential in context. Dawson and Davy turn to AI but leave even it none the wiser. 

The joke finally lands with Murray’s spaghetti painting and Jack’s sublimely ridiculous rock. Bond’s Gogron, for the love of myth, is painted on cheese, albeit disappointingly that cheese is not gorgonzola. Interpreting a tale this grotesque, this ugly, and, as in Hull’s maquette for a painting, venomous will take thousands of years.


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

David Muenzer, Teen at Final Hot Desert ★★★☆☆

David Muenzer

Teen

★★★☆☆

Muenzer’s messy show bedroom actually is someone’s messy bedroom most nights of the week.

Saccharine Symbols at Rose Easton ★★★☆☆

Marisa Krangwiwat Holmes, Shamiran Istifan, Tasneem Sarkez

Saccharine Symbols

★★★☆☆

Meaning parts with the image in this exhibition, never to return. Post-structuralism triumphs.

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

Esteban Jefferson

May 25th, 2020

★★★☆☆

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

Trevor Yeung, Hong Kong in Venice ★★★☆☆

Trevor Yeung

Courtyard of Attachments

★★★☆☆

This fishbowl universe is easy sea comfort but ultimately no sushi.

Pablo Bronstein, Cakehole at Herald Str ★★★☆☆

Pablo Bronstein

Cakehole

★★★☆☆

Bronstein falls into the late evening stupor of the cheese trolley, the oyster tray, and… the Mars bar.

Elisa Giardina Papa: She Flickered In and Out of History at ICA

Elisa Giardina Papa

She Flickered In and Out of History

★★☆☆☆

Giardina Papa renders transhumanist dreams sharply. Their promise, alas, is imaginable only in uninhabitable abstract.

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