Șerban Savu

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Curated by Ciprian Mureșan
On until 24 November 2024

What happens to the worker when work has no purpose? In a series of social-realist paintings so extensive that to not think of the labour which went into making them is impossible, Savu traces the as-yet imaginary terminus of Romania’s socialist utopia. 

This Elysium is part panel house block, half Roman ruin. Mosaic reconstructions and faux archaeology spread from the canvas into museum-like models that the Socialist Republic of Romania would have been proud to exhibit in the same location in the 1960s. Savu’s t-shirt-clad 21st-century gentlemen explorers, however, betray his installation’s timeline. 

These future young men have little to do but look ill at ease in their leisure. The reason comes clear at an offsite location where workers make artefacts for Savu’s production under the gaze of Venice’s leisurely tourists. This offshoring project, one fancies, drives these labourers envious of their future selves which in Savu’s archaeological fancy will face only themselves.


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

Eva Rothschild at Modern Art ★★☆☆☆

Eva Rothschild

These sculptures are too clean, too ordered, and too clever for no good reason.

Dickon Drury at Seventeen ★★★☆☆

Dickon Drury

The Preceding Cart & POV: You are Beans

The Preceding Cart & POV: You are Beans

The Preceding Cart & POV: You are Beans

Painting needs prophets, Drury plays a jester.

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

Tyler Eash

All the World's Horses

All the World's Horses

All the World's Horses

The artist must choose which ground is best ceded.

Nanténé Traoré at Sultana and Amanda Wilkinson ★★☆☆☆

Nanténé Traoré

She says it's the high energy

She says it's the high energy

She says it's the high energy

Bodies clash with lights in front of Traoré’s Narcissus camera.

Material Rites at Gathering ★★★☆☆

Fritsch, Genzken, Oldenburg, Shani, Sherman, Smithson, Thek

Material Rites

Material Rites

Material Rites

The instincts are right, but too much makes sense to make sense together.

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

James White

Every Corner Abandoned Too Soon

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.

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