Tacita Dean

Black, Green, Green and White

★☆☆☆☆

On until 22 November 2025

Phoning it in makes little sense in the age of the WhatsApp message, and film studies lost to video a long time ago. Dean was once good at this transition. This two-segment exhibition – consisting of inconsequential light paintings and film sprocket drawings in the gallery’s main space and a torturous 16mm film portrait of another film master in the basement – makes no effort on behalf of its subjects, let alone the medium.

Dean’s slate drawings and Polaroid doodles relate to Shakespeare, but one wouldn’t know it. One wouldn’t need to because such imagery is perfectly serviceable student dorm decoration. In the gallery, however, it is so quotidian that it barely distinguishes itself from the degree show.

Worse, though, is the forty-minute-long film portrait of the Ukrainian photographer Boris Mikhailov and his wife Vita. The subjects, whom Dean stages in the shadow of Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, inspire interest inherently. This could have been a tender portrait of an ageing couple’s stillness, or any number of things, really. But Dean gives the Mikhailovs both too little and too much to do in her frame. The result captivates before revealing itself to be dead boring.


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

Jack O’Brien, The Reward at Camden Art Centre ★★☆☆☆

Jack O'Brien

The Reward

★★☆☆☆

No narrative emerges from the tonnes of steel and plastic his work consumed

Soufiane Ababri, Their mouths at Barbican ★★☆☆☆

Soufiane Ababri

Their mouths were full of bumblebees

★★☆☆☆

Ababri’s paintings for the Grindr generation are more cartoonish than they are from life.

Marina Xenofontos, Public Domain at Camden Art Centre ★★★☆☆

Marina Xenofontos

Public Domain

★★★☆☆

There’s an unfortunate ‘emerging artist’ vibe to this handful of readymade sculptures.

Celia Hempton, Transplant at Phillida Reid ★★★☆☆

Celia Hempton

Transplant

★★★☆☆

Sense finally returns only outside the gallery.

Talar Aghabshian, Solace of the Afterimage at Marfa’ at The Approach ★★☆☆☆

Talar Aghbashian

Solace of the Afterimage

★★☆☆☆

The carpet dealer gallerist’s zeal reveals the work’s lamentable inadequacy. 

Jennifer Bartlett, In the House at Pippy Houldsworth ★★★★☆

Jennifer Bartlett

In the House

★★★★☆

“Sky”, “roof”, “31”, a mantra turns into paint.

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