Tommy Camerno

Delirious

★★☆☆☆

Curated by Antoine Schafroth
On until 28 January 2024

Is there a limit to the number of fads a single practice can channel? In this bijou, four-piece show, Camerno packs building site machismo, camp Technicolor nostalgia, generational warfare, and a dollop of old queer. 

Such indecision could be dismissed as youthful enthusiasm, but these inconsistencies are premeditated. Ornamental steel shapes hung from a monumental totem revel in laser-cut precision. They’re so far oblivious to the speckles of rust that will one day consume them. A ‘70s pin-up who appears on one canvas is till today unmoved by the decades which separate her from glory.

But the procession of time marked out in another painting is unstoppable. What’s left of the show are stage props that feed adolescent imaginations with false memories of the long-finished party. But even if Camerno’s complaints against the past were legitimate, his bet on the lasting value of his stock illustration tropes makes for poor politics.


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

Dickon Drury at Seventeen ★★★☆☆

Dickon Drury

The Preceding Cart & POV: You are Beans

★★★☆☆

Painting needs prophets, Drury plays a jester.

Terry Winters: Along the River at Modern Art ★★★★★

Terry Winters

Along the River

★★★★★

A creationist science born out of oil.

Wilhelm Sasnal at Sadie Coles ★★★☆☆

Wilhelm Sasnal

★★★☆☆

Only in flights of anger does this vision come close to becoming believable.

Andreas Angelidakis: Escape Room at the Greek pavilion in Venice ★★☆☆☆

Andreas Angelidakis

Escape Room

★★☆☆☆

Make Plato’s Cave Great Again

Amanda Wall, Femcel at Almine Rech ★★★☆☆

Amanda Wall

Femcel

★★★☆☆

There’s no dignity in paint when the arc of art history tends to “show hole”.

Dan Guthrie: Empty Alcove / Rotting Figure at Chisenhale ★★☆☆☆

Dan Guthrie

Empty Alcove / Rotting Figure

★★☆☆☆

The problem for a culture built on iconoclasm is that eventually, it will need to create images of its own. Guthrie is yet to consider this because his image war is still virtual. The subject of his static video installation,…

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