21/9/18: LONDON TART ART
Sometimes it's just nice to share something we're into. And this week our intrigue has been held very much stuck on Chelsea-Louise Berlin's new book, 'Tart Art', which launches at Cultural Traffic Arts Fair, free to attend and on at Old Spitalfields Market on Sunday 7th October (email us for more info!).
Documenting the ‘Art of the Tart’ - when from the mid to late nineteen-eighties Tart Cards became the new norm in phone boxes across the capital - Berlin's new book showcases 300 of the earliest and most significant ‘Tart Cards’ she found in London pasted to the phone-box back-plate and windows. These are now archived in her ‘Berlin Collection’ of ephemera and ‘Pop’ items.
‘Tart Art’ the book offers an intriguing look into the changed face of the adverts used by prostitutes and dominatrixes to attract their punters, including historical references, details on the law and explanations of how the art came-about and developed, chronicles through reproductions of the finest and most diverse ‘Tart Cards’ what is now regarded as a vital piece of Pop culture, Art and Social history.
The modern Tart Cards originated in the 1960s as simple subtle handwritten notes in the windows of local newsagents, tobacconists or retail shops. They didn’t provide a direct reference to prostitution or the purveyor themselves. More often they were carefully worded and augmented with a phone-number, with euphemistic advertisements and coded services enabling them to operate on the outskirts of what was legal.
Artist of the week : GREGOR WRIGHT
In ‘Magic Stuff’, Gregor Wright marries the aesthetics and complexity of painting with the intuitive nature of drawing by employing technology. Eschewing his previous modes of production, Wright presents a new series of works on UHD screens leaned against the walls of the gallery's Bricks Space. At first glance, one could liken these new works to digital paintings, but – though they very much possess painterly elements – Wright has found a kinship they share with drawings too- their offer of immediacy, a very particular quality he finds key – the speed in which an idea can be realised.
By placing the screens on the floor and leaning them up against the wall, Wright further removes an explicit association with painting. But possibly what could be the biggest trait that separates these works from a comfortable comparison to painting, or drawing for that matter, is that there is something not quite definite about them – their static nature is not certain.
Gregor Wright is exhibiting in 'Magic Stuff' at the Modern Institute in Glasgow.
For more information please visit www.themoderninstitute.com
