The Nature of Change: Hybridity and Mutation

Venue: The Old Truman Brewery, No. 4 Wilkes Street, London, E1 6QL
Dates: Tuesday 29th March - Sunday 17th April 2011
Private View: Tuesday 29th March 2011, 6 - 9 pm
Symposium: Saturday 16th April 2011, 11 am - 5 pm

Hybridity and mutation are forms of change with particular relevance to post-modern culture. They inform everything contemporary society consumes and produces, from food and technology, to music and art.  In the absence of conditions such as collectively agreed shape and direction disparate sources, such as imagination and practicality, are conflated to intriguing effect.

The Nature of Change brings together a group of talented emerging and mid-career artists, whose work identifies with the notions of hybridity and mutation. In some instances hybridity defines the manner in which they use their chosen medium; Piers Secunda's use of paint refuses to conform to conventional expectations of painting or sculpture.  In others, the theme pertains more directly to their chosen subjects. James Drew investigates and documents the lives of individuals whose identity is an intentional hybrid of different personalities and ages.  Kazuya Tsuji’s bronze sculptures are grotesque mutations on a disorientating miniature scale and espouse a poignant comedy in their monstrosity. In the hands of Alice Bradshaw, normal household objects undergo a physical and conceptual mutation to become art/object hybrid versions of their former selves, which are defined by a curious sense of the uncanny. Alex Kyriacou's subjects cavort and perform in front of the lens; their carnivalesque forms often disturbing and abject combinations of man and beast, desire and repulsion.

The theme of this group show is intended to provoke discussion regarding the nature of change in the current cultural moment. As Ovid suggests, change is an eternal condition of life, yet this exhibition offers examples which actively investigate the creative character, motivations and attitudes towards change today.

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