280616 – Taxidermy – Jamb, London SW1 > words
Revisiting and re-evaluating century old traditional skills is a curious pastime in a world of computer clicks and taxidermy is probably one of the last traditions one would expect to be revisited. Stigmatised with associations to crumbling Victorian country mansions and Carry On horror films. Contemporary works by Damien Hirst have helped the public re-evaluate the medium and anamorphic representations have been prevalent in many of the works of Alexander McQueen. Here taxidermy may refigure compositions from 17th Century Dutch paintings as three-dimensional still life or be the subject of unsettling contemporary portraits. Process is meticulously photographed, a white soapy water forms a distilled background from which radiates the subject’s ghostly beauty, a very modern interpretation of the medium.
Nature is beautiful but wisely cautious, we rarely see exotic creatures up close. Perhaps it is this proximity that really opens our eyes. We are forever confined to the human world with its unnatural cities, its miles of motorways and acres of glass and concrete. We are used to mechanisms and fabrications, our organising systems rely on grey grids and pure geometries, within which the biological is a masterpiece of aesthetic composition. We are reminded just how far detached we have become from the other species that occupy the planet.
The work of Ferry van Tongeren and Jaap Sinke can be seen at the New Masters exhibition Jamb London through to 080716.
The Surrogate Twin