Red Red Red...
What: MARTIN SEXTON's BLOW-UP - SEX WITH KARL MARX
Where: THE ECONOMIST PLAZA, 25 ST JAMES’S STREET, LONDON SW1A 1HG
When: 10 JULY-4 SEPT 2009, DAILY 10AM-6PM
How (much?): Free!
WHAT THEY SAY: An oversize blown-up camera is sited on the plaza so that the lens reveals within snippets from Michelangelo Antonioni’s iconic 1960s film ‘Blow-up’. This is watched over by a bust of Karl Marx reminiscent of the monumental bust at Chemnitz in former East Germany – a city that was until 2006 named Karl-Marx-Stadt. The interior of the camera is viewed as if in a peep show, the audience has to crouch slightly, much as a fashion photographer might gaze upon the model. The outside of the camera is covered with bill posters and heavy graffiti over a series of film posters and stills from ‘Blow Up’ with mildly erotic images taken from contemporary advertising. Martin Sexton produces powerful and controversial art. He works at the interface of ancient history, metaphysics, the psychosocial aspects of ufology & the politics of aesthetics — all countered with an overpowering poetic vision that has echoes of the wilful extremism of rock n’ roll.
WHAT WE SAY: We love walking because it is likely we stumble on things extraordinary. This time our attention is caught by a camera—we’re talking a gigantic, red wooden one overlooked by a glass bust of Karl Marx. This outdoor mixed media installation is a sharp piece of social criticism, seemingly a mockery to Karl Marx who is bound and fixed there to witness the thriving of capitalism and the fast disappearing Communism. Not only the voyeuristic discomfort is felt, but also the metatheatrical existence of the work. Who and what is actually being watched here? Marx’s watching Antonioni’s Blow-Up, or the camera that tries to capture Marx’s response to the perversion of his proposed political ideology? And, we are the ultimate “watcher” of this. Sexton’s work accumulates multiple interpretations. Sadly, the rain was pouring down, and SUPERSWEET, sans umbrella, could not linger longer to make sense of all this.
VERDICT: It’s definitely worth a second look.
Words and photography: Poonperm Paitayawat