An Extraordinary Turn of Events 2011 - 12
Chronicles some of the major events, both national and international, that occurred during the years 2011 and 2012.
Exhibition image: ‘An Extraordinary Turn of Events,’ Francis Kyle Gallery, 2012.
Pageant, 2012
‘Pageant,’ remembers the procession of boats that drifted down the Thames, through cloud and rain, to mark the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. Featured on the pot are the working boats – the barges and rescue boats, the Dunkirk little ships, the tall ships, the leisure cruisers, and fleets of kayaks, canoes and sailing boats.
'Pageant' 2012, showing the Gloriana
'Pageant' 2012 showing the Royal Barge
The Gloriana, a detail from 'Pageant.'
End of the Rainbow, 2012
‘End of the Rainbow,’ shows the historic relationships between art, religion, trade and banking in the City. It features the Medici gondola and crest, the patron saints of banking, accountancy, pottery, charity, and protest, the Occupy the City tents, Cezanne’s Card Players, and numerous visual puns based on banking language.
Wedding Procession, 2011
‘Wedding Procession,’ shows a glimpse of the royal wedding of 2011 including the tree lined aisle, the preposterous feathered hats, the runaway horse and the forest of raised phones recording, for the first time, a royal wedding by digital phone camera.
Wedding Procession, 2011
Wedding Procession, 2011
Wedding Procession, 2011, detail showing horses and carriage
St Mark of the Farm, 2011
St Mark of the Farm fictionalises the life of Mark Duggan, who was shot by police in August 2011 prompting four nights of rioting across the UK. It is divided into three like an altar piece showing his birth place, the scene of his death and his funeral procession which included plumed white horses, not unlike the royal wedding.
Continuing Unsettled, 2012
‘Continuing Unsettled,’ remembers the 2011 uprisings in the Arab Middle East viewed by me and my mother looking at the Sunday papers at home and by Hossein on his computer screen and via Twitter. Tahrir Square in Cairo is mixed up with the Pearl Roundabout in Bahrain, and the memory of the 2009 uprisings in Iran which upended Hossein’s life.
Missing, 2012
‘Missing,’ 2012 shows images of me with some of my friends at their home in small-town, semi-rural Iran, in winter in 2008. We’re sledging in the foothills of the Kurdish Mountains. Later I visit friends in Tehran in their small, shared apartment. It turned out to be our last meeting though I didn’t know it at the time.
