THE ROYAL FAMILY
Private view Friday 11 March, 6:30-8:30pm
Exhibition dates12 March – 2 May 2011
ADAM DANT, HANS-PETER FELDMANN, ALISON JACKSON, ALAN KANE, LARS LAUMANN, OTTO MUEHL, TONY OURSLER, FRANCIS UPRITCHARD
Looking ahead to the wedding of Prince William of Wales to Kate Middleton, ‘The Royal Family’ features work by eight British and international artists that focuses on representations of the House of Windsor. Spanning a range of media, these works examine the family’s individual members, and the signs and signifiers of contemporary monarchy. Often irreverent, the show explores class, celebrity, conspiracy theory, the meeting of the mythic and the mundane, and the visual language of State.
At the centre of the exhibition is the apparent contradiction of the persistence of the British Monarchy into the 21st century, and the central place this archaic institution still occupies in a culture characterized by mass democracy, and mass communication. For the artists featured in ‘The Royal Family’, the House of Windsor is alternatively a projection of a certain implausible fantasy of national grandeur, and a symbol of an oppressive class system, the object of worldwide obsession, and a sometimes tawdry real life soap opera. The exhibition also considers Monarchy as a lens through which to reconsider ourselves – the Queen’s subjects, the ‘common people’ to her Sovereign – and our relationship with State power.
The exhibition is curated by Ralph Rugoff, Director, Hayward Gallery and Tom Morton, Curator, Hayward Gallery, from a concept by Ralph Rugoff.
A free pamphlet, providing a guide to the works, accompanies the exhibition.
Review in The London Evening Standard
Huffington Post article on Alison Jackson / the exhibition
Exhibition e-flux
