Projects
- Nostalgia Rebranded - Scott King's Welcome to Saxnot at the Studio VoltaireScott King’s current show Welcome to Saxnot, at Studio Voltaire, London, addresses the persevering illusion of nostalgia. Recent years have seen an increase in the political tendency of yearning for a past that isn’t perturbed by problems such as the housing bubble, staggering rates of unemployment and social alienation. Many would like to go back to a quainter, easy, carefree time, when jobs were easy to secure without competition, when the supermarket had less variety but higher quality products and when the members of the neighbourhood communities knew each other well. King’s exhibition proposes the fulfilment of this wistful dream. His exhibition functions as the promotion for an upcoming project, Britlin’s Saxnot. As the infographics comprising the show propagate, Saxnot will be a place of unadulterated fun and simplicity. Who needs the bamboozling present, when you can fully immerse yourself in the materialisation of an illusory past? This is the question the logic of the show asks. Britlin’s is King’s own take on the Butlin’s camp, a place synonymous with “holiday” in most British minds throughout the 60s and 70s. It was a popular getaway location, but more importantly, it was a carefully curated, utopian world in its own right. It offered a wide range of entertainment shows and thrills; Wobbly Knee Competitions, Grandmother Beauty Pageants, Darts Championships, Dancing Marathons, and all other kinds of activities that attracted every member of the family. Kids were let free to roam the nearby forests on their own. Nursery patrol teams were organised to alert parents every time they heard a baby crying from inside the lodgings. Everyone paid the same amount of money for the camp. “One week’s pay for one week’s holiday,” held the slogan. Butlin’s camps were drenched with the ideology of egalitarianism. It propagated the ethos of sameness as the basis for compassion and collectivity. The dozen or so infographics which make up the show can roughly be divided into three sections. Some champion the glory of the days gone by. A set of technicolour photographs depict rosy-cheeked children waving at their parents from a rollercoaster, friends unwinding at the poolside, red-bearded midgets shining their gigantic teeth from a colourful flower bed. There is a menu that lists all the meals available on order: Shrimp Cocktail, Pineapple and Beef Roast, Rhubarb Pie, the sort of things which, back in the 70s, might have been fashionable. Other images celebrate the understated charm of Brutalist architecture in their depiction of council housing estates comprised of same-sized houses with identical rooms within. With another set of pieces, King attempts to step away from this illusory bubble. A few graphic designs point towards the caveat of this system of thinking. There’s a mirror with the title “I’m Going Back” engraved on its surface. Standing in front of it we are to look at the reflection of ourselves with this world in the background. It’s almost as if the piece would position us as not just participants, but the very vessels that carry this ideological bubble within. This is the first piece that makes us consider our own purpose in this environment, about whether it is a sage idea to undertake this journey at all. Do you really know your neighbour? points towards the freakish paranoia without which no egalitarian community could function. All of a sudden, the idealised, pitch-perfect image that was conveyed by previous pieces attains a new significance: that image could only be maintained insofar as there is a commonly shared other, as long as some form of scaremongering fuels the social structure. Of course, the people at Butlin’s were fond of the rules and regulations: disobeying them would have led to their expulsion. One Bad Apple taps into the same idea. The image shows a few dozen, perfectly identical, bulbous, shiny green apples. There’s one half bitten on the bottom. This detail provides a great deal of contrast, evoking ideas about how the sameness that is so enjoyed by the visitors of Britlin’s is sustained by a rigorous and regimental process of exclusion. Unlike the postcards on display, the images of the buildings, or the menu leaflet, these latter two works make manifest the shoddy ideological core of the utopian model society. A set of images push even further the daunting idea that inclusion is always the result of exclusion. Belgian Waffle features a gigantic, rainbow-coloured cross placed over the pages of a multilingual dictionary. The colourful patch covers up all too well the non-English paragraphs. Remember Calais consists of a bunch of black dots heaped on top of each other. Only one line, the one that goes across the middle is rainbow-coloured. All of a sudden, the show turns towards a different problem. From the quaintness and simplicity of a pleasurable life that awaits at Britlin’s, King shifts toward discussing the cost of sustaining the such possibilities. From loving families enjoying a great time, our attention is drawn to the cost at which this fantasy is afforded. By subtly invoking the problems of border control, King aims to criticise the developments that have taken place in much political discourse of recent years. King alternates rather successfully between providing enthusiastic depictions of the days everyone yearns to return to, and chalking up the problems inherent within such wishful thinking. The highlight of the whole exhibition is the kiosk at the back of the room, a consumerist enterprise where visitors are encouraged to pick and mix their favourite souvenirs and memorabilia from the Britlin’s that has yet to be built, from the imaginary location which we have yet to develop an affinity for, the place we have yet to experience in order to fantasise about returning to it. Britlin’s is the ultimate fantasy, the fantasy that embodies how empty yet misguided the act of fantasising about the past actually is. Eventually, the visitors are let go of after having fulfilled a few questionnaires, application forms and after having been given the guidelines. Hugging a lovely Britlin’s logo sweatshirt, one can’t help but wonder whether the past is that which we remember or that which we wish it to be. §
- ABBA: Super TroupersABBA entered the Eurovision contest for the second time in 1974 and the rest is history. With an English-language performance of the song “Waterloo”, the Swedish band swept British audiences off their feet and ushered in a new era of popular music, most often referred to as Eurodisco. But ABBA were held dear not only for championing a new ideal of a pan-European culture. Their whimsical, extravagant outfits drenched in glitter, catchy melodies, sugar-sweet lyrics and unique origin story offered something for all kinds of audiences. Television viewers saw them as a fantastic spectacle. Club-goers appraised them for their ability to release hit after hit. Even now, the unprecedented success of the group lives on, despite the fact that they stopped producing music in 1984. ABBA: Super Troupers, a new exhibition at London's Southbank Centre, captures the cultural legacy of the group in a manner as immersive as any one of the group’s hit singles, plunging viewers right into the kaleidoscopic world of the Swedish pop stars. Each intricately designed interior represents a watershed moment in the history of the group as audiences are taken through the historic Napoleon Suite of the Grand Hotel, Brighton, the grimy toilets of a discotheque, a quaint Swedish living room, where the group began its career, and a recreation of the room in which they would eventually split. Inviting audience participation at each and every turn, the show celebrates fandom as well as the group. Viewers are encouraged to name the titles of ABBA songs in a quick quiz, or to sing karaoke in a studio reminiscent of the set of the “Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)” music video. There’s plenty of trivia about the group’s relationship with audiences, too, relayed in the accompanying narration provided by long-time ABBA fan, Jarvis Cocker. Careful listeners will discover a surprisingly erudite explanation of how technological developments and political events influenced the group’s reception. As we are told, ABBA’s initial breakthrough was fuelled by the decision to release records in English. Shrewd and innovative marketing decisions are unpacked, all of which helped record sales skyrocket; ABBA conquered millions of British living rooms via their use of television broadcasts and were amongst the first pop artists to hold stadium-scale concerts. The exhibition also startles the viewer with its attention to more intimate details. We learn of how Bjorn and Benny would exchange a coconut while sitting on a blue silk pillow in a glass case, as a way to wish each other luck. And, of course, much attention is devoted to the outfits. A plethora of historic ensembles are on display: from the crushed velvet jackets adorned with badges and gems worn at Eurovision, to the full-body gold capes that became their signature style. Then there is the memorabilia. Fishnet hats, lipstick-stained champagne glasses, star-shaped guitars and other luxurious items are dotted throughout the exhibition. Taken together with the various archival materials, newspaper clippings, family archive portraits, handwritten music sheets and rare vinyl covers, they make up a glorious assemblage of memorabilia. The exhibition’s sense of fun does an outstanding job at satisfying ABBA's fans, but it also provides plenty of particulars for the less initiated. The sheer range of objects on display and attention to detail will draw anyone into rich and kitsch world of ABBA, one that sets them out as nothing short of a global phenomenon. Read the full text here.
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Work history
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Gallery AssistantDavid Zwirner
London, United KingdomFull Time
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CopywriterSlapp
London, United KingdomFreelance
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Skills
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- Picture Research
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