Marwan Rechmaoui - Beirut Caoutchouc 2004-08 (click to enlarge)
Ghost - Kader Attia 2007 (click to enlarge)On Friday, after going down to see a very disappointing exhibition near Sloane Square featuring photographs of Russian Prison Tattoos, I decided to check out the always reliable Saatchi Gallery. The exhibition featuring there at the mo is called Unveiled: New art from the Middle East. Some really nice pieces running through their 12 gallery spaces. However, when I got to the 13th room (located in the basement) I had my mind blown by possibly one of the weirdest installations I've ever experienced.
(click to enlarge)
(click to enlarge)
Sun Yuan and Peng Yu - Old Persons Home (click to enlarge)Sun Yuan and Peng Yu are two of China's most controversial artists, renown for working with extreme materials such as human fat tissue, live animals, and baby cadavers to deal with issues of perception, death, and the human condition.
In Old Person's Home, Sun & Peng present a shocking scene of an even more grotesque kind. Hilariously wicked, their satirical models of decrepit OAPS look suspiciously familiar as world leaders, long crippled and impotent, left to battle it out in true geriatric style. Placed in electric wheelchairs, the withered, toothless, senile, and drooling, are set on a collision course for harmless ‘skirmish' as they roll about the gallery at snail's pace, crashing into each other at random in a grizzly parody of the U.N.dead.
In Old Person's Home, Sun & Peng present a shocking scene of an even more grotesque kind. Hilariously wicked, their satirical models of decrepit OAPS look suspiciously familiar as world leaders, long crippled and impotent, left to battle it out in true geriatric style. Placed in electric wheelchairs, the withered, toothless, senile, and drooling, are set on a collision course for harmless ‘skirmish' as they roll about the gallery at snail's pace, crashing into each other at random in a grizzly parody of the U.N.dead.
This sculpture was produced in 2007, and features 13 x life size sculptures and 13 x dynamoelectric wheel chairs. You can observe the installation from a mezzanine floor, or venture down onto the gallery floor and stand amongst the action, but beware - these guys aren't looking where they're going - they don't even know where they are!
There is a very trippy video of the installation on the Saatchi site:
http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/artists/yu_yuan.htm
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