I first met Laura Oldfield Ford 5 years ago when what public profile she had was as an activist rather than an artist; but even then I could see she was serious about pictures as well as politics… and she still is. Recently she’s become the most happening newcomer on the London gallery circuit, as the heaving crowd for the opening of her first solo exhibition at Hales Gallery on Bethnal Green Road last night proved. As I was walking through the door I ran into writer Janine Bullman. Once inside I got chatting with former Mute Magazine editor Anthony Isles who was standing next to Anna Harding from Space Studios, then Fabian Tompsett formerly of the infamous London Psychogeographical Association ambled over… Next I was saying ‘hi’ my long time collaborator Chris Dorley-Brown; followed by Tracey Moberly, Bill Drummond and Richard Thomas from Resonance FM. Familiar faces were flashing by faster than a speeding train… To give just one random example, Malcolm Hopkins from Housman’s Bookshop disappeared into the crowd before I could catch his attention. By the time I found Laura I’d been in the gallery close on two hours and the crowd was finally thinning as people headed on to The Owl & The Pussycat for post opening drinks. And since most of us had already had a few beers by then, we were certainly ready for a few more…
The opening was too busy for me to give the work the attention it deserved, but I’ve been looking at Laura’s pictures for a long time and they are most definitely a groove sensation. I ran into Adam Dant AKA Donald Parsnips on Bethnal Green Road a couple of days ago and when I’d asked him if he was going to the Oldfield Ford opening, he’d replied: “Of course, she’s the new Daumier.” I’ll be going back to London 2013, Drifting Through The Ruins to check it out properly, and some of you can do so too, because it opens today (30 January) at 7 Bethnal Green Road and continues until 14 March 2009. In the meantime, here’s a bit of the gallery blurb about the exhibition:
“The main focus of the show is more than one hundred ink drawings that Oldfield Ford has recently produced as part of an ongoing project chronicling the impact of regeneration on London called 2013, Drifting through the ruins. The drawings form a broken narrative, focusing on part of east London currently being cleared for the 2012 Olympic site and documents the city as palimpsest, a site of perpetual writing and over-writing. Oldfield Ford has made many walks (or ‘Drifts’) through these abandoned areas and imagines them populated by the semiotic ghosts of failed utopias in the year 2013. ‘The London I conjure up in these drawings is imbued with a sense of mourning. These are the liminal zones where the free party rave scene once illuminated the bleak swathes of marshland and industrial estates’. ”
And while you’re at it don’t forget to check – http://www.stewarthomesociety.org/ – you know it makes (no) sense!
Comments
Comment by Time Traveller on 2009-01-30 09:01:13 +0000
fucking hell fuck shit god damnit why didn’t you tell me Bill would be there?
Comment by Tony Parsons on 2009-01-30 09:02:51 +0000
I was there it was the ultimate groove sensation!
Comment by Dire McCain on 2009-01-30 09:05:16 +0000
Was Vic there?
Comment by Dave Kelso-Mitchel on 2009-01-30 09:07:40 +0000
To me it is the shading in Laura’s pictures that is the total turn on….
Comment by Dave Mitchell on 2009-01-30 09:15:08 +0000
Sounds groovy. But ‘faster than a speeding train’ is a bit of a cliche. How about ‘faster than a dose of the running shits through an Old Folks Home’?
You can have that one on me, if you like.
(not literally of course)
Comment by David Kelso on 2009-01-30 09:43:56 +0000
What does Bill Drummond keep under that sporran?
Comment by Ernest T. Bass on 2009-01-30 13:31:23 +0000
If a duck stood still you could catch him by the Bill!
Comment by Díre McCain on 2009-01-30 17:03:51 +0000
Never mind Vic, klone, was Lamb Chop present? I’ve now been awake for three hours and fifty-nine minutes, and have not only managed to drop every single object I’ve picked up, but have also walked into the same stack of boxes seven – count them – SEVEN times. There’s a lovely contusion developing on my left shin, which appears to be taking the shape of Theodulus of Pamphylia’s noggin…
Comment by Ron English on 2009-01-30 17:49:17 +0000
I’ve bill boarded Bill…
Comment by Hamburglar on 2009-01-30 18:12:52 +0000
ROBBLE ROBBLE ROBBLE!!!!!
Comment by Jay Jopling Inc. on 2009-01-31 13:15:24 +0000
What a fool I’ve been, I let Hales sign Laura Oldfield Ford before I even got around to opening my cheque book??? Does she have a price or is she one of these horrible artists who just won’t give me the time of day…..
Comment by Andy Warhol on 2009-01-31 13:17:21 +0000
I was there did you see me sweeping up afterwards????
Comment by Red Veg on 2009-01-31 13:29:33 +0000
Laura’s work looks so good I could eat it!
Comment by THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE PENSIONABLE on 2009-01-31 15:44:36 +0000
I like it, I like it
Comment by K Mail on 2009-01-31 20:42:19 +0000
Laura Oldfield Ford is hot, can anyone give me her hotmail address????
Comment by katie katie on 2009-02-01 11:25:04 +0000
Hands off K Mail, she’s hot, talented AND MY WIFE!!!!!!
Comment by Michael Kearney on 2009-02-02 17:32:14 +0000
It’s nice to see a place on the internet where husbands and wives can have their affairs in the full light of public debate (albeit while faking their identities to the point of pure horny)
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-02-02 19:40:15 +0000
it’s a groove sensation! toot toot!
Comment by Díre McCain on 2009-02-02 22:08:33 +0000
And it’s no longer a multiple of six…
Beep beep!
Comment by mistertrippy on 2009-02-03 11:22:12 +0000
7 X 7 Is…. Toot toot!