Title: Double Take

Posted In: Photography

Duration: 07 March 2017 to 22 April 2017

Venue: Skarstedt London

Opening Hours: Tuesday to Friday 10:00 - 18:00 / Saturday 10:00 - 17:00

Location: 8 Bennet Street London SW1A 1RP United Kingdom

Telephone: +44 207 499 5200

Email: [email protected]

In the Tom Croft -designed Skarstedt gallery in Central London’s St James’s , the white-cube-prescribed white walls, high ceilings and pale natural wood floors are serene and welcoming. The gallery, owned by Per Skarstedt , opened here in September 2016. Less than a year after relocating from their Old Bond Street premises, it still has the patina of freshness.  Per Skarstedt started out as a collector, buying his first piece, a Cindy Sherman , at the age of 23. Now the owner of two galleries in NY and one in London , Skarstedt focuses on contemporary European and American art, and he often ssingles out a particular period in an artist’s life. For the current London show, Skarstedt has gathered the works of nine artists who share a cross-generational interest in the concept of photographic appropriation. ‘Double Take’ looks at how the power of pictures – supposed documents of veracity – has been questioned by the selected artists, beginning from the 1960’s until today.   

Double Take exhibition view. Courtesy Skarstedt Gallery, London.

Steven Shearer (b.1968), Guys , 2005. digital c-print. 73 1/4 x 95 in. (186 x 241.3 cm) . Copyright the artist, courtesy of Modern Art London; Galerie Eva Presenhuber, Zürich.

Roe Ethridge (b.1969), Pic 'n Clip 9 , 2016, dye sublimation print, 72 x 48 in. (182.9 x 121.9 cm). Image Courtesy of the Artist and Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York.

Double Take exhibition view. Courtesy Skarstedt Gallery, London.

Double Take exhibition view. Courtesy Skarstedt Gallery, London. Selectively borrowing from existing images, all of the artists examine how commercial imagery shapes our perceptions of the world and ourselves.  Richard Prince  in particular breaks down the fantasy of magazine editorials and advertising in his photographic series Untitled (Four Women with Hats) , which emphasize the various staged options of one idea.  Prince ’s Untitled (eyelashes) is strategically positioned at the other end of the room to Hank Willis Thomas ’ Why Wait Another Day to be Adorable? Tell Your Beautician "Relax Me." , an image lifted from a hair relaxer ad that paradoxically seems to elevate black beauty by promoting a product that eradicates black hair texture. Thomas , who was present at the opening, spoke about the effect of popular culture’s overwhelming whiteness on the black consciousness, an issue that resonates with the very core of concept appropriation and empowerment through ownership: taking the images that surround us and giving them an alternative meaning.  

Roe Ethridge (b.1969), Double Jess Gold , 2015, dye sublimation print, 53 x 40 in. (134.6 x 101.6 cm). Image Courtesy of the Artist and Andrew Kreps Gallery, New York.

Double Take  exhibition view. Courtesy Skarstedt Gallery, London.

Hank Willis Thomas, Why Wait Another Day to be Adorable? Tell Your Beautician "Relax Me." , 1968/2007, Lightjet print, 56 3/4 x 50 in. (144 x 127 cm.) sheet. Courtesy of the artist and Maruani Mercier Gallery, Brussels / Belgium.  As referencing and re-appropriation are eternal themes in history or art, these works carry their own weight within the canon. Prince ’s Cowboys reinterpret what the American Dream looks like, taking a self-reflexive and critical stance on how media manipulation alters meaning. Blurring the boundaries between original and reproduction, reality and images, each one of these artists opens up new avenues for the viewer to investigate – especially in our current over-instagrammed world – and how we consume and regurgitate visuals. Steven Shearer ’s ‘ Guys ’ could be the Google Image result of a search for the term in the title – and it is, though aestheticized - and it is very much similar to the way images come toward us today.  

Louise Lawler (b.1947), Nude , 2002-2003, cibachrome print (museum mounted), 60 x 40 x 2 in. (152.4 x 101.6 x 5.1 cm). This work is from an edition of five. © Louise Lawler, courtesy of Metro Pictures, New York.

Anne Collier (b.1970), Studio Floor #3 (Marilyn, Norman Mailer) , 2009, c-print, 42 1/4 x 56 1/4 in. (107.2 x 142.7 cm). Courtesy of the artist; Anton Kern Gallery, New York; Marc Foxx Gallery, Los Angeles; The Modern Institute/ Toby Webster Ltd., Glasgow; Galerie Neu, Berlin / © Anne Collier.

Collier Schorr (b. 1963), Dorothea , 2012, pigment print mounted on aluminum, 50 x 39 3/4 in. (127 x 101 cm.) image, 58 x 48 in. (147.3 x 121.9 cm.) framed. Copyright the artist. Courtesy Stuart Shave Modern Art, London and 303 Gallery, New York.

Double Take exhibition view. Courtesy Skarstedt Gallery, London.

Double Take exhibition view. Courtesy Skarstedt Gallery, London.

Robert Heinecken (1931 - 2006), Are You Rea (detail) , 1964 -68. from a series of twenty-five gelatin silver print photograms from magazine pages, 11 3/4 x 9 in. (29.8 x 22.9 cm.) each framed © The Robert Heinecken Trust, courtesy of Cherry and Martin, Los Angeles.