Alex Hoda’s show at Edel Assanti (to 26 Oct) features marble sculptures of chewing gum. That fuses two well-established tropes: blowing something small up big to make us look at it differently, which Claes Oldenburg was first to exploit systematically; and using precious material – and the labour of production – to elevate the worth of something casual or valueless, which, for example, Sue Collis does particularly subtly. Jeff Koons’ balloon dogs or Urs Fischer’s giant aluminium versions of squeezed lumps of clay offer combined approaches.
What’s more, the art use of chewing gum is pretty much a tradition of its own. Alina Szapocznikow’s 1971 series of ‘Photosculptures’ monumentalise pieces which she chewed. Adam McEwen has used wads on canvas to refer to the bombing of German cities in WWII, contrasting the understanding of gum-chewing child and gum-arranging man. Dan Colen has made enough ‘paintings’ with gum that he has an established process: ‘I pay people to chew the gum. Students get 50 cents for each piece. Then we take the gum and make it dirty with street shit. I want it to be both elegant and real’. Which leaves us with the question: has Hoda taken established tropes in fresh directions, or is just an ersatz follower of others? The visceral impact of a five-foot-tall gob of marble gum spat straight on the wall certainly feels like something new.
From Alina Szapocznikow’s 1971 series of ‘Photosculptures’
Most days art Critic Paul Carey-Kent spends hours on the train, traveling between his home in Southampton and his day job in Surrey. Could he, we asked, jot down whatever came into his head?
