April 3rd — 18th 2014 Brixton East 100 Barrington Rd SW9 7JF www.benturnbull.com
Ben Turnbull announces his latest US-focused project, The Death of America American History X is Ben Turnbull’s latest solo exhibition to be shown in four separate volumes, each stage treading its own unique story of America’s past.
Part One – The Death Of America is presented using comic collage and fabricated children’s toys to tell the story.
Following on from his 911 Firefighters series (2011) and his exploration of the dark truths surrounding the Columbine and Virginia Tech massacres (2009), Americana serves again as Turnbull’s muse and platform for more darkly satirical comments on the country’s social and political ideologies.
No stranger to exploring the darker side of the US, this series will refer to American assassinations, with the show owing much of its genesis to the celebrated 1976 American vigilante film directed by Martin Scorsese, Taxi Driver. The exhibition will feature collage portraits of Martin Luther King, John F Kennedy and Bobby Kennedy as well as real life ‘Taxi Drivers’, Lee Harvey Oswald, (the sniper who assassinated John F Kennedy) and Charles Manson, one of America’s most notorious murderers.
‘Gods lonely men’, a quote taken from Robert De Niro’s character Travis Bickle, informed Turnbull’s vision of Oswald and Manson as real-life anti-heroes who no longer try to fit in with the rest of the world, fashioning themselves not only as outsiders but as a vigilantes, pitted against heroic subjects, the Kennedy’s and King. A large-scale collage work of an American flag will be displayed in six separate sections. Entitled The Executioner’s Song, a title taken from Norman Mailer’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, each artwork bears quotations from the fallen victims.
Turnbull will also revisit a specific theme explored in a previous show that has since resonated in popular culture. As part of his 2006 exhibition, Turnbull introduced All the Pezident’s Men. A group of large toys, taking the iconic image of American presidents were re-packaged as the inter-changeable heads of a Pez sweet dispenser. In 2011, The Washington Times ran an editorial dismissing Obama’s administration as a ‘Pez-dispenser presidency. In 2012, the candy company released a series of presidential memorabilia to teach children about American history. As the originator of the ‘Pezident’ concept, Turnbull will reintroduce the subject matter with sizable new president sculptures of Lincoln and Kennedy.
Turnbull has felt that some of the narratives of previous shows had been lost or compromised, the most commercial pieces cherry-picked and singled-out to sell, diluting the intent and messaging. In 2013, he was invited to do a retrospective of his work with the Lancaster Institute for the Contemporary Arts, which altered his perspective enough to want to show outside the established gallery circuit. He says,
‘I was standing with the director, who was interested in the work and not the profit and I realised I wanted to work on this basis.’
About the artist
Born in 1974, Turnbull is self-taught. His childhood, was somewhat displaced moving home frequently with his Irish mother who worked in public houses as a live-in barmaid. While his mother tended the bar downstairs, Ben found escape through comic books and the pantheon of cult US television shows, Captain Scarlet, The Man From Uncle and The Six Million Dollar Man which has informed his art. His first visit to the US was in 2008. His rationale behind his US obsession: ‘We were poor. I never thought I’d get to go there. I guess thought I’d make my own America.’
Turnbull’s training bypassed the traditional art school route, he chose instead to learn his skills from working alongside practicing artisans and craftsmen in a workshop environment. Starting in the studios of Conran and Tom Dixon resulted in working with clients such as David Collins on projects including Claridges, J Sheekey’s and Quo Vadis. Experience with other mediums then came with a move to the studios of Shepperton and Elstree working on numerous film productions including Danny Boyle’s, 28 Days / Weeks films, the BBC’s Bleak House and Joe Wright’s Pride and Prejudice.
www.benturnbull.com
