Die young stay pretty at ICA, London (1998)

Art Design Publicity 3(2) - Totally Walker | Published 14 August 2011
Page 3 of 9

Die young stay pretty

Earlier we claimed that the Saatchi Collection/Gallery resembled an institute of contemporary art more than a museum; London already has its ICA with a history of supporting experimental art dating back to the late 1940s. In some respects the Saatchi enterprise can be considered the ICA’s rival and competitor (plus the Whitechapel and Serpentine galleries). The Saatchi Gallery had far more display space than the ICA and greater financial resources. (The ICA’s funding stems from membership fees, entrance charges, Arts Council grants and business sponsorship.) In terms of shows of new art, the consequence was that the Saatchi Gallery overshadowed the ICA. In November 1998, immediately preceding the first display of New Neurotic Realism, the ICA fought back with a show of new art— mostly British— entitled Die young stay pretty, evoking the fate of movie stars who had died tragically early but thereby achieved an ever young, perenially beautiful, posthumous media existence. The show was commissioned by Emma Dexter, ICA exhibitions director, curated by Martin Maloney, and sponsored by Habitat.

Exhibiting at the ICA were 12 artists who included the sculptors Steven Gontarski, Caroline Warde and Gary Webb, and the painters Jane Brennan, Dexter Dalwood, Peter Davies and Michael Raedecker. Collage and video were also represented plus canvases by Maloney. (Incidentally, few people in the art world seem to find it strange or unethical that an artist who curates a show includes works by himself in it.) Works by two of the contributors— Peter Davies and Martin Maloney— had previously appeared in Sensation and works by six of the artists had been purchased by Charles Saatchi and labelled New Neurotic Realism; consequently, there were significant continuities and overlaps between the Royal Academy of Arts, ICA and Saatchi shows— Maloney being the principal connection. Perhaps Die young stay pretty did not so much steal the thunder of the Saatchi Gallery as act as a trailer for its 1999 exhibitions.

The catalogue included an introduction by Patricia Ellis— a Canadian who gained an MA at Goldsmiths’ and who writes much copy for Charles Saatchi— and interviews with the artists conducted by the English artist and writer Gemma de Cruz.[4] Ellis’s text was heavily footnoted but the references were overwhelmingly to websites, pop music and mass-culture sources. Her overwrought prose style also echoed that typical of promotional publications: “Tragically hip, their work is posed: beautiful, profound, seductive, edged with just enough trauma to make it truly glamorous ... Emulating simulation, this generation cherish the Novocain hum of the synthetic ... In the thrust towards tomorrow, they are racing to immortalise the Now.”

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