I was very lucky the other evening to be allowed to attend a private Q&A with Gilbert and George at the White Cube Masons Yard hosted by Louis Vuitton, surrounded by works from their current Urethra Postcard Art Exhibition. Gilbert & George are great orators and it was a thoroughly enjoyable evening. I had seen the exhibition two weeks before which sets at an equal standing the themes of national pride, immigration, work, sex and the universality of London, through the medium of collected postcards.
These themes reminded me of another artist I had chanced upon lately on my recent trip to Paris.
One evening I passed Gallerie Oliver Robert in the Marais and my eye caught the work of Julien Beneyton.
Despite the gallery being closed, the kind attendent let me in for a closer look and I was pleasantly mesmerised by Mr. Beneyton's work which I share with you here.
The work captures the seemingly mundane and everyday in a way that makes the subject suddenly multi-layered, faceted, dimensional...choose your own word for complex.I have been to many of the places depicted in his work and the intensity of Cligancourt Market, Amsterdam's Red light district or the Bronx as I remember them are there in the pictures.
Both Gilbert & George and Julien Beneyton's exhibitions are on until February 19th 2011.
See them both if you can.
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