Lack of art show reviews or coverage or whatever the hell it is we actually do recently you say, well that’s because, on the whole, nothing is exciting anyone around here enough to want to hammer out words on a keyboard, it all seems so underwhelming and politely by the book at the moment around here (politely? Is that us being polite? It seems tediously by the book right now!). Went to seven or eight East London gallery openings last Thursday evening, a Thursday evening in November in East London was once so so alive and exciting in terms of art and yeah I know things has got tougher what with the greed of rent, the destruction of gentrification, with spaces being forced to close and the rest of it but do the spaces that are still open or have more recently opened need to be so tiredly conservative? Off searching East London’s new openings last Thursday, of to Three Colts Lane and such and yes, truth is, it really was just a tiny bit depressing, was there anything worth taking to the time to write about? There was one painting at Maureen Paley‘s place that really stood out, a painting that really looked back and spoke, a rather gorgeous Merlin James painting currently part of his solo show, a rather raw uncluttered rather simple painting called Likeness and yes, there was something about those eyes of Sang Woo Kim at a very very busy Herald Street Gallery opening of his solo show, besides that there really very little.
A walk back along The Hackney Road and the galleries just off the road didn’t yield anything much to shout about in any kind of positive way either, there were a couple of things to maybe shout about in a negative way but really, who needs it? We’re not here to write about art shows that do very little to excite us, we are going to as many shows as we always did, we’re not missing that many, true, there are one or two galleries we’ve just given up on going to now but we are checking out most things and when we do see something worth shouting about we’ll be shouting as loudly as we ever did (and then you can all start moaning about things being way too positive and candy coated around here, about how we seem to like absolutely everything we see, believe me, we never have liked everything but we are seeing less and less to shout about right now). We’ve been to so many shows recently, skull-based group shows in so-called street art galleries (or urban art as they prefer it, most of it feels like conservative coffee table art to me these days, can’t remember what we last saw anything like a decent street art flavoured show? Have we seen one decent street art show this year? Have we seen one since the lockdown? Went to a student show the other day where all you could hear was the chatter about which plane the art school kids were catching to Venice and “see you there on Thursday dude” like going to Venice with mummy’s credit card was nothing that much bigger than going to hang out and get in the way of the art at an opening in Peckham. We’ve polite print shows down by the canal, to arts council funded tedium that stays in the gallery interacting with seemingly nobody much for months on end (surely anyone who was interested in the first place went in the first couple of weeks? What is the point of small shows in small galleries that hardly anyone ever goes to going on for weeks on end let alone months and months on end?)
So anyway, last Thursday was all about running around parts of The East End, about leaving the Hackney bunker full of hope if not anticipation, off on the hunt for art, for that one thing, that one piece, that show or that artist that will ignite something, that will please please excite, that will speak in some kind of way. Sang Woo Kim‘s solo show The Seer, The Seen at Herald Street Gallery was the nearest thing to something that did bite or at least hint at igniting something more than half heartedly pointing a camera phone at things and standing there searching for something more and then heading home to write half heartedly polite reviews when in truth, with maybe the exception of those Sang Woo Kim eyes once again best things seen on Thursday night were the accidental layers and the unintended collaborations on the fractured walls on the dark evening streets of East London.
Sang Woo Kim’s room full of self-portraits, well mostly a room full of eye portraits, pieces painted in several ways, sometimes textured with broken brushstrokes, sometimes smooth and almost dangerously close to being photorealistic, at other times kind of gestural, a whole bag full of paintings all focused on his eyes, one painting looking right at you, another maybe looking beyond you or avoiding you the viewer. Eyes that reflect, so he says, a desire to “reclaim agency” over his racialisation as a Korean man in British society. It is all about Kim’s eyes, his eyes are everywhere, closed cropped eyes, eyes as a repeated motif, repeated in the variety of styles found in his different paintings, eyes that question, eyes that maybe accuse? I guess his epicanthic folds, something once widely ridiculed by the West, are now seen by many through the lens of an almost orientalist fetish. Indeed we’re told “Kim’s emphasis on his eyes are an attempt to encode a different set of significations beyond their Otherness: of a more complicated meeting between racism, objectification and the struggle against these forces. Here, in Kim’s debut solo exhibition in London, the contrast between his eyes and those of others—held open by a speculum, gazing away from the viewer, staring in amazement at something beyond the frame—suggests a multidirectional spectatorship between the artist and his milieu in the imperial metropole” – I mean it is a show that questions, a show that questions many things, a show that addresses more that questions maybe? I mean paintings of your own eyes, I wouldn’t want to do it – actually there was a moment during the packed opening and all the congratulation being offered when our eyes met, just for a brief second, the artist himself, not his paintings, just a brief second, a deliciously awkward moment before heads turned away and normal service was resumed like it needs to be here. Sang Woo Kim’s eyes were the nearest thing to a challenge, to a bite, to a kick, to something more than a half hearted so what.
I’m not sure if Sang Woo Kim’s paintings or his show was something to like or indeed to dislike either, it surely isn’t a show to like or dislike, it isn’t about that, it isn’t as simple as that, it is maybe something left of that? Something beyond just liking or disliking? It wasn’t an uncomfortable show, not sure if the artist wanted it to be? I;m not sure if the eyes in the painting really did speak in any kind of way but then the gallery was packed and it was noisy and people were doing that annoying standing in front of the paintings, back mostly to them busy taking to each other and sucking down the free beer, like we’re only here for the social event, which we probably are. Side note, I’m seeing very few of the faces we’d regularly see, where’s everyone gone, is the art churn that big? Has everyone given up on art? Left town? Gone to the seaside? Been forced out? Just can’t be bothered? The art crowd had changed, I assume this crowd was mostly the current crop of art students, they’ll probably say I should piss off as well, they’re probably right, shall we knock all this on the head? So Sang Woo Kim’s show, it really needs to be visited again in a few days time when the dust has settled and the crowds have gone and well it is on for the rest of the year so there is plenty of time, why do shows go on for so long? This one goes on until 1st February next year for gawd sake, why? What do gallery people do all day? Don’t they get bored? Three weeks was way too long for me, time to change the show, let’s do more, let’s get some energy in here, change change change, who needs a show to last more than three weeks, why are galleries being so damn boring these days. No rush then, we’ve got a good few months to go back and have some quiet time with Sang Woo Kim’s paintings hell, we can go back next year! Is there much point in carrying on with any of this, shall we just go down swinging? Shall I just hit the delete button and not bother saying any of this? There was a visit to the new exhibitions just opened at The Approach Gallery on Saturday, a show of work by Bronx artist Glenn Goldberg and his decoration, or is it more, or is it enough? Watch this space? Maybe? Is there any point? (sw)
Merlin James can be explored at Maureen Pavey Gallery until 11th January 2025. Sang Woo Kim‘s eyes can be engaged with at Herald Street until 1st February 2025
Three East London art shows worth checking out right now…
As always, click on an image to see the whole thing or to run the fractured slide show
THE ORGAN 
3 responses to “ORGAN THING: East London’s Thursday night’s art openings, was Sang Woo Kim’s show at Herald Street Gallery really all there was?”
[…] show The Seer, The Seen is still on, feels like a lifetime ago that we covered that one – East London’s Thursday night’s art openings, was Sang Woo Kim’s show at Herald Street Gallery … Good to briefly catch it again before it ends I guess, it goes on until the first day of February […]
[…] show The Seer, The Seen is still on, feels like a lifetime ago that we covered that one – East London’s Thursday night’s art openings, was Sang Woo Kim’s show at Herald Street Gallery … Good to briefly catch it again before it ends I guess, it goes on until the first day of February […]
[…] show The Seer, The Seen is still on, feels like a lifetime ago that we covered that one – East London’s Thursday night’s art openings, was Sang Woo Kim’s show at Herald Street Gallery … Good to briefly catch it again before it ends I guess, it goes on until the first day of February […]