Paul Mccarthy: Piccadilly Circus, Bunker Basement

by Paul McCarthy

"Using the Victorian interior of an abandoned bank on London’s Piccadilly as the on-site location for this video performance, and a rudimentary recreation of that bank’s subterranean vaults in his studio outside Los Angeles for supplementary footage, McCarthy has staged a slapstick Twilight of the Gods that also doubles as the most disturbing Sadeian fantasia since Pier Paolo Pasolini’s Salo." (Robert Storr)A president (George W. Bush), multiple Queen Mums, and a terrorist (Osama bin Laden) are the protagonists, "With their oversized heads and giant clown shoes, they resemble strangely hybrid creatures....cartoon characters that shit, bleed, and possess real genitals." (Ralph Rugoff) In frenzied acts of self- and reciprocal mutilation, sawing and hacking away at each other’s oversized foam heads, McCarthy’s characters "do not appear to be think-ing at all. Instead, they act instinctually, which is the political moral of McCarthy’s riotous scenario; reasons of state cannot explain such destruction and debauchery but an amoral state of nature, which no mask of decorum can hide or contain, unleashes primary urges that do." (Robert Storr) Scalo is very excited to present this 348-page two-volume edition of photographs, which contains an extensive documentation of McCarthy’s unrestrained performances and over-the-top installations. Exhibited internationally since the late 1970s, McCarthy’s work has been shown most recently at important museums and galleries, the Tate Modern, London (2003); Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (2000); and New Museum of Contemporary Art New York (2001).Piccadilly Circus was performed and exhibited at Hauser & Wirth London; Bunker Basement was performed at Paul McCarthy’s studio in Los Angeles and the video was shown as part of the installation at Hauser & Wirth London (2003).Born 1945 in Salt Lake City, McCarthy trained as a painter before experimenting with film and producing photographic work in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Based in Los Angeles, his work is known for its perverted interpretations of childhood stories and vulgarity of expression.

Genres: Art

348 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[Bart · Rating 5 out of 5]

Paul McCarthy is easy to like: he is “a critical analyst of the mass media and consumer-driven American society and its hypocrisy, double standards and repression.” This two-volume book, sold in a slipcase, catches his most overtly political work. The marketable products around McCarthy are ironic given his usual targets, to say the least. I guess everybody turns into an overaged hippy living the life sooner or later.

The two installations/performance art/video works feature G.W. Bush, the Queen Mum, Osama Bin Laden. Piccadilly Circus is set in a former London bank. Aside from some of the characters and that setting, there’s nothing directly political: the characters engage in typical McCarthyan slapstick behavior: what starts with glossy oversized heads & shoes, ends gross, nude, and smeared in fluids.

The books only contain stills and photographs, and capture the world’s eerie madness well.

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