Brand New and Retro: UP Projects

Brand New and Retro

Empire Bethnal Green

21 February - 21 March 2004

curated by Gemma de Cruz and
Emma Underhill

Matt Calderwood
Luke Caulfield
Tanya Fairey
Dara Friedman
Kirsten Glass
Douglas Gordon
Jun Hasegawa
Jim Lambie
Peter Liversidge
Kristen Lovelock
Toby Ziegler

Brand New and Retro catalogue £5. To order: info@upprojects.com

Brand New and Retro presented the work of eleven new and established international contemporary artists working in paint, sculpture, film and video in a former church and factory space in Bethnal Green, London E2

The recycling of past styles has become an established way of making art as well as fashion and music to the point where the concept of Retro is now an integral aspect of contemporary popular culture.  The most noticeable thing about the teenage kids that hang around on street corners looking like the latest generation of punks and Goths is that everything has been watered down.  They don't look angry or threatening, but that isn't the point for them - they're not trying to do it again they're just trying to do it now.  Putting on someone else's clothes doesn't put you in 1977 so what is the appeal of Retro?  Partly it is `about borrowing the legacy of a previous era with the same casual commitment as putting on a T-shirt. After all, the 1990's proved that it is possible to relive all the best trends of the past whilst adding a contemporary twist to invent something new rather than just making a nostalgic nod to the past.

Appropriating images from art history is an accepted genre within contemporary art.  In recent years artists have expanded this method of working by mixing up art references with fashion trends from different era's and sampling materials and imagery from popular culture of the recent past - reworking and updating them so they converge within a new, unified form. For the artists in Brand New And Retro looking old has become part of looking new.  Each artist has adapted or worked directly over the top of an existing style of art, object or image, re-inventing it and making it their own.