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How The West Was Won, It’s A Lie But It’s Made To Sound Like Fun, 2018, comics on wood, 85 cm x 126 cm © The artist
Exhibition
Ben Turnbull: American History X volume III, Manifest Decimation
15 Oct 2019 – 2 Nov 2019
Regular hours
- Monday
- Closed
- Tuesday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Wednesday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Thursday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Friday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Saturday
- 10:00 – 18:00
- Sunday
- 10:00 – 18:00
Address
- 183-185 Bermondsey Street
- (adjacent to White Cube Bermondsey)
- London
England - SE1 3UW
- United Kingdom
Travel Information
- C10 Victoria to Canada Water (Stop F Bermondsey Street)
- London Bridge - Borough
Bermondsey Project Space is delighted to present an exhibition of works by the acclaimed artist Ben Turnbull.
About
Entitled American History X volume III, Manifest Decimation, the show is the artist’s first since his highly-acclaimed Saatchi Gallery presentation in 2017 and extends Turnbull’s ongoing exploration of American political and social culture.
Comprised of seven large-scale collages executed in his trademark style using cut-outs from vintage American comics, the works examine the history of the ‘Indian Removal Act’ and the concept of ‘Manifest Destiny’, a belief which led to a cultural genocide of native Americans.
Manifest Decimation is a revisionist take on the mythology of how the west was won. Using cut-outs of Western comics and pulp novels – the type that showed ruthless colonisers as a necessary force for civilisation – Turnbull spins it around and makes the Indians the victors, the cowboys the vanquished.
The centrepiece of the show is a re-imagining of Mount Rushmore with Native Americans now centre stage, and, on closer inspection, the surrounding terrain is a vast battleground of comic book Cowboys and Indians.
The exhibition is the third in an ongoing series, following American History X volume II, Smells Like Teen Spirit, and American History X volume I, The Death of America, 2013.