Charlie Warde: Concrete Legacies

About

The show brings together 3D ‘plastic paintings’, gold plated etchings and a film from his residencies at the Goldfinger Factory in Trellick Tower and at The National Trust’s 2 Willow Road – both designed by Brutalist architect Ernö Goldfinger, the latter his Hampstead home.

Warde represents an upsurge in interest in Brutalism amongst artists, at a time when Britain is rapidly divesting itself of its ‘failed’ Brutalist heritage. For artists like Warde, Brutalism has become source material – something to be observed, quoted, appropriated – a part of art history.

Since his MA, Warde has been obsessively researching Goldfinger’s buildings and collecting deep technical data by trawling through archives and interviewing academics and architects. He uses traditional painter’s materials such as raw pigment and mediums to accurately model concrete and aggregate pieces, and then assembles these into precise copies of weathered architectural fragments, but with a painter’s eye for their colours and processes of colouration.

“We live in heightened Neoliberal times with a skyline punctured by the high-tech signature architecture of banks and private equity firms; populated by people who are lucky enough to afford their own homes. Brutalism is part of the Zeitgeist again because it harks from a time when the state provided. It represents a muscular return to strong core values.” Charlie Warde

“Warde simultaneously celebrates and challenges Goldfinger’s attempts at building utopia.” Icon Magazine

Warde’s work can be found in the permanent collections of the V&A Museum and 2 Willow Road. He has been recently spotlighted by Artslant (Under the radar) and Axisweb (#five2watch).

For press information, please contact info@charliewarde.com, iavor@lubomirov-angus-hughes.com or info@themuseat269.com