Figuratively Fiction by John Gathercole

About

John Gathercole has been working professionally for many years, selling and showing internationally, including both Tate Modern and Britain. Painting is his first love but initially found success as the founder of the Kreative Union of Neo-aesthetic Terrorists, (the K.U.N.T ists, a play on the German word for art). An anti aesthetic anti art punk collective that lampooned the art world.

With the Kreative Union he catechized what is considered art, exploring whether art is morally emancipating or socially engaging and what was considered art as both good and bad, high and lowbrow. Through this they challenged the assumptions of established aesthetic criteria by employing subversive working agendas and disputing the role of the artist in society.
They went on to open a shop/gallery, ‘The Emporium’, in East London which allowed the group to pursue a commercial artistic venture, establishing the Kuntists as a brand and entity by producing a fanzine, clothing range, art gifts and dolls and also forming a band and releasing a cd ‘Art Noises’.