A collective exhibition of 27 young creatives will be launched at Shoreditch Town Hall, London, on March, 26, 2009. “Handle with Care” will showcase the works of emergent talents, who will use a wide range of media, from fine art and photography, to design and illustration.
The show wants to give an overview of their multiple points of view on a single but really wide theme: “Handle with Care.” What does it mean? Is the artist, or the public, invited to handle with care the art itself? Or is it the artist’s last scream in favour of mother nature? The intrinsic polysemy of the sentence invites the artists to play with it, giving to the public a prismatic vision of the subject.
The exhibition title suggests fragility and delicacy, but at the same time awakens the bestial instinct of destruction. The artists themselves decided the theme after several animated meetings after work at the Design Museum, and while their job didn’t directly inspired them, it certainly influenced their way of thinking . All the artists are employed at the Design Museum, London, and this unconsciously gave them the chance to be on the same platform and to create their first exhibition as a group.
As gallery assistants, the artists also get to see the backstage of the museum, where all the shipped artworks are packed with signs like “Fragile” “Handle with Care.” “Handle with Care is a sentence that often came under our eyes” said one of the artist, “the hours in the gallery are long and there is plenty of time to think and to flow with the fantasy.”
The exhibition wants to involve the viewers in a chain of interpretations, without giving a definitive answer to the theme, without preferring any particular perspective. The show presents original artistic interpretations on the same subject, giving an overview of contemporary concerns and solutions in the art practice, thanks to the variety of media used and the artists’ different backgrounds.
If for some of the artists “Handle with Care” refers to something - objects, relationships, animals, environment, social life, intimacy, experiences -that must be protected and kept safe, for others opposite feelings of brutality, destruction, and anger might emerge. Through this dichotomy the show try to create a sort of narrative featuring 27 fresh and young visions on the theme.
Reaching the public with unseen perspectives, the exhibition is an opportunity for this young creative to show their work and express their opinions. Their wish to communicate their concerns through different languages, and the need to be ‘listened’ from different eyes, have prompted the artists themselves to put on the show.
Sara Pergola Curator