This text was written in response to Of Foxes and Ghosts, a group show featuring artists Maya Bloch, Henry Curchod, Veronika Hapchenko, Antonia Kuo, Julia Maiuri, Maciej Nowacki and Areum Yang at MAMOTH Contemporary (London) open from May 7th to June 11th, 2022.
Excerpt:
Once upon a time, in a not-so-far-away land called The West (a.k.a. Europe), a few talented artists became invested in a ‘new’ artistic language known as Abstraction. Encouraged by previous experiments led by Fauvists, Romanticists, and Impressionists before them, this new generation of artists was breaking ties with centuries of continental figurative tradition. Alongside Expressionism, these cousin styles allowed for something that, historically speaking, had been rather overlooked: self-expression. Now seen as a way to transcend reality, art in the West was turning to look inwards.
Of Foxes and Ghosts is inspired by Pu Songling’s Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio, a series of tales wherein spirits, ghosts and foxes represent the human vices as witnessed by the author in his contemporary society. This literary gem shows the power of metaphors in understanding and critiquing reality, a strategy shared by all the seven artists currently showing at MAMOTH Contemporary.
Claudia Contu 