East End Review

Tag: Jeremy Deller

  • Students occupy gallery over plans to sell-off Cass art school

    An Cass occupation – Barbara Ntumey 620
    An occupier registers disapproval at plans to relocate the Cass. Photograph: Barbara Ntumy

    Opposition against a £50 million sell-off and relocation of the Cass Faculty of Art, Architecture and Design has gathered pace, with students occupying a gallery on Wednesday evening.

    The students have moved into the Bank Gallery space on Whitechapel High Street to protest against London Metropolitan University’s plans to merge its departments into one campus on Holloway Road by September 2017.

    The plans, approved in October, would see The Cass’s current home in Aldgate and the rest of London Met’s East London estate sold off, with the proceeds used to revamp the Holloway campus.

    The occupation was sparked by the suspension of Robert Mull as Dean of Faculty, believed to be the result of Mull’s refusal to support the university’s ‘One Campus, One Community’ policy.

    A group called Occupy the Cass has issued a list of demands, which include not selling the Cass’s Central House building on Whitechapel High Street, and a commitment not to cut courses, staff numbers and student places.

    Courses in jewellery, silversmithing and the last musical instrument making BSc in the UK are being phased out at the Cass as part of the university’s ‘annual portfolio review’ but which the occupying students see as evidence of an “asset stripping exercise to balance the university’s books”.

    The group’s actions have been endorsed by the likes of artists Jeremy Deller, a visiting professor at the school, and Bob and Roberta Smith, an associate professor and course leader there. The latter described the occupiers as “wonderful people” who are “standing up for the Cass [and for] art education at all levels.”

    However, a statement released by London Metropolitan University said it is investing £125m in new workshops and studio spaces to create a new home for The Cass at the Holloway campus.

    “We appreciate that some students are concerned about the move, but we’d like to reassure them that the Cass is not closing, nor will its making ethos or successful studio model of teaching be lost,” the statement read.

    “By moving to Islington, the Cass will be in one location as opposed to the faculty’s current split between Central House and Commercial Road. Students have already highlighted the success of the previous merger between the School of Architecture and School of Art and Design to form the Cass three years ago, and we believe another move, with considerably more investment, can only be positive.

    “We are inviting students to work with us to shape the Cass’s future together, and we’d urge those occupying today to accept that offer.”

    The occupation is the latest measure in an increasingly high-profile campaign to ‘save the Cass’. A petition opposing the one campus plan has more than 2000 signatories, and last week the school’s proposed move away from East London was mentioned during a debate in the House of Lords. Bob and Roberta Smith has created a new artwork protesting the move, an open letter to chancellor George Osbourne penned on convector heaters, which is on display at William Morris Gallery.

    Mayor of Tower Hamlets John Biggs has described himself as “deeply shocked” at the decision to move the Cass, whose alumni include members of the newly-crowned Turner Prize winning collective, Assemble.

  • Jeremy Deller’s English Magic brought to William Morris Gallery

    William Morris takes direct action with Roman Abramovich's yacht in painting by Jeremy Deller
    William Morris takes direct action with Roman Abramovich’s yacht in painting by Jeremy Deller

    Celebrated conceptual artist Jeremy Deller has brought his exhibition for the British Pavilion at last year’s Venice Biennale to Walthamstow.

    Climbing the steps of the cosy William Morris Gallery, you find yourself caught between two giant banners in the midst of heated discussion. Resembling African tribal masks, these banners are expressions of the twin evils of corporate tax avoidance and permissive tax havens. Designed by trade union artist Ed Hall, they are but one piece in Deller’s grand prophecy of the fall of capitalism in the not too distant future.

    Deller’s exhibition is called ‘English Magic,’ but perhaps ‘English Anger’ would have been more appropriate. He draws upon the fantastical and mythological as a means of expressing his fury at an unjust world in which capital begets capital, which then begets power, and finally suffering.

    In his ground floor exhibition, there are two murals painted on the wall, both featuring the revenge of the oppressed proletariat. In one, William Morris, champion of socialism, emerges from the Venetian waters like Poseidon to discard the mega yacht of Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich that, in 2011, docked by Venice’s Biennale Gardens, blocking the view and causing consternation among residents and tourists. Jeremy Deller said: “For me William Morris is a fascinating character who wore his heart on his sleeve, mixing politics and art in a way no one has managed to since.”

    The other mural is an illustration of a prophetic political demonstration in 2017 on the notorious tax haven island of Jersey. The story is as follows: the people of Britain descend on the town of St Helier, outraged by the continued secrecy and irresponsibility of the country’s wealthy, and the demonstration quickly becomes violent. The burning house in St Helier depicted in the mural is symbolic of the collapse of modern capital-centric society.

    A floor above, Deller moves from the near future to the recent past: The Iraq War. Here, the dark arts of English Magic are conjured in drawings by prisoners in the UK, many of whom former soldiers, of the war’s key figures and events. And then there’s the centerpiece: a video of Britain’s birds (and many other things) scored to South London’s Melodians Steel Orchestra interpretation of ‘The Man Who Sold The World’ by David Bowie.

    Anna Mason, curator at the gallery, reports that visitors are flocking to Walthamstow’s art hub in “record-breaking numbers”. Over 2000 came to see English Magic last weekend, with a great response following rave reviews.

    The exhibition is missing the piece ‘A Good Day for Cyclists’ – an important part of Deller’s Venice showcase that couldn’t fit in the Walthamstow gallery. English Magic is nevertheless provocative, interesting and righteously angry.

    English Magic is at William Morris Gallery Lloyd Park, Forest Road, E17 4PP until 30 March.