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Story by Jack Foley |
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SURREALISM and fashion collides in spectacular style at Pollock Fine Art
gallery in Beak Street, London, with the arrival of a new exhibition entitled
Hans Bellmer and More Dolls.
The event, which runs until June 1 and is in support of Crusaid, features
the work of Hans Bellmer and his close circle of artists and friends from
Belgium (Leo Dohmen and Paul Delvaux, for example), before taking in the work
of other surrealists such as Marcel Duchamp and England's own first couple
of surrealism, Pailthorpe and Mednikoff.
Spanning a period from 1938 through to 2002, the exhibition comes right up to date by profiling the work of contemporary surrealists such as Hans Breder and Alexei Hay (whose work, The Undesecrated, is pictured above).
American Hay is described as a photographer who uses the parameters of fashion
photography to push the envelope of art. Bearded models, two headed models,
and prosthetics are just a few of the devices utilised for recent issues of
Dutch magazine. He has shot fashion for other magazines such as Dazed, Esquire,
GQ, I-D and has put together campaigns for Gucci, Armani X and Mac. His first
one-man show took place at Bronwyn Kenan in New York.
Further examples of his work - which ranges from the erotic to the popular
(see Tim Roth's Planet of the Apes
shoot) - can be viewed by clicking the right hand web link in the box above.
Of the other artists on show at Pollock Fine Art, Carlos Pazos is considered
one of Spain's most important artists, bridging the late Franco period to
the present. A hero in his native Catalonia, Pazos is a visual poet who, like
Warhol, is considered a great connoisseur
of popular culture. He is set to have a major retrospective of his work at
the Rainer-Sophia Museum in Madrid.
German-born Hans Breder, meanwhile, moved to New York in 1965, where
he exhibited minimalist sculpture. After accepting a teaching post at Iowa
State, he began to produce an extraordinary collection of body sculptures,
utilizing his students as nude models.
Through the simple device of cropping and reflecting sections of the body
with mirror planes edges, Breder created 'amorphous uber-bodies' that, like
Bellmer before him, seemed to 'unlock doors to the psyche'. His work is to
be included at the upcoming Ana Mendeta retrospective at the Museum of Modern
Art in New York.
Which
brings us to Bellmer, the launch pad for the exhibition. According to the
weblink we have provided (and which can be accessed by clicking the top left
button in the box above), Hans Belmer (shown in this self portrait,
right) made over a 100 photos of several dolls he made in the early 1930s,
with the assistance of his brother and his sister in-law, in part as a protest
against Germany's Nazi regime, and in part out of an expression of erotic
feelings.
Opportunistic collectors are expected to arrive in force at Pollock Fine
Art during the exhibition, armed with chequebooks, and 10% of all sales will
go to Crusaid, the UK's national fundraising charity for HIV and AIDS.
Pollock Fine Art, 21 Beak Street, off Regent Street, London, W1. Tel: 020
7434 9947.
Nearest Tube: Piccadilly
Opening hours: Monday to Saturday, 12pm to 7pm.
RELATED STORIES: Warhol at the Tate, review by Tom O'Riordan. Click here
Warhol and Pop Art at Pollock Fine Art, preview. Click here
The seductive world of Guy Bourdin, preview and profile. Click here