ART CITIES:Hong Kong-Eddie Peake

Eddie Peake, Tangerine, 2016, © Eddie Peake, Photo © White Cube (Ben Westoby)Eddie Peake’s work includes performance, film, photography, painting, sculpture and installation. The artist first attracted attention in 2012 when he was still a student at the Royal Academy Schools and staged a naked football match in which the different teams were distinguished only by their socks. Before he graduated, Peake had created dance performances for the Chisenhale Gallery, Tate Modern and Performa 13 as well as having his first major show at White Cube Gallery

By Efi Michalarou
Photo: White Cube Archive

For “Where You Belong” his solo exhibition at white Cube Gallery in Hong Kong presents four new groups of work. The first is a series of abstract canvases in which spray-painted, acid-coloured lines create overlapping misaligned frames within the picture. Leaving the centre white, the empty space can be read in different ways: an area of possibility, like an empty cinema screen waiting for the projection to start, a material, an existential vacuum or even as a proxy for the ultimate infinite void – death. A second group of paintings is equally charged and vibrant in colour, but these are populated by schematic and cartoon figures. A mysterious cartoon faun holds up a crystal ball, offering-up to the viewer a ‘painting-within-the-painting’ of images of autobiographical significance. For the artist, the faun represents an alter-ego, a manic, playful anarchic character that stands in as narrator, choreographer and witness. In the centre of the gallery, a wall with smashed apertures frames a view of the gallery beyond, a device employed by the artist in past installations both to choreograph the movement of visitors and to create a tantalising sense of partial disclosure. Behind this, a billboard-sized photograph of a statuesque nude, looking at a computer screen, entirely covers the wall. Signalling hands have appeared in Peake’s past work, outlined in neon, suggesting alternative methods of communication, such as emojis or the covert hand language of gangs. His newest sculptures are larger than life gesturing female hands. The extravagant manicures and gaudy jewellery that adorn them are not only expressions of individuality, but also evoke the often painful insecurity implicit in the pursuit of identity through adornment. For the artist, they recall his youthful idolisation of his glamorous teenage sisters.

Info: White Cube Gallery, 50 Connaught Road Central, Hong Kong, Duration: 25/1/16-7/1/17, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat 11:00-19:00, http://whitecube.com

 

Eddie Peake, Triple Selfie, 2016, © Eddie Peake, Photo © White Cube (George Darrell)
Eddie Peake, Triple Selfie, 2016, © Eddie Peake, Photo © White Cube (George Darrell), Courtesy White Cube Gallery

 

 

Eddie Peake, A Fifteen Year Old Eddie Goes To A Museum, Which May Or May Not Have Been Tate Britain, On A School Trip And Has No Interest In The Bonnard Exhibition That Was The Reason For The Trip – Except For A Painting Of Bonnard’s Wife In The Bath, About Which Eddie Commented To His Friend (Who Incidentally Would Later Become A Famous Columnist) "She Looks Sexy,” To Which His Friend Responded "She Is In Her Eighties" – But Sees A Richard Hamilton Painting From The Permanent Collection And Decides It Is His Favorite Painting Ever, 2016, © Eddie Peake, Photo © White Cube (George Darrell)
Eddie Peake, A Fifteen Year Old Eddie Goes To A Museum, Which May Or May Not Have Been Tate Britain, On A School Trip And Has No Interest In The Bonnard Exhibition That Was The Reason For The Trip – Except For A Painting Of Bonnard’s Wife In The Bath, About Which Eddie Commented To His Friend (Who Incidentally Would Later Become A Famous Columnist) “She Looks Sexy,” To Which His Friend Responded “She Is In Her Eighties” – But Sees A Richard Hamilton Painting From The Permanent Collection And Decides It Is His Favorite Painting Ever, 2016, © Eddie Peake, Photo © White Cube (George Darrell), Courtesy White Cube Gallery

 

 

Eddie Peake, Gonna Kill Myself So Fuck You Anyway Part Two, 2016, © Eddie Peake, Photo © White Cube (Ben Westoby)
Eddie Peake, Gonna Kill Myself So Fuck You Anyway Part Two, 2016, © Eddie Peake, Photo © White Cube (Ben Westoby), Courtesy White Cube Gallery