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The Arts Intel Report

... And His Friends

Oct 18, 2021 – Feb 28, 2022
Church Hill, Little Milton, Oxford OX44 7QB, UK

Douglas Gordon usually pulls inspiration from a sweeping range of cultures, mediums, and styles, but for his new exhibition his focus is intimate: his friends. Well, not his actual friends, but the people and works that have kept him company throughout his life. In particular, several of the new paintings in this solo show feature the 18th-century Scottish bard Robert Burns, an important influence on Gordon during his adolescence in Glasgow. Gordon makes his work by destroying his inspiration—literally, sometimes by burning canvases, and figuratively, ripping advertisements from their context and surrounding them with images to remake their meaning. He doesn’t spare Burns: the text of his 1794 poem “Red, Red, Rose” is scattered throughout the exhibition. Typical of Gordon, his new work is in multiple mediums, from burned sugar crystals to smashed mirrors. —J.D.

Douglas Gordon, “Untitled,” 2021. Courtesy of Albion Barn.