In 2009, Goodman Gallery Cape Town presented The Mirror Stage, Turk’s first solo exhibition in South Africa. For the show Turk created an installation based on Andy Warhol’s ‘Factory’, the artist's infamous original New York City studio, which Warhol occupied from 1962 until 1968.&nbsp;

The gallery walls were wallpapered with silver foil as a visual game with reflection and disorientation, against which a selection of Turk’s paintings, silkscreens and sculptural pieces were shown. The title of the show referred to Lacanian ideas about child development and the emergence of self-consciousness. Displayed works included the signature works Your Authorised Reflection and Erutangis (signature backwards), complementary riffs on this Narcissus theme. 
 
Continuing the Warholian reference, the show included a series of large silkscreen portraits of the artist as Che Guevara, Joseph Beuys and Elvis Presley amongst others, as well as works based on Warhol’s urine oxidation paintings – abstract works made by pissing on copper metallic painted canvas. 

Turk takes a Gestalt approach to cliché and iconic imagery, subverting our sense of what we think we are seeing with echoes of familiar characters who pervade our cultural consciousness like annoying déjà vu, or pop tunes running repetitively through our minds. Elvis, Beuys, and Che Guevara are all&nbsp;iconic figures – heroes, consumed by the system and now the art.

Mirror Stage, Goodman Gallery (Cape Town)

In 2009, Goodman Gallery Cape Town presented The Mirror Stage, Turk’s first solo exhibition in South Africa. For the show Turk created an installation based on Andy Warhol’s ‘Factory’, the artist's infamous original New York City studio, which Warhol occupied from 1962 until 1968. 

The Mirror Stage

‘Good business is the best art,’ Andy Warhol once provocatively claimed. Tate Modern’s hit autumn exhibition Pop Life examines how artists since the 1980s have cultivated their public persona as a product, and conjured a dazzling mix of media, commerce and glamour to build their own ‘brands’. Beginning with the grandfather of Pop, Andy Warhol, the show includes Jeff Koons’s infamous Made in Heaven series and his stainless steel Rabbit sculpture, an iconic array of golden spot and butterfly paintings from Damien Hirst’s record-breaking 2008 auction, and a reconstruction of Keith Haring’s Pop Shop in New York. Also included will be works by Richard Prince, Martin Kippenberger, and the notorious YBAs, and a new commission by Takashi Murakami.

Further info&nbsp;<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/pop-life-art-material-world">here</a>.

Pop Life

‘Good business is the best art,’ Andy Warhol once provocatively claimed. Tate Modern’s hit autumn exhibition Pop Life examines how artists since the 1980s have cultivated their public persona as a product, and conjured a dazzling mix of media, commerce and glamour to build their own ‘brands’.

The first exhibition at the new Patricia Low Gallery

Pop My Cherry

The first exhibition at the new Patricia Low Gallery

In September of 2009 Aurel Scheibler Gallery presented Turkey Foil, a solo exhibition by Gavin Turk that explored the themes of invention and originality, of authorship and authenticity.

Citing the great gestures of the ‘stars’ of art history, Turk appropriates iconic works, repeating and thereby heightening their effects. Serving up his own blend of art from the scenes of art history, he has continually reinvented himself as an artist throughout his career. Well-known works of art are adopted and their meanings altered; appearance and reality are called into question.

In his title artwork Turkey Foil, Gavin Turk used silkscreen on wood to construct his own brand cult and robbed Duchamp’s ready-mades of their foundation. What appeared to be prefabricated, found objects taken from everyday life—a discarded apple core, an old sleeping bag, and a burnt-out campfire—were revealed to be intricately produced and painted bronze sculptures. In this way Turk demonstrated how incessant reproduction had bled the original anarchistic content from Dadism, which now functions as an accepted code.

Jean Baudrillard’s nightmare scenario of (anti-)media theory in the 1970s was celebrated by in the exhibition: mass media’s creation of a hyper-reality that only works in simulation and simulacrum. By positioning the observer in its midst, Turk was able to demystify this scenario. Mystification, fetishisation, star cult, recycling, and duplication confronted audiences a dense and deliberate way, with artworks referring back to their own lack of substance.

Turkey Foil

In September of 2009 Aurel Scheibler Gallery presented Turkey Foil, a solo exhibition by Gavin Turk that explored the themes of invention and originality, of authorship and authenticity.

A curated group exhibition exploring the use of &lsquo;trompe l&rsquo;oeil&rsquo; devices in modern and contemporary sculpture

No Show

A curated group exhibition exploring the use of ‘trompe l’oeil’ devices in modern and contemporary sculpture

Of all the artforms in Britain, sculpture has been widely regarded as the most inventive and innovative. Over the decades the pace with which it has evolved to incorporate new materials, new forms and new ideas has been unmatched. This display offers an opportunity to trace key moments from the mid 20th century to today. 
From coloured steel in works by Anthony Caro, to Barry Flanagan's soft fabric and photographs of grass, sculpture is seen in a state of perpetual revolution. Ian Hamilton Finlay reminds us of sculpture's political potential, despite its demise as either monument or memorial. Gilbert &amp; George introduce the idea of seriality and ephemerality through their postcard series. Richard Long removes constraints of scale simply by walking in the landscape, and bringing back the evidence in text and photographs. Tony Cragg, Bill Woodrow, Richard Deacon and Richard Wentworth - the New Sculptors - re-introduce the urban landscape by giving scrap and other scavenged street materials unexpected new life, the 20th century equivalent of metaphysical poetry. Richard Wilson's Corner transposes table football from the bar-room to the gallery, and Jim Lambie's glittering turntables bring club culture into the daylight.

This display marks the British Council's 75th anniversary. It is one of five displays presented over one year and selected by guest curators who each contribute a distinct curatorial perspective. The final display in Spring 2010 will result from an international competition open to curators worldwide.

Of all the artforms in Britain, sculpture has been widely regarded as the most inventive and innovative. Over the decades the pace with which it has evolved to incorporate new materials, new forms and new ideas has been unmatched. This display offers an opportunity to trace key moments from the mid 20th century to today.

The Third Dimension

Gavin Turk Ltd was presented by Paul Stolper Gallery in association with RS&amp;A LTD. The exhibition included The Mechanical Turk, a 14-minute film commissioned by RS&amp;A, as well as works on paper, canvas, and mirror.

For his RS&amp;A commission, Turk investigated the fascinating historical story of the ‘Mechanical Turk’ – a life-sized mechanical man that was dressed in Eastern costume and could somehow play chess. &nbsp;The film consists of Gavin Turk dressed as ‘the Turk’ in the identical setting and posing as the 18th Century automaton.

Together with the film, Turk presented a series of works that highlighted his fascination with the commodification of art, and how art history is hijacked and reconstituted in contemporary art. For Gavin Turk Ltd. the artist dissected art historical influences and re-presented them in painting and print.

In Turk Love the word ‘Love’ is substituted from Robert Indiana’s seminal work of the same name for his own surname. The piece explores notions of cliché in popular culture, how highbrow becomes the everyday, and the machinations of how an artwork evolves not only into a signature piece, but how it infiltrates the everyday.

This filtering process was further exemplified by Turk’s series of silkscreen works on mirror presenting images of the artist in in the guise of Andy Warhol and Che Guevara; both icons are reduced to motifs to be used across any number of media, in this case mirrors to adorn bedroom walls.

Your Authorised Reflection, a mirror that is clear save for a signature at the bottom right hand side, examines how the signature bestows value on a work, while the inherent reflective qualities of the mirror reflects the artist’s interest in portraiture.

Shop Sign, a hand-carved shop sign that reads ‘Gavin Turk’, hangs inside the gallery and runs along the length of a wall. The nostalgia generated by Shop Sign reflects a cultural shift from small family run businesses to global brands more allied to America than to Europe. The meticulously crafted artefact disguised as a piece of found ephemera.

Gavin Turk Ltd at Paul Stolper

Gavin Turk Ltd was presented by Paul Stolper Gallery in association with RS&A LTD. The exhibition included The Mechanical Turk, a 14-minute film commissioned by RS&A, as well as works on paper, canvas, and mirror. For his RS&A commission, Turk investigated the fascinating historical story of the ‘Mechanical Turk’ – a life-sized mechanical man that was dressed in Eastern costume and could somehow play chess.  The film consists of Gavin Turk dressed as ‘the Turk’ in the identical setting and posing as the 18th Century automaton.

Gavin Turk Ltd

Distortion is a collateral event of the 53rd Venice Biennale, curated by James Putnam in association with the Gerasuti Foundation

Distortion (2)

Distortion is a collateral event of the 53rd Venice Biennale, curated by James Putnam in association with the Gerasuti Foundation

Distortion

Right Hand and Forearm displayed in the ‘Perfoming Sculpture’ section of the Tate Collection Display at Tate Liverpool

Right Hand and Forearm displayed in the ‘Perfoming Sculpture’ section of the Tate Collection Display at Tate Liverpool

DLA Piper Series: This is Sculpture

Jazzz was a major exhibition of Gavin Turk’s work at the Sean Kelly Gallery in New York featuring paintings, photographs, sculpture and a video installation.<o:p></o:p>

Hung in the Main Gallery, a group of seemingly-abstract large-scale paintings in the style of Jackson Pollock were in fact constructed from countless layers of paint, representing Turk’s repeated signature. Turk’s characteristic appropriation of identity in these paintings was echoed and reinforced by a group of black and white photographs of the artist in his studio making the paintings. The photographs are reminiscent of the well-known series of photographs by Hans Namuth and Rudy Burckhardt that helped demystify Pollock's famous drip painting technique.<o:p></o:p>

The Mechanical Turk, a film in which the artist presents himself as a life-size chess-playing automaton, was be projected in Gallery 1. Turk examines the fascinating historical story of The Turk – a life-sized mechanised figure dressed in Turkish robes, which would trick viewers into believing it was a world-class chess player. The film, which is 14 minutes long, shows the artist dressed in costume executing the knight’s tour, a series of complicated chess moves whereby the knight is placed on an empty board, visiting each square only one time. <o:p></o:p>

Jazzz

Jazzz was a major exhibition of Gavin Turk’s work at the Sean Kelly Gallery in New York featuring paintings, photographs, sculpture and a video installation.