Twitter sensation The Artist Taxi Driver – 125,000 followers on t’internet – is to oversee a major live art “experience” at the Bethlem Gallery, part of their summer exhibition, starting from next month.
Over the past decade or more, his anarchic, subversive anti-establishment take on national and global events has become his form of performance art, through painting, video, spoken word, and anything and everything else.
He uses the media, activism and mental health to create daily artworks – especially online, where a prolific output of works can be seen on social media sites as well as in galleries and on the street.
He’s now even started to commercialise some themes from his work, with Artist Taxi Driver-style T-shirts (“Who buys this shit”) and tote bags (“Fuck Keir too” among the themes).
Living art: The Artist Taxi Driver, Mark McGowan, in one of his new T-shirts
And for its summer exhibition, ThMcGowan saide Bethlem Gallery in Spring Park is giving the public an opportunity to create their own art with The Artist Taxi Driver, and others, in what they describe as an “immersive” 90s-style “live lounge”.
“With the gallery transformed into the “live lounge”, visitors will enter an extraordinary space filled with wall hangings, sofas, rugs, a piano, drums, digital musical equipment and a wardrobe transformed into a giant speaker,” the Gallery said in unveiling their plans for summer.
“They will be able to browse reimagined vintage rock T-shirts, an original album covers display and a vinyl record exchange library, as well as being able to mix or make music and visuals thanks to an immersive recording studio, a DJ booth, projections, and an array of musical instruments.”
The exhibition opens on May 8.
As well as being able to drop by anytime during gallery opening hours, there will also be a series of workshops visitors can book into, scheduled performances and a Bethlem Live Lounge festival that will take place on June 8.
“We know through previous projects and via our academic lead on this project, Professor Sally Marlow at King’s College London, that music-making and listening to music can positively impact our mental health and express our experiences of mental health and mental ill health in novel, often helpful ways,” said Sophie Leighton, the director at the Bethlem Gallery.
“Mark’s idea of a Live Lounge – inviting visitors to perform in the space – brings these ideas to life and in doing so we will be creating and capturing the sound of our communities. The recordings produced will be an important and exciting legacy.”
The art will be live and evolving but also captured in the form of an album as well as music tracks featured on Bethlem Gallery’s website. The vinyl album entitled Melancholy and Madness, is a collaboration between The Artist Taxi Driver, producer Gawain Hewitt, internationally-acclaimed musician Nitin Sawhney and Bethlem artists and choir members – whose voices will feature on the album.
Melancholy and Madness will be released as a limited-edition vinyl album.
“Melancholy and Madness has been designed to own negative tropes and reclaim ‘madness’ as a description of a state that we can all experience at points in our lives,” McGowan said. “It is not an identity, and creating a piece of music reflects the fluctuating nature of such an experience.
Design classes: a stylish and contemporary tote bag from The Artist Taxi Driver. Ideal for politicians of all parties to carry around their vacuous and unread leaflets
“The album is something we hope that everyone can relate to in some way. The idea of mental health only applying to people in hospital is untrue. Without underestimating the impact of mental ill health, which I know from my own experience can be devastating, it is true to say that we all have highs and lows, and exploring how this might sound through music is a way to make us think about those states in a different light.”
Other music tracks, which will be available digitally, will be recorded at various points during the exhibition and accompanying workshops, capturing sound, songs and lyrics made by participants and visitors.
Additional opportunities for those who are eager to develop visual and design skills include a T-shirt making workshop led by designer Julie Verhoeven, where attendees will have the chance to create reimagined vintage rock t-shirts.
Bethlem Live Lounge is curated by The Artist Taxi Driver, with the involvement and support of artists including: Barrington G, Finn, Halimah Zakiuddin, Joanne Barrett aka Wen Frank, Jonas Tiknius, Kim, Leon Clowes, Nidhi Ashiwal, Nitin Sawhney, Siobhan Cawson Mooney, Susan Noonan, Susannah Oliver, Tom Newlands, the Mind and Soul Community Choir, Peter Harris, Warren from Meatraffle and Julie Verhoeven.
It has been developed in collaboration with Prof Sally Marlow and with the support of the ESRC Centre for Society and Mental Health at King’s College London.
The Bethlem Royal Hospital on Monks Orchard Road is the world’s oldest psychiatric institution. Bethlem Live Lounge is open to the public from May 8 to July 13 at Bethlem Gallery in Beckenham.
For more information visit www.BethlemGallery.com
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