It's Hard to be a Saint in This City The Space
Contemporary British artist Stuart Semple's latest exhibition at The Space can be construed as a form of self therapy and an attempt to exorcise past demons - bullied school years and a near-death allergic trauma at 19 - through art.
Semple mused on the title: 'In the contemporary realm, it unseals our jar of emotions as a loner and a spiritually detached being.' The mention of sainthood is a quest for selfhood and a cure for sanity.
Art critics have observed that Semple's works probe the darker side of humanity, issues such as fear and death. But it's disputable that his oeuvre is really so gloomy. For one thing, immediately after the artist recovered from his near-fatal allergic trauma, he produced as many as three works a day. Art has consumed him entirely. And when he released 2,057 pink Happy Clouds over Tate Modern in 2009 - to cheer up Londoners in the midst of the recession - it showed a robust faith.
In this solo show, Semple displays a fresh impetus to make sense of the anarchy loosed upon his world. 'The ordeal changed my whole life,' he says. 'Art is now a vital outlet for me to discern my world. Of course, in the postmodern status quo, popular culture is a powerful stack of tools to re-invent and recount new stories.'
There are a number of autobiographic works in this exhibition. Soft sculptures such as Freak, Creep and Wuss (2011) are names his schoolmates used to call him. But these verbal insults today stand feebly in their absurdity.