Hew Locke
One of the U.K.’s leading artists, the Anglo-Guyanian Hew Locke has long altered, scrambled, and defaced traditional imagery, with a side specialty in visuals connected to British colonial rule. As a child, the nuns at his Anglican school in Guyana punished him for doodling mustaches and beards on pictures of England’s monarch. Since then, Locke has drawn and sculpted hundreds of heads of Queen Elizabeth II, availing himself of everything from pencils, pastels, wood, cardboard, colored beads, fake jewels, plastic lizards, and toy rifles to construct his royal likenesses. The point of his mangled portraits is subversive in the extreme: they don’t merely vandalize the official histories inscribed in children’s textbooks, they also flesh out the hidden structures of colonialism and globalization tucked beneath the calm visage of Great Britain’s ruler.
Locke’s contribution to Life During Wartime, consists of three different but related bodies of work. The first consists of five pencil, acrylic and watercolor on paper portraits he made while “in lockdown and at home”; they are titled Corona Queens. The second are three 2018 acrylic and pen African-American figures painted on actual nineteenth century Confederate bonds; he has titled this suite of works Song of the South after “the wince-inducing Disney film of 1946.” The third work, a 2016 video animation titled Sovereign State was originally commissioned by the digital art platform Sedition, and appears on this platform thanks to their generosity.
— CVF, USFCAM
Hew Locke, Sovereign State, 2016. Digital animation with sound. Digital edition of 300. Commissioned by Sedition Art. Courtesy of the artist and Sedition Art. (Still image - video no longer available after exhibition dates)
“Growing up in Guyana, Hew Locke remembers images of Queen Elizabeth II on his school exercise book covers remaining long after the country’s Independence. As children, he and his friends would get into trouble for defacing the symbols of the monarchy by playfully giving her spectacles or a moustache. More seriously, Locke’s current work challenges the dearth of more complex images of the royal family and instead creates images with a very different truth as art. Elizabeth II is somebody who for Locke, holds 60 years worth of political secrets in her head; declaring that he wouldn't wish to know all the things she knows. In this video work, Sovereign State, Locke has shown her mouth bound; to hold everything in. Sounds of whispers hover in the air as the images of the Queen transform slowly from one to the other. Edvard Munch’s famous 1893 painting The Scream is a significant influence, as are Tudor portraits of Elizabeth I by Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger. These include The Rainbow Portrait in which she wears a dress covered in eyes and ears as the all-seeing ruler, and The Ditchley Portrait, where she stands upright on a map of England; storms raging behind her while the sun shines before her. Locke’s contemporary take on the monarchy references medieval and renaissance imagery of the ruling elite, who were often portrayed with skulls or skeletons as a reminder that ‘in the midst of life we are in death’ and thus change is always inevitable.”
— Video and text courtesy of Seditionart.com
“I am mostly still in lockdown at home, painting the series of Corona Queen watercolours—though I am slowly returning to the studio—one day a week—where I am working on a group of equestrian statues. My mind drifts back with real pleasure to my previous exhibitions and the experience of walking around shows and seeing how the audience reacts: art needs an audience. A show of mine is currently in quarantine in Colby College museum in Maine—the gallery is closed due to the virus, and I think about my floating boat-sculptures suspended in a darkened space waiting for people to return. I have had a relatively easy lockdown, but I am always aware that for millions of people times are tough and the future precarious and uncertain.”
— Hew Locke
Artist Hew Locke. Photo by Danny Cozens.
About Hew Locke
(Edinburgh, Scotland, 1959 )
He lives and works in the UK.
Hew Locke’s fusing of historic sources with current political or cultural concerns, and the merging of influences from The Caribbean and London, lead to richly textured, vibrant pieces that stand on a crossroad of histories, cultures and media. Locke explores the visual representation of power in areas such as portraiture, coats-of-arms, financial documents, and public statuary. He engages with the embodiments of power globally, building amalgamations between different cultures and histories. His public artworks include the memorial marking 800 years of Magna Carta, situated at Runnymede, and engaging with the history of human rights. His solo exhibition Here’s the Thing, first seen at Ikon Gallery in Birmingham, UK, is currently touring the USA, and an upcoming solo show at The Lowry Gallery in Salford, UK, will include new work taking on Equestrian Statues.
Artist website: hewlocke.net
Gallery website: halesgallery.com
Gallery website: ppowgallery.com
Sedition Art website: seditionart.com