Bold new video works by five artists of the moment living or working in London will take over the world’s largest public screens this July in London, Seoul and Tokyo. Curated by Sir Norman Rosenthal, ‘LONDON ZEITGEIST’ comprised of five independent films by Larry Achiampong, Alvaro Barrington, Matt Copson, artist duo Hannah Quinlan and Rosie Hastings, together forming a bold and comprehensive showcase of the most promising artists within a generation to emerge from London.

This group exhibition adopts its title from Rosenthal’s 1982 exhibition ‘Zeitgeist’ that was held in Berlin’s Martin-Gropius-Bau almost forty years ago, and which was arguably one of the most historically significant global painting surveys of the 20th century, bringing together 45 of the world’s most driven and symbolically heroic artists of the moment. Rosenthal’s unwavering commitment and capacity to embolden the great talent of the time has become a defining characteristic of his career. In 1981, Rosenthal introduced artists such as Baselitz, Kiefer, Polke and Richter to an audience beyond Germany in ‘A New Spirit In Painting’ and helped launch the careers of Damien Hirst, Tracey Emin, Sarah Lucas and many others with ‘Sensation’ in 1997 at the Royal Academy of Art in London:

“That complex German word “Zeitgeist” (Time/Spirit) that more and more has entered the English language – just like “Kindergarten” once did (!) – naturally relates to place as well as time. Each of the four young artists chosen I believe address these issues subjectively, inevitably, sometimes obliquely, yet each in a “Spectacular” and “Beautiful” way onto the iconic Piccadilly Lights screen. They then are transmitted to the other side of the globe. They are pictures both of issues and fantasies that obsess four individual artists living and working in London, forever a huge urban national centre, and that hopefully too will touch audiences around the world.” – Sir Norman Rosenthal

For CIRCA I will show an animation of a gargoyle jutting out from the wall of LEDs, tongue outstretched, dripping water from its mouth, eyes scowling. Occasionally it coughs up junk (M&Ms, milk, coins, roaches) and spits them out like a cat would a hairball. The background is pure black, as if the gargoyle is jutting out from the nearby architecture. -Matt Copson

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SCREEN LOCATIONS

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London, Piccadilly Lights

Experience ‘Gargoyle’ by Matt Copson every day at 20:21 BST/GMT (9 – 15th July) on the iconic Piccadilly Lights screen.

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Seoul, K-Pop Square

Experience ‘Gargoyle’ by Matt Copson every day at 20:21 KST (9 – 15th July) on Seoul’s COEX K-Pop Square screen.

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Tokyo, Yunika Vision

Experience ‘Gargoyle’ by Matt Copson every day at 09:00JST (9 – 15th July) on Tokyo’s Yunika Vision screen.

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London Zeitgeist: The Spirit of the Times

Written by Norman Rosenthal

David Hockney, the great star of the Piccadilly Lights and all round the world this last May (“Sunrise at Sunset” I called it, has often stated there is no longer a Bohemia like he used to know – a lot to do in his mind with bans on smoking and perhaps even a new puritanism that seems to be infecting the world at this time. Well I would, with all due respect to the master, maintain it is not quite as simple as that. certainly as far as the visual arts are concerned, indeed in culture generally, every new generation, in each place where young artists live and work, will form its own new Bohemia. This is one definition of the Zeitgeist – the Spirit of the Times – a largely German philosophical concept and composite word, that has now entered the English language just like Kindergarten/ Garden for Children!

In spite of the terrible nationalist misunderstandings that underline Brexit, London remains still a great cosmopolitan largely tolerant mega city – beautifully so, and it still attracts artists to live, work, interact with each other, support each other too. Since 1945 at least many such groups of artists and their hangers on have come and gone – one thinks of worlds around Francis Bacon Lucian Freud and the Colony Room; Richard Hamilton, David Hockney and Allen Jones walking up and down the Kings Road in the Swinging Sixties, the Sculptors who gathered around the Lisson Gallery up the Edgware Road and the Nigel Greenwood Gallery in Sloane Square in the Seventies – Gilbert and George, Richard Long, Anish Kapoor, Antony Gormley and others, only to be succeeded in the happy Hoxton Square Days by the YBA’s, lead by Damien, Sarah, Tracey, Angus, The Chapman Brothers and a host of others.

DISCOVER THE LONDON ZEITGEIST

Anne Imhof

Alvaro Barrington

Larry Achiampong

Hannah Quinlan + Rosie Hastings

Gallery

Biography

Matt Copson

Matt Copson’s work cogently employs theatrical devices in an effort to approach notions of contemporaneity, abstraction, eternal recurrence, automation and the uncanny.

Utilizing examples from folklore, the culture industry, and ancient philosophy, Copson reintroduces familiar narratives, sometimes partially rendered or in the process of abstraction. Central to these narratives are protagonists or characters who typically express themselves in the form of a soliloquy while coming to terms with their current state or predicament, a predicament that can only be described as being highly dramatic, perpetually conflictual, and impossible to resolve.

For the last several years, Copson has focused on the specialized medium of laser animation. Traditionally employed in concerts, nightclubs, and Pink Floyd events, the artist became fascinated with the medium as a natural progression from what has been a foundational source for his practice both as a tool and as a conceptual methodology: drawing.

In contrast to a traditional moving image, laser animation distinguishes itself not only in terms of how light is manifested (and projected) but more importantly in how movement is rendered. In a moving image, the illusion of movement is depicted through multiple still images and the minute shifts between them. In a laser projection, movement is essentially generated by movement itself: mechanical motors rapidly move lasered points across a material surface to form a picture. Thus, even a still image generated by laser projection is continually in movement. Synonymous with the act of drawing, laser animation can be fundamentally understood as drawings in movement.

For Copson, this holds prismatic significance insofar as the primary concern of his practice since its onset has been contemporary subjectivity, defined by the conditional constants of flux, spectacle, and attention.

Matt Copson was born in 1992 in London, England. He currently lives and works between London and Los Angeles.