Inside the White Cube – Jack Greer, Alex da Corte and Augustus Thompson

The White Cube continues its presentation of the work of artists under the age of 40 from the US in the North Gallery of its Bermondsey space.

This exhibition is part of Inside the White Cube, a programme profiling work by artists who have not previously shown at the gallery. The series provides a platform for exploring new developments in international contemporary art across a range of practices and media. The group of three artists currently on show is composed by Jack Greer, Alex Da Corte and Augustus Thompson.

What these three artists have in common is being part of The Still House Group, as permanent members or as artists in residence. The Still House Group is composed of artists under 30 recognised as being some of the most talented artists of our generation, who run the gamut of style, medium and inspiration.

This group of artists has been able to build up a prosperous market without art galleries, external dealers and curators for the past six years. Stll House is an emerging artist-run organisation based in a warehouse in Red Hook, NY. There are eight permanent artists – Alex Perweiler, Isaac Brest, Zachary Susskind, Louis Eisner, Jack Greer, Brendan Lynch, Dylan Lynch, and Nick Darmstaedter. One artist in residence changes every three months.

Alex Da Corte and Augustus Thompson have been two recent artists in residence at Still House. Going inside Da Corte’s room is, at first glance, like stepping into an alluring pink disco. A fully immersive experience.

Alex Da Corte White Rain, 2014 installation view

His project White Rain is rooted in the belief that “fantasy is present and available in all forms of imagery”. Da Corte, unlike the others, decided to work involving the entire space of the room, with the aim to include and make the installation fit with the global space. His work includes a series sculptures comprising of brightly-coloured rubber balls placed on colourful, shiny plinths. Through the works in his exhibition Da Corte aims to “trap time and identity, almost as if in a stop-motion animation, through a textured and kaleidoscopic plexiglass installation that oozes, discombobulates, and gleams”.

Alex Da Corte White Rain, 2014 installation view

 Jack Greer, following his better-known patches style, has created a series of patchwork paintings using loose scraps and off-cuts of materials from his shared studio in Red Hook. By incorporating what is otherwise “somebody else’s trash” in his paintings, Greer has always seen his practice as both collaborative and solitary. Each painting is an abstracted collection of different narratives, sewing together collected materials and recreating imagined landscapes. As is the usual practice of the Still House group, Greer inserts autobiographical and ready-made objects like cacti plants.

Jack Greer, installation view

Augustus Thompson in his works of art is manifesting a serial alphabet of forms and symbols from everyday life, all this forms derive from Los Angeles industrial design and municipal signage. In the series of large-scale paintings displayed in the show, he has rendered bathrooms from Koreatown in Los Angeles where he has inked imposing black and white elementary shapes onto metal stall door panels. During the opening night he made also an audio performance engaging with Brian Eno’s, Music for White Cube that was a specially commissioned sound installation by internationally acclaimed musician Brian Eno, presented in 1997 at White Cube.

Augustus Thompson, installation view

by Fausta Maria Bolettieri

All images courtesy of the White Cube

Alex Da Corte, Jack Greer, Augustus Thompson  is  on until  July 6 at: The White Cube  144-152 Bermondsey Street, London SE1 3TQ