'cene to partner Artgame - Margate's first integrated art gallery & hotel
Artgame - the first integrated art gallery & hotel on Margate’s seafront launches with new exhibition Friday 5th July 2019
Artgame will present a self-curated inaugural show from internationally-renowned artists: Dazzling Allgood, dr.d and Chu, exhibiting souvenirs of brand subversion, visual activism and word games to take away.
Each artist combines their lyrical audacity with industrial strength and dextrous sense of humour, creating unique artworks, installations and paintings. They all have origins in the anti-establishment and positively encourage the viewer to rewrite the rules and celebrate the many real and fictional movements from the past, present and the future.
The fully refurbished Artgame Hotel on Marine Drive has four luxury apartments, with stunning views over Margate’s Main Sands.
Dazzling Allgood, dr.d and Chu have each been assigned to an apartment to lend their witty and genius artistic skills, each creating their own unique spaces. These artworks will remain in situ for a whole year, another artist will then take over, revamping the apartments once again, always refreshing and evolving alongside Artgame’s ethos.
An online shop selling one-off limited edition prints, original artworks and souvenirs will soon follow.
WHAT: Artgame presents: Dazzling Allgood, dr.d & Chu
WHEN: Exhibition runs from Friday 5th July until Sunday 14th July 2019 / Open Thursday to Sunday 11:00am - 6:00pm
WHY: Artgame’s guide is the failings within a society enslaved by manipulative laws which governing bodies use to subdue and condition the society in which we all live. The game is to stimulate discussion through the use of abbreviation, contamination and determination to succeed and deliver the alternative, because life is not a watercolour. Art is the remedy.
The Artists
Dazzling Allgood
www.instagram.com/dazzlingallgood
Allgood's work brings a local voice to the opening of Artgame, Margate... Coming from this land of crack cocaine, welfare, thievery and the poor, his text based pieces draw inspiration from this underworld and its languages and dialogue. His artworks shout in your face with a series of street memes and chav speak (lingo) from a section of society that has no real name; erotic taboos and shocks formulated by the Dadaist's ancient attack on their audience are revisited due to history repeating and the continuing of a governed and dominated society.
Allgood refuses to shut up, an alternative to a lot of what art of many forms, denies, and is passive towards and in doing so supports the government that represses it. These "Chavisms" are deliberately gritty and ugly and yet help shape a sense of community and belonging in a generation of people who consider themselves dispossessed and overlooked. They are the "wasted" generation, unfit for purpose ambitionless and sated by drugs and petty crime. These witty exorcisms of bile, combined with patterns and branding logos derived from designer and sports-wear logos make a futile comment on crisis, value and aspiration, spanning belief, popular culture, religion, intimacy and death...
Dazzling Allgood is an artist born in Margate, Kent. He graduated from the Kent Institute of Art and Design (KIAD) with a BA (hons) in fine art. Allgood believes in art. He believes in its power to transform lives and believes art is capable of engaging and enriching the spirit. Allgood is inspired by graffiti from the 1970's and 1980's, fairground and amusement arcade signage and lettering, comics and record cover art. His work covers a wide range of media from painting to stencils, assemblages, sculpture and reconstructed furniture…
dr.d
www.instagram.com/subvertiser
dr.d is a legend of street art subversion, using his insightful observations to ‘doctor’ everything from big brand billboards to political posters. Each ‘rip’ forms a defiant protest and a good kick up the backside to those who choose to look on.
Dr D’s subverted images often appear with perfect timing to respond to current affairs and social debate, and are a paradox by definition; each piece charged with a powerful passivity. Indeed, the artist’s mischievous mode of social commentary is clear to see for those who are actually willing to take a look around dr.d urges you to raise an enlightened middle finger to the establishment!
After failing art at GCSE (10th grade in the U.S.) dr.d embarked on a plethora of glamorous career paths: rat catching; building site labourer; cab office radio controller; burger van man, to name but a few.
Then an old school friend asked him to help flyposting in central London so he jumped in. When this became a bit monotonous dr. d started cutting bits from billboards and moving them on to others to make new words and phrases. Pretty soon he was making his own posters and putting them up on walls, billboards and bus stops. Other 2D and 3D projects followed. Lately dr. d has been installing faux street signs warning of ‘Curfew - Social Cleansing’. This poster was displayed at the London Design Museum’s ‘Hope to Nope’ show (2018) which explored design’s role in dictating and reacting to major political events. However, along with many other participants from around the world, dr. d removed his work from the exhibition when the Design Museum rented their atrium to arms dealers.
Exploring (literally) new perspectives and embracing computer-aided technologies, Chu’s work has continued to push back the boundaries of graffiti since he first began experimenting with aerosol paint & home computers in the late 1980’s. Chu describes his creations as gently reminding us of the everyday conflict between digital and analogue devices.
During his 30 years of creative enterprise, he has successfully gained a reputation working with some of the most culturally influential artists of our time. Projects with Banksy and Jamie Hewlett, collaborating on groundbreaking opera ‘Monkey Journey to the West’ and at the Swiss Embassy in London, public commissions for Glastonbury Festival South East Corner being a few of the highlights he is humbly proud to mention. An ardent defender in the use of aerosol paint since 1988, starting out in a small overflow village north of Walsall in the West Midlands and now living in Margate pursuing a studio career. Chu has contributed cutting edge creations on public works, various galleries and group shows around the UK. as well as ‘artist in residence’ for Google with the launch of their VR painting software called Tiltbrush.
Chu was also responsible for co-directing and producing the new promotional video for a song entitled “Who’s Been Having You Over?”, the debut single from the new album by Peter Doherty and his new band the Puta Madres. The sleeves of all the band’s new releases and merchandise are also designed by Chu, with artwork by Peter Doherty.
Chu has recently installed a new landmark on Margate’s seafront near Turner Contemporary at Rendezvous The piece is called Turner Way, and is a 7m oversized replica road sign, exposed to the brutal elements as part of Margate Festival last year. His work has also been on show at the inaugural Joseph Wales venue and at the popular Geek festival, held inside Dreamland, as well as a sell out retrospective exhibition in Old Town shortly after he moved here in 2017. Chu’s studio is at Fort Road Yard, opposite the Turner Centre.