Tom Hunter: Life and Death in Hackney

13 Apr-5 May 2024

The Vale of Rest, Cibachrome print on aluminium. Credit: © Tom Hunter

Overview

Tom Hunter's landmark series Life and Death in Hackney 1991 - 2001 depicts a world completely built over by the London Olympics and the ongoing gentrification of Hackney and adjacent areas.

In parallel to the exhibition At Home in Hackney, A Community Photographed 1970-today at the Hackney Museum - featuring his Holly Street Tower Block model, on until the 15th of June - Tom Hunter will show 7 large images at the Grey Galley.

Life and Death in Hackney paints a landscape, creating a melancholic beauty out of the post-industrial decay where wild buddleia and sub-cultural inhabitants took root and bloomed. This maligned and somewhat abandoned area became the epicentre of the new warehouse rave scene of the early 90s. During this time the old print factories, warehouses and workshops became the playground of a disenchanted generation, taking the DIY culture from the free festival scene and adapting it to the urban wastelands. This Venice of the East End, with its canals, rivers and waterways, made a labyrinth of pleasure gardens and pavilions in which thousands of explorers travelled through a heady mixture of music and drug-induced trances.

Artists

Press

Tom Hunter: Life and Death in Hackney - press release
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