#POP! An Exhibition of work by Brian Travers @ Havill & Travis Gallery, Harborne, 18th September – 31st October 2015
‘Splash, Splat, Zap n’Trickle’
On being invited to become an honorary trustee at The National Gallery a living British playwright predicated his acceptance with one proviso – that above the main entrance was emblazoned the legend, ‘You don’t have to like all of it!’
That sage wisdom and liberation of spirit will take you willing by the hand and guide you through the psychedelic dream-streams of Brian Travers’ intoxicating painting/objet d’art debut exhibition – #POP!
But a week or so back home after UB40’s pan-European tour — Brian’s opening night’s début exhibition at Havill & Travis drew the Rock-Steady star’s ultimate, and most assuredly accurate accolade ever, ‘ My word, doesn’t he look well hung!’ Took thirty years mind. Indeed, the hanging* and gallery dynamic lend themselves to a vivacious, non-precious ambient ‘Installation’ motif.
Revelling in 60s self-pleasuring erogenous comfort zones could be retro-reactionary and ersatz passé. But, visitors to the Havill &Travis gallery are soon subsumed into a kaleidoscopic menagerie of vibrant mixed media and formalised mayhem. The principal exhibits are ceiling to floor portrait/landscape hung canvases in varying sizes – very few are framed — but witty with it. Often the exuberance of applied paint mediums, principally acrylic and enamel, bleed over the canvas boundary framing lending a sense of anarchic, energetic fluidity – or as one wry observer remarked, ‘It’s Painting on the Edge.’ For the most part expressive-abstract, there are also variations on a theme of minimalist, part geometric, mountain terrace landscapes — Hindu Kush #1 &2 being but two.
#P0P! explodes with effervescent primary chromatic vigour, vitality and eye addling abstract abandon. The arcane and fearfully authentic looking absinthe installation seemingly serving as a homage to the Faustian Pact frenzied artists made with the wormwood Muse. Until the second night, that is, when BT and co, literally in the spirit of his creative ancestors, gave the bottle and sugar-drip a serious caning! #POP will drink itself? A wry twist on Warhol’s consumer parody there, Brian!
Re-purposing through appropriation, Travers imprints his ubiquitous Lichtenstein primary coloured vernacular on objet trouvé such as jumble-sale kitchen ephemera. Call it the revenge of the bland; re-energising the unwanted, disposable heroes of our throw-away society — a re-contextualised tit for tat.
#POP! is bold – bustling and hustling for attention and affection – a tumescent indulgence that celebrates Travers’ gifts of garrulous generosity of expressive spirit – a man who snooks a cock at pomposity – rather wearing his honest art on his acrylic-stained sleeve – and the kitchen floor table by all accounts. Do #POP! in and see it.
Words: John Kennedy
Photos: Ian Dunn
Saturday 19th September — Saturday 31st October
Opening Hours
Thursday 12 – 5pm
Friday 12 – 5pm
Saturday 12 – 5pm
14 Lonsdale Rd, Harborne, Birmingham, B17 9RA
Email: info@havillandtravis.com