Cockaigne

Rattus Rat Bedlington

Gallery 2
Opening 01.05.19 6-8pm
Artist Talks 23.05.19 6-7pm

‘Cockaigne’ takes its name from the Medieval daydreaming of those who lived lives of toil or squalor, enduring the cess, disease, mortality and strict religious life prescribed to them. But through their collective fantasy Cockaigne came to be. There where many ways to get there, a favourite being to dig a hole, fill it with manure and immerse oneself up to the neck and be transported. This world is opposite, where work and struggle are replaced with excess and rest. Desire and fantasy becomes manifest and it is virtuous to indulge rather than abstain. Roast beasts run up to you with knives already in their backs pleading to be eaten. Through this shrine to this paradise, you may glimpse existence in Cockaigne.

Images

Rattus Bedlington, Visitor #1, 2019, oil on panel, 25 x 35 cm

Rattus Bedlington, Study for Cockaigne, 2019, polymer clay, oil paint and cellophane, dimensions variable

Rattus Bedlington, Shrine of The Discover, 2017, oil on panel, dimensions variable