London Entwined: A Look at the Exhibition Streets of Gold

Daniel Saul, creative director of the exhibition, explains that the show is an “attempt to view London through the eyes of people just arrived”. The Museum gave these international artists, who have recently settled in London, access to the permanent collection and asked them to choose objects to inspire and incorporate into their artwork.

Copyright - Museum of London/motiroti

Saul explains that each piece revolves around three layers. First, the artists, guided by Museum’s curators, chose objects that sparked their imagination. Second, they developed their artistic response to that object. Third, the artists interacted with communities to bring that experience into their work.

The three layers come together to produce eye-catching and thoughtful works. Whittle’s see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil, plays on migration and labour, souvenirs and perceptions from the 1700s and today. The highlight is the remixing of two 18^th century souvenir prints (link and link) that demonstrates how popular culture mitigates our understanding of ourselves and others, sometimes to awful effects.

Moghaddas’s six drawings, Between Water and Wind, are beautifully intricate, panoramic journey. She entwines her journey from Iran to London with the piece that inspired the work, London from the Roof of Albion Mills,and sprinkling throughout the poetry of William Blake and Omar Khayyam.

Voller’s photographic sculptures, Redefinitions, though less elaborate in weaving the three layers are no less thoughtful. He embeds images from the Blitz and videos of people reading testimonies from the Christchurch earthquake within his photographs of present day London. The work asks us to consider how cities rebuild themselves, what traces are left behind from the trauma. Finally, there is Jankovic and Olarescu’s Waste of Space featuring plays from the Museum’s ephemera stores that are auditioning for their relevancy.

Copyright - Museum of London/motiroti

If the works are strong and complex, the exhibition itself does not express their ampleness. The texts on the wall give a basic sketch. It is through the audio guide with the artists speaking on their own work that the viewer can understand each object’s depth.

This is slightly problematic as the guide is only accessible through QR codes. If you can retrieve them, a particular standout is Whittle’s incisive voice on London’s history and relationship to labour.

Also challenging is that, though sharing a common catalyst, the works lack conversation with each other. What do Moghaddas’s prints have in common with Jankovic and Olarescu’s installation? A possible relationship seems to appear between Moghaddas’s prints and Whittle’s installation centred on the idea of movement.

This is not to say that the artists should have been in collaboration with each other but that this is an outcome built into the mechanism of the exhibition.

A further challenge with the exhibition is that not all the works have migration at their centre. Waste of Space is the odd one out, focusing less on migration and instead on the state of West End theatres, according to the duo on the guide. Perhaps the plays are meant to represent migrants auditioning to come or stay in the UK?

Copyright - Museum of London/motiroti

The one interesting feature of the exhibition is a rack of postcards with Whittle’s work. The postcards ask, “When does London become home to you?” The exhibition encourages viewers to write their response and to read the responses of others. The intervention provides an opportunity for visitors to focus and feel engaged. Motiroti also encourages people to leave their answers via their Facebook and Twitter pages.

Despite the flaws of the exhibition, Streets of Gold is well worth a visit. The display provides a chance to see the wonderful outcome of a museum collaborating with an outside group. Motiroti and Saul provide us with a different reading of London through a migrant lens by showcasing the upcoming strength of these five artists. The power of the exhibition rests on the vigour of the artworks on display.

These four works could work in a variety of context but it’s the migrant focus that brings out the best of them. Viewers going should have migration in the back of their minds but should also take this as a chance to explore new works by new artists. The exhibition showcases creative energy and dynamic contributions of migrant artists who have found themselves drawn to London.

If you’ve seen the exhibition, I would love to hear your thoughts.

Streets of Gold runs until 15 April 2012. Entry is free.