Jamie Fitzpatrick: Memorials To Sausage Politics art review – Grotesque statues
With a satirical bent, Fitzpatrick examines the silliness of statues and our under-interrogated colonial history
A new Muriel Spark statue might be up in Edinburgh before this exhibition comes down; but there will still be more animal statues than monuments to women in the city. Edinburgh-based artist Jamie Fitzpatrick had been curious about public statues even before the anti-racist moment in 2020 when the Black Lives Matter movement prompted the toppling of Bristol slave owner Edward Colston’s bronze statue; but Fitzpatrick parked his ideas for fear of appearing to bandwagon-jump. He returns to his civic excavations with this solo show, exploring who we memorialise and how that reinforces social hierarchies.
Taut horse buttocks are all round our nation’s capital and Fitzpatrick platforms their absurdity, alongside the pomposity of uniformed, kilted men (most of whom we’d struggle to name) perched on plinths, towering over lesser mortals. These sculptural works curve downwards menacingly, whilst looking as though they are on a shoogly peg. Monstrous teeth jut out from thick clay, with rough features like Basquiat drawings, and clownish goggle eyes give thousand yard stares. The grotesque collection is a tactile smudge of chunky contours in Caucasian flesh pink and horse manure brown, where ridiculous rows of white wig curls appear as though they could slide off the melting men any minute. Memorials To Sausage Politics is an irreverent take-down of colonial might.
Jamie Fitzpatrick: Memorials To Sausage Politics, Edinburgh Printmakers, until 25 October.