Excerpt from But wait… there’s more! (Lean Six Sigma), 2023. Full video available on request
Lean Six Sigma, 2023
Solo exhibition at Quench Gallery, Margate
May 20th 2023 - July 2nd 2023
Following a body of research into supervillains of antiquity (colonial merchants, slave traders, and industrialists), the present (billionaire profiteers of extractive neo-colonial practices such as mining and waste dumping), and the future (colonisers of as-yet-unknown territories such as space and the deep sea), Lean Six Sigma speculates on the opulent ornamentation of these villains’ lairs.
Lean Six Sigma looks at opulence as a display of oligarchic overindulgence from a privileged few, distorting and multiplying the shapes of extractive industrial machinery, and the interior aesthetics of dictators’ homes and private jets. This is counteracted by the materials used to wrap the sculptures: fabrics sourced from charity shops, stretchy synthetics selected to imitate luxury
Lean Six Sigma also celebrates opulence as a means of Black resistance and Black joy. It flickers with formative memories of the artist’s Cameroonian immigrant aunties and uncles’ glamorously decorated homes, and the ostentatious personal styles of Black female rappers, chiefly Lil’ Kim.
London Short Film Festival Screening of But wait… there’s more!: Alien Extravaganza at Rio Cinema
But wait… there’s more!, 2023
Single channel video
2 minutes 49 seconds
Starring - Laura Lovemore
Food Design - Corah Ambrose
Music - Not Sarah
Hair and Makeup - Laura Lovemore
Nails - Lyndsay Smith
Untitled 5 x sculptures, 2023
Various sizes
Wood, waste plastics, charity surplus fabrics, metal wire, thread, wadding
Mystery Vessel, 2023
41cm x 38cm x 38cm
Wood, charity surplus fabrics, bedsheet, polychromic film, metal wire, thread, wadding, acrylic yarn
Untitled 4 x wall panels, 2022
Wood, Biscoff chocolate foil, charity surplus fabric, wadding
1/4 on loan from the Mason & Fifth Collection, London
L6Σ, 2023
Digital photomontage, paper, plastic, metal wire, Biscoff chocolate foil, velvet
The exhibition was supported by Creative Scotland, a-n the Artists Information Company, and The Gane Trust
Installation photographs by Ollie Harrop