Kenny Hunter: Let's Forget
This exhibition for The Fine Art Society can be seen as a continuation of my ongoing efforts to deconstruct the monument as a permanent symbol of political and historic progress and instead re-present it through my work as a form in flux, open to varied interpretation. Whilst resolutely committed to a contemporary reflection of current conditions, it also cross-references ancient archetypes with post-war modernist attempts to create unifying humanist, monumental forms.
Working against historicist notions of meaning and progress, my art practice has been centred on understanding history as a fragmented, incoherent and subjective experience. This has been expressed in my work by inverting traditional monumental values and certainties with unexpected uses of scale, material and subject matter, opening up questions for the viewer rather than providing answers.
To create this exhibition I have experimented in the studio with different methods of display, while making new additional elements from scratch to combine with existing works. This process of remaking itself runs counter to monumentalist ideas of permanence and certainty. By presenting these new and reworked sculptures I hope to generate engagement from the viewer that will ask them to reconsider both the future role of the monument and its legacy, provoking questions such as: what are they for; what do they represent; who do they serve?
It is through the use of standard art-historical modes that my artwork can be traditional without becoming conventional, using archetypes against themselves so that something subtly provocative, speculative and newly relevant can emerge.
