dark beige

Not many people appreciate the rich, deep symbolism and artistic virtuosity that embodied the flyers of the rave scene in the early 90s. All of that will hopefully change after a major retrospective at Tate Modern this summer. Being London's premier art critic, I have been granted a sneak preview.





This flyer from 1995 is a classic - the female face trapped within a pyramid evoking early Goya and late period Tony Hart, while the two withered hands conjuring some kind of magic above her are clearly a nod to post-impressionistic existential angst. The ring on the index finger of the right hand seems to hint at anxieties about post-feminist patriarchy in Europe. A wonderful piece.



Two pyramids reflecting each other in space - two men who held the world in their hands (Churchill and Hitler) - not hard to see what this seminal work is trying to say.




The human face divided by words, just as existence is divided by knowledge. Note the luminescent proto-digital grid, a sly nod to fears of the future, underlined by the mountains on the horizons; some of earth's oldest phenomena - is the artist excited about modernity or afraid? The delicious ambiguity is (as ever) scintillating.



The grid again, a recurrent theme in the art of this movement, though here the mood is noticeably lighter - the female eyes above the water an embracing of motherhood, while the planets in the sky underline the supremacy of the id.




Not quite sure what this is. Some strange circles, a little thing inside a square...something to do with the Spanish civil war? God knows.