Andrew Barrow
Artist Statement
In 2001 his first one man show at the Rebecca Hossack Gallery, entitled Man of Letters, was featured in the Sunday Telegraph, Hello magazine and the Evening Standard where it became a page three feature under the title Opening of An Envelope. He has, since then, had two more sell-out shows at the gallery. His collectors include Sir Paul Smith and Nicky Haslam.
Andrew Barrow’s Alphabet: an Appreciation by the Earl of Shufflewick
Andrew Barrow’s postage stamp alphabet has an eccentric exuberance of its own: odd, illogical, mischievous, deadpan but bubbling over with private jokes and autobiographical allusions, both irreverent and irrelevant. Imagine a calendar, a stained glass window and a box of sweeties- complete with tinsel- thrown into one. Yet there is a disturbing depth to these twenty-six collages. Windows, doorways, staircases and clock faces hint at an inner world, the engine room behind the frivolous façade. Each letter in Barrow’s alphabet sings a different tune: heavy, sedate, sinister, absurdly grim-crack, tragic, comic, gaudy, grotesque or beautiful. And each panel also buzzes with contemporary humanity in its richest, rarest, most high-falutin’ forms.
Barrow’s visually provocative and longstanding household gods- Ken Dodd, Barry Humphries (in his own right as well as in his various stage personas) – efface the monarch or head of state in many of the stamps, often with no regard to the alphabetical relevance and are aided and abetted by a cast of other metroploiyan picture sues, notably Nicky Haslam, the Little Britain duo, Brigadier Parker Bowles, the late Jennifer Paterson, Isabella Blow, Sir Peregrine Worthstone, Lucy Lambton, Sybille Bedford, Francis Wyndham, Harold Pinter, Richard Ingrams and Sir Dai Llewellyn.
Darker notes are struck by the presence- in the letter S- of Saddam Hussein and Dr Harold Shipman. Many of Barrow’s celebrity heroes feature more than once. Look under J and F for Oscar-winner Julian Fellowes, under N and C for Conde Nast supreme Nicholas Coleridge and under L and F for Lucian Freud. Barrows himself appears in several panels and so do his four children, the youngest of whom, 2-year-old Blossom, swings from a branch of the letter B.
These artworks not only embrace the tools of Barrows’ trade- Pritt Sticks and/or scissors feature in letters A, P, R, T and U, but also but also celebrate the ‘implementa’ of childhood. Thomas the Tank Engine puffs away in the foreground of the letter T alongside Mrs Tittlemouse. Andy Pandy perches happily on the crossbar of the letter A, Little Jack Horner snuggles comfortably in the crook of the letter J, poor old Humpty Dumpty tumbles off one of the arms of the letter H and Goosey Goosey Gander kicks an old man down the stairs in the very jaws of the letter G!
But- make no mistake about it- there is nothing tame or provincial about these complex assorted images. Snakes entwine themselves around the letter S and crosspatch zebras nibble away at the letter Z. Though dominated by the cosily serene philatelic image of Queen Elizabeth II, these artworks imply as background material stamps from across the world- from North Korea to Easter Island to the Isle of Man- and the whole alphabet has a stirringly multi-racial feel which is both thought provoking and exhilarating.
So hooray for Andrew Barrows and hooray for the Rebecca Hossack Gallery! Now hurry to Windmill Street and see these bizarre bits of mature juvenile exotica for yourself!
Shufflewick
November 2005