Announcer is a new exhibition at The William Morris Gallery from artist David Mabb comparing the design work of William Morris and El Lissitzky, which promises to be suitably revolutionary.
Following on from recent shows at Modern Art Oxford and the National Portrait Gallery, the revival of William Morris' reputation (and his transformation into a relevant contemporary culture figure) continues – albeit at a place it must never have been in doubt. With its recently opened Announcer, the William Morris Gallery hosts British artist David Mabb’s thought-provoking exhibition, in which the revolutionary politics of William Morris and Russian designer El Lissitzky are forcefully contrasted.
Morris and Lissitzky both viewed design as a means through which the need for revolution could be communicated, and as a way of developing a vision for the utopian post-revolutionary world. Morris delved into the past to salvage what he saw as the traits of an idyllic pre-industrial society; Lissitzky, meanwhile, saw technology and modernisation as integral to his vision for the future.
Throughout Announcer, Mabb combines and contrasts the Utopian ideas of these two men by overlaying and bringing together their most renowned book designs: Morris’s edition of Chaucer from his Kelmscott Press and Lissitzky's For the Voice, a revolutionary book of poems by Vladimir Mayakovsky.
With the visions of Lissitzky and Morris intertwined across thirty canvases, the separate Utopian visions are never able to fully merge or separate. Mabb hopes this will “suggest a new way of doing things, drawing on both Morris’s and Lissitzky’s ideas whilst acknowledging their contradictory nature”. But perhaps unlike his nineteenth century inspiration Morris, Mabb is clear that he doesn't “want to tell viewers what to think, the work isn’t didactic like that – they’re being asked to be active readers”.
With these new works being displayed alongside an original copy of the Kelmscott Chaucer, and an original For the Voice, this exhibition promises not only to be a chance to see two of the finest pieces of avant-garde book making side by side, but also to leave viewers with a fresh perspective on two very different and influential figures in the development of graphic design.
David Mabb: Announcer
Until 27 September 2015
Forest Road, London E17 4PP