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Ordure of no merit

Article relating to an exhibition, 1998
Published by: The Sunday Times
Year published: 1998
Unpaginated.

image of Ordure of no merit

2 page original clippings/monochrome text with full colour illustrations/taken from the culture section of The Times, Sunday edition/ Review relating to an exhibition.

Title: Ordure of no merit (subtitle): Chris Ofili, best known for his use of dried elephant manure, is a front runner for the Turner prize. What a travesty, says Waldemar Januszczak.
Author: Waldemar Januszczak
Source: Sunday Times, Culture section, no date, pp 10-11

Article contains a large colour reproduction of a Chris Ofili painting with the following credit: ““If Seurat had been a designer of blaxploitation posters.“ Blossom, 1997. Photograph by Jochen Litikeman.”

Largely critical review of the solo exhibition of Chris Ofili at the Serpentine Gallery, London. 29 September - 1 November, 1998. Main element of the argument against Ofili’s practice is his appropriation of the painting techniques of the San people from Zimbabwe. Januszczak asserts that this appropriation has been undertaken in a thoughtless manner by the artist (although this statement is unsubstantiated in the article). From the review: “He’s a sampler, that’s all, a cultural tourist. He samples from porn mags. He samples from black cultural history. He samples from the ordure of the animal kingdom. And - most unforgivably - he samples thoughtlessly and glibly from the great, the importantly and the criminally neglected art of the San people of Zimbabwe.”

Related people

»  Waldemar Januszczak

Born, 1954 in Basingstoke, UK

»  Chris Ofili

Born, 1968 in Manchester, UK

Related exhibitions

Related venues

»  Serpentine Gallery

London, United Kingdom

»  Southampton City Art Gallery

Southampton, United Kingdom

»  Whitworth Art Gallery, University of Manchester

Manchester, United Kingdom