I want to get off now!

Two person show with artist Jennifer Cunningham at
Monster Truck Gallery, Dublin
June 11th – June 28th

What is spatial in Cunningham’s work becomes material in Simon Fleming’s; in an overlaid build up of paint, print, buntings or plastic meshes, he seeks through the excessive artificiality and shabby make-up of the carnival the thrilling promise of endless fun and happiness, which we still somehow believe in even though we know the paint is peeling and the metal rusty.
Michaële Cutaya 2011

This exhibition explores and re-visualises the concept of the tired carnival, the worn hold over of public diversion. With the advent of cheap air travel comes the demise of the carnival. Dreamland, Luna park, Coney island, have all suffered from or succumbed to neglect in recent years. It this neglect that attracted us.
Their dilapidated foreshores consist of run down shops, fast-food outlets and derelict arcades. Brash gaudy amusement arcades flicker and wink, pumping demented electronic rhythms into the night, their seedy sheen has a strange allure. Among the dandelions and the chip wrappers, a shoddinesss is revealed. There is rust under the paintwork, cracks in the plaster, and the chairs worn. For many people they are nostalgic places, they spark off a range of associations and images, of feelings and senses. We are interested in that nostalgia, in the sense that the carnival can never be what it was in our memories. The way we see these places has changed, they are not all wonder, lights and screams. They have aged, faded and become old and in many cases have died behind rusting fences.
This exhibition would not have happened with out the donations of those listed below, through the Fund it group. www.fundit.ie

Thank you,
The team at Fundit, Kenneth Redmond, Anne O’Byrne, Joanne Martin, Jennifer Fabbian, Cuckoo Savante, Liz Lennon, Shane Wims, Ceara Conway, Andrea Shepley, Elaine Cosgrove, Lisa o’Donnell, Anne Marie McKee, Hannah Smith, John Petrulis, Maeve Curtis, Diet of Worms, Jennifer Hendel, Mark Commins, Aideen Barry, Aoife Terry, Jill Lamberts, Bamboo Sessions, Kathy O’ Leary, Terence Black, Bernadette Madden, Fiona Kearney, Eimear Twomey, Majella Dowdican, Phil Sun, Justyna Kocjan, Ruth Le Gear, Antonia Mc Taggart, Alan Butler, Kathleen Furey, Tim Jago Morris, John Brady