Gordon Cheung UK, b. 1975
The Abyss Stares Back, 2015
Financial Times stock listings, acrylic, pumice and sand on canvas and sail cloth
78 1/2 x 177 1/2 x 2 in.
(200 x 450 x 5 cm)
(200 x 450 x 5 cm)
9458
Further images
The Abyss Stares Back confronts us with an aerial view of Guantanamo Bay, a lingering spectre of ideological hypocrisy. In the distance we see King Solomon’s Temple, fabled to include...
The Abyss Stares Back confronts us with an aerial view of Guantanamo Bay, a lingering spectre of ideological
hypocrisy. In the distance we see King Solomon’s Temple, fabled to include a hole into which ancient monsters
were hurled – creating a mythological parallel with the politically significant landscape. Four bullriders – a
recurrent motif in Cheung’s practice, evoking the four riders of the apocalypse – straddle the landscape like
placeholders on a board game. The painting’s title refers to Friedrich Nietzsche’s “Beyond Good and Evil”,
Aphorism 146 (1886): “He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.
And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.”
hypocrisy. In the distance we see King Solomon’s Temple, fabled to include a hole into which ancient monsters
were hurled – creating a mythological parallel with the politically significant landscape. Four bullriders – a
recurrent motif in Cheung’s practice, evoking the four riders of the apocalypse – straddle the landscape like
placeholders on a board game. The painting’s title refers to Friedrich Nietzsche’s “Beyond Good and Evil”,
Aphorism 146 (1886): “He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.
And when you gaze long into an abyss the abyss also gazes into you.”
Provenance
Provenance Private Collection
Exhibitions
Exhibitions Here Be Dragons ( 04/30/2016 to 07/17/2020 ) The Abyss Stares Back ( 10/09/2015 to 11/20/2015 )