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Iconoclasm

Iconoclasm, Art Exchange, University of Essex, Colchester, UK (18 February - 28 April, 2023) | https://www.artexchange.org.uk/

Sam Durant@ArtExchange


Based on images gleaned from various historic sources, including newspaper and television reports, Sam Durant’s drawings focus in on moments of intense disruption and call on current debates about how we relate to symbols in public spaces.

Infiltrating the squares, paths and buildings of the University of Essex’s Colchester campus, the original graphite drawings on paper document fleeting yet significant moments of historical change. Now reproduced and increased in scale, their appearance in various sites around campus draws attention to questions of representation: who gets to occupy these spaces, and to be heard – reminding us of the 1960s and 1970s protests at the University of Essex when campus came together in its squares in an attempt to build alternative futures.