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The work of contemporary artist Joe Webb sees a return to ‘analogue methods’ in beautifully retro style. Opting for painstakingly crafted collage techniques, Webb’s work is reminiscent of early Paolozzi, layering together found images and photographs from vintage magazines, to create surreal and often esoteric prints. ‘Trumped’ is Webb’s comment on the 2016 presidential election, depicting the iconic hand and flaming torch of the Statue of Liberty, against a flat, red background. The piece is saturated with allusion form the dominant Republican red, overpowering the Democrat blue tone of the statue, to the wispy yellow flame, that bears more than a little resemblance to the new president’s enduringly golden mop. Yet the print, with its snappy title, remains ambiguous a gloomy assertion that Trump has, after all, trumped the democratic values of the US, or an optimistic symbol of America’s potential to trump President Trump Perhaps only time will tell…
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