A new summer art festival at Whitechapel Gallery has been slammed as a 'morose and meaningless exhibition' that gave the reviewer a migraine. The Backyard Biennial's central show, 'East of the Aldgate Pump', aims to map east London as a place of movement, resilience, and cultural interdependence, but instead delivers a disjointed, poorly explained mess.
Confused curatorial vision
The gallery claims the exhibition is about east London, Britishness, migration, climate crisis, music, and global trade. Yet the works often stray far from this brief. Marwan Bassiouni's photos of views from mosque windows are mostly not in London or even England. Susan Pui San Lok's video focuses on the Chinese community in Dagenham, while Adam Farah-Saad's installation is specifically about west London's Brent Cross shopping centre. Rehana Zaman's dual film looks at seasonal workers in Punjab and Scotland, and Fozia Ismail's sculptural work addresses climate breakdown's impact on Somali basket weaving.
Missed opportunities and strong individual works
Despite the show's flaws, some individual pieces shine. Farah-Saad's installation of Mariah Carey CDs under a huge image of the North Circular ring road is described as 'a tender, sad elegy to lost youth'. Denzil Forrester's paintings of reggae clubs are 'wild and hypnotic images of the heyday of soundsystem culture'. However, these are let down by a curatorial framework that feels like 'an exercise in ticking Arts Council England funding boxes without any consideration for the audience'.
A joyless take on migration and community
The reviewer notes that the exhibition makes the idea of migration and community in London feel 'totally joyless'. Near the end, Laisul Hoque's snack stand offers trays of jhuri bundiya, a childhood treat connecting Bangladesh and London, providing a small respite. The exhibition runs until 6 September at Whitechapel Gallery.
