ART: FIFTY24SF Gallery presents “Over Normal”- a solo exhibition by Stanley Donwood and his first ever showing in the United States

More after the jump:


As the poster above says, Stanley Donwood is having his first ever U.S. exhibition at gallery FIFTY24SF in San Francisco. The exhibition will be up from September 2nd until October 27th.  You can read more on the show and some background behind it at here. Pitchfork has a great interview with Mr. Donwood about the exhibition and some insight into some of the Radiohead covers. The interview is part of a special edition of Take Cover, a new series aimed to "track down the most striking new album covers taking up web space and vinyl bins and get the story behind them".

 I know I've mentioned it before, but at the risk of being redundant, I'll go ahead and say it again: Radiohead is very much my cup o' tea. As a result, anything and everything involving the Oxford 5 catches my attention (much like the post on Phil's solo endeavours). This is no exception. In fact, there are two reasons why this is exciting news in my world: One, it involves Radiohead, duh. More importantly however, is reason #2.

Aside from the music, there has been another element to Radiohead's albums that has inspired my artistic interests and direction since I first noticed it on OK Computer, and that has been the album artwork. It was bleak and cold, practically all white, but perfectly conveyed that same sense of isolation (Subterranean Homesick Alien) and panic (The Tourist) found in the music of the album. There has never been a Radiohead album cover that was merely a barf-inducing, cliche, egotistical photo of the band on the front. You know, the kind of ridiculousness you expect from shitty rappers and/or American Idol runner-ups. The person responsible for that is Stanley Donwood. He has designed the artwork for Radiohead since The Bends (although this one actually included pictures of the band in the liner notes) and often in collaboration with Thom Yorke who is credited under the name "Dr.Tchock".

One of the many elements to his artwork that really intrigues me most is the use of layers and textures, much like the music contained inside.

From OK Computers' frigid cover containing scribbled up & super imposed images of airline flight safety brochures to the use of hypodermic needles, syringes, ink & molten wax on the completely opposite and colorful In Rainbows album, Donwood has always taken a manual approach to his creations.

Here's a trailer for the Over Normal exhibition



FIFTY24SF GALLERY
218 Fillmore Street
San Francisco, CA
94117-3504
(415) 861-1960
GALLERY@FIFTY24SF.COM

HOURS:
WEDNESDAY-SUNDAY: 12-6

via: FIFTY24SF & Pitchfork