Auto-destruction in Art and Art in destruction: Ed Baxter remembers Art in Ruins and his own contemporary installations incorporating human hair gathered from barbers’ shops and a vast mound of used tea bags. “The cosiness of the war-years’ subway… of the mattress… of the priesthole… of the flophouse… of the bamboo cage. Of the public house. In the mausoleum of kitsch that shelters you from the storming sky hangs a photo of the now bearded Prince and the now blond Minister of Defence, his hair blowing like industrial scum in the Goose Green breeze, subliminally announcing the recovery of equilibrium.” Extract from ‘Filth’ by Ed Baxter 1985. To be continued…
