Stuckists return to free-thinking home

Nov 11 2008 by Vicky Anderson, Liverpool Daily Post

THE Stuckists are back. Returning to the Liverpool Biennial and wreaking their continuing challenge on what they call the “ghastly” Turner Prize, members of the international painting movement are currently staging a major show at the View Two gallery.

“Liverpool has become one of the most important places for Stuckism, in some respects more important than London,” says Charles Thomson, one of its co-founders.

“There, the national museum and the Tate completely rejected everything we have done apart from a few postcards in the archive – whereas the National Museums Liverpool acknowledged we have something to see and gave us an exhibition at Walker Art Gallery at the heart of the 2004 Biennial.

“I seriously believe Liverpool is doing what London should be doing. London has a much more conformist approach, ironically, for a city that may be one of the most important in the world for art.

“Liverpool has got more freedom, it does what it wants. It is like a breath of fresh air.”

The Stuckist art group was founded in 1999 by Thomson and Billy Childish, who has since left, with 13 artists to promote “figurative painting with ideas” and oppose conceptual art.

There are now over 160 sister groups in 40 countries.

The name comes from an insult by Tracey Emin to Childish that he was “stuck”. The current exhibition has been in the pipeline since the Walker exhibition in 2004 – with the Stuckists returning in between for the 2006 Biennial with the show The Truimph of Stuckism at Liverpool School of Art and Design.

“This show is the most intense hang we have done ever, in terms of the amount of work and the size and space available,” says Thomson.

The exhibition showcases 170 paintings – mostly new – by 31 artists including Thomson and Merseyside Stuckists Andrew Galbraith and Jasmine Maddock.

“If history turns around, like it did with the Impressionists where we now say the people who rejected it are idiots and credit people who saw what was going on, Liverpool is going to be the place that gets the honours.

“If everyone completely forgets about Stuckism, then it won’t matter and it’s a win-win for Liverpool,” Thomson laughs.

The Stuckists – An Antidote to the Ghastly Turner Prize is on at the View Two on Mathew Street until November 29.

vickyanderson@dailypost.co.uk