Announcing Purple Lands

28 July – 29 August

Unit London is delighted to announce a new body of work from Rex Southwick, one of the most exciting emerging artists on the gallery’s roster. Southwick’s work is concerned with notions of affluence within the domestic setting. His latest show, Purple Lands, explores the process by which we have arrived at a near universal concept of the western domestic ideal. Modernist buildings are depicted under construction, labourers populate the space in the shade of date plants, self-referencing the act of creation and the potential disconnect between creator and created.

Southwick breaks down these domestic settings into their constituent parts, depicting architectural components as a series of motifs: a series which, when arranged in the correct order, provides a concrete assurance of status and happiness. Southwick is questioning whether the owners construct these environments because it fits the way they live, or whether the environments are a reflection of their aspirations to live a certain way. Southwick lays bare the material framework by which these often vacuous lifestyle dreams are made reality.

Rex Southwick in his studio, 2020