Artistic Expression through Harmony and Tranquility
In the heart of London, artist Travis embarks on a series of thought-provoking installations that challenge the status quo and push the boundaries of contemporary art.
One of his installations finds Travis in Hyde Park, where he discovers a discarded Ukrainian flag fluttering beside a rainbow one. He notes the juxtaposition of nationalism and identity politics as competing brands, a poignant observation that resonates in today's politically charged climate.
In another installation, Travis is moved by a curiously homo-erotic Reuters image of a soldier cradling a dying comrade. This image serves as a catalyst for his creative expression, inspiring him to construct a model of Downing Street using obsolete drone components and shredded subpoenas, populating it with figurines of world leaders, each wired to electrodes.
As the world watches the ongoing conflict in Gaza unfold, Travis immerses himself in the BBC's rolling coverage, injecting ketamine and intercutting the footage with clips from A Clockwork Orange. This installation serves as a stark reminder of the brutal reality of war and the desensitisation it can bring.
Travis takes his audience to the Tate Modern, where the gallery has been transformed into a UN refugee camp. Visitors simulate drone strikes, negotiate ceasefires, and experience PTSD via role play and dramatic reconstructions. In another installation, the war in Ukraine is re-staged as a fashion shoot in Kyiv, with models posing in combat chic and mock shrapnel wounds.
Travis encounters Susan Hayward, an artist whose works explore the connection between humans, animals, and nature, symbolizing emotional closeness beyond the visible. In one installation, Susan and Travis lie down beneath a recursive projection of the Thames that ebbs and flows with blood and hash-tags, and Susan whispers, "When art is inspired by atrocity, it becomes atrocious."
Travis watches the Trump-Putin summit unfold on twenty screens in a derelict branch of Currys. In another installation, the summit is staged like a wedding, with Putin presenting a map of Ukraine smeared with lipstick and Trump nodding, eyes glazed, as if sedated by applause.
Travis constructs a diptych, where Panel A depicts Trump and Epstein exchanging brochures for resorts outside the jurisdiction of the United Nations, and Panel B shows Maxwell and Putin exchanging forged passports with amended dates of birth.
In another installation, Travis confronts a static baton charge of mannequins dressed in riot gear, beneath the gaze of CCTV cameras replacing the eyes of one of the lion statues in Trafalgar Square. A recording of a crowd chanting "Free Palestine" is played in his headset during this installation.
Travis leads a crowd through a summer of protests in Trafalgar Square, where each person holds a QR code linking to a different atrocity. In another installation, he attends a replica protest in London, where Maxwell's face is projected onto Big Ben and Epstein's silhouette flickers across the facade of Buckingham Palace.
Travis walks through a simulated Oxford Street in Gaza Strip, where mannequins wear flak jackets and are posed in attitudes of submission, and a half-starved child's face is projected onto the store's windows. In an adjacent PC World, a hologram of Ghislaine Maxwell adjusts her pearls, and Epstein's voice plays through hidden speakers, monotonously reciting names from a list.
In what is either a dream or an AI deepfake, Travis merges Trump with Epstein and Putin with Maxwell, blurring the lines between reality and fiction. Something crunches beneath his feet, revealing a toy telescope half hidden under a wilted sunflower.
Through his installations, Travis invites us to question, challenge, and reflect on the world we live in, pushing us to confront the uncomfortable truths that lie beneath the surface. His art serves as a mirror, reflecting our own society back at us, inviting us to consider the role we play in shaping the world we inhabit.
