“Ian’s misguided A-list patrons include fashion designer Sir Paul Smith and film director Shane Meadows”, reads the press release, and it’s clear to see what’s attracted the aforementioned British icons to Ian Stevenson‘s establishment-prodding work. Made in Broken Britain, showing at Newcastle’s The Outsiders gallery ’til 7th July, deftly fuses Meadows’ outsider vision of dysfunctional Britain with Paul Smith’s wry humour, and it’s every bit as brilliant as that sounds.
Stevenson is poking fun at all that we despair at in modern Britain and beyond, from smashed up Corgi police vans to ‘silly little drawings’, the artist observes all that’s ridiculous and wrong in our world, soaks it up, and throws it right back in our faces. Confrontational, whilst remaining blissfully puerile, Made in Broken Britain is a childlike indictment of our sorry social state. Brilliant.
