Western Morning News (Saturday)
Tomb covers for the stinking rich
FRANK RUHRMUND takes in an exhibition examining the lives of 7 billionaires
It was 200 years ago that the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley in his A Defence of Poetry, said: “The rich have become richer, and the poor have become poorer, and the vessel of the state is driven between the Scylla and Charybdis of anarchy and despotism.” In today’s parlance, the last few words could be re-phrased as between the devil and the deep blue sea, something with which the Penwith-based artist Andrew Swan, if his exhibition Stinking Rich... the Cost of Wealth, now at the Daisy Laing Gallery, Penzance, is anything to go by, would surely agree. An artist whose career began early – at nine years old he was asked to create a world map in his school playground, which he not only did but also went on to gain first prize for painting in the village annual fun fair. He later took the foundation course at what was then Falmouth School of Art, followed by two years at Cardiff College of Art, and then worked in London as a graphic designer for several years. In 2007 he returned to Cornwall and set up his own design work retail company Raw Cornish which he ran for seven years. Since then he has pursued his own career as an artist. A publicspirited painter, for the past five years he has been a volunteer with the Penzance Streetfood project, and during this time his art has centred around the members of society who struggle to find a foothold in today’s world, financially and socially. Stinking Rich happens to be his first data-driven project based and also one in which he has been working on a number of art pieces simultaneously. He admits: “At first I had no idea of what to do, all I knew was that it felt wrong to see such extreme wealth when so many people were suffering poverty and hunger.” He also supplies the origin of the phrase Stinking Rich. Apparently, in the 19th century the tombs of the wealthy were left open in case they wanted to leave should they be interred prematurely. The decomposing bodies were inclined to smell, hence the term Stinking Rich. He has been working on his project for the past nine months, researching and analysing extreme individual wealth focusing upon seven persons in the UK and USA, looking at how they created such wealth, and the impact their activities have had on society and the environment. His chosen billionaires were from the UK, Kirsten Rousing, Denise Coates, James Dyson, Jim Ratcliffe, and the USA: Alice Walton, Jeff Bezos and Chuck Feeney, the latter being the only one of them who has reputedly given away 100% of his fortune.
Resembling 18th century tomb covers, his collection of etchings, made from recycled printed plates etched with figures of the named people are thought-provoking. Admission is free – Stinking Rich... the Cost of Wealth is at Daisy Laing Gallery, Old Bakehouse Lane, Penzance, until October 9.