About the Exhibit - Helter Shelter or: The Red Show! Or…

Alex Da Corte’s exhibit, Helter Shelter or: The Red Show! Or…, at Sadie Coles HQ is everything you’d expect from an Alex Da Corte show. It’s fully immersive, which is a feat for a venue as large as the Sadie Coles HQ’s Kingly Street location. 

Given that Da Corte is influenced by Pop Art and Surrealism, you see references to puff the magic dragon and The Peanuts gang as you wander through the exhibit. 

Da Corte is known for combining “high and low-brow American cultural references – from branded items found in domestic life to figures from popular culture.” (source) 

The press release for this exhibit was quite unique. It’s a series of notes or pieces of information that the artist has collected that seem to have influenced this exhibit. I notice he references a stack of cards - which these large wooden walls resemble. 

“Objects as stand-ins for people then became a way for me to understand that objects are just another kind of language that we can pair together to create these sentences that turn into poetry.” - Alex Da Corte (source) 

Overall though, he leaves the rest to the imagination, not explaining much of anything. Which is kind of nice, it just lets us enjoy the madness. 

Exhibition Walkthrough

To see a walkthrough of the exhibit, skip ahead to 16:30 in the video below.

About the Artist - Alex Da Corte 

Alex Da Corte is an American artist, born in New Jersey from a family of house painters. He received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of the Arts, Philadelphia, and a Master of Fine Arts from the Yale University School of Art. 

“His videos, sculptures, and installations come in deep, bright, saturated colors, often neon. They freely riff on pop culture, including children’s television, reality TV and cartoons.” - Washington Post (source) 

Da Corte lives and works in Philadelphia.