Plaza Plaza is hosted by Sadie Coles HQ, The Shop
'Basher Dowsing' was the nickname of William Dowsing (1596–1668), an English Puritan iconoclast whose mandate was the destruction and removal of idols from buildings in Cambridgeshire and Suffolk in the middle of the 17th century. I was born in Cambridge and am extremely familiar with the absence of the art destroyed by him. I worked on this show from a distance from Rome and later from Berlin, while unable to return to the UK to see my family, due to the pandemic but also paper-work arising from Brexit.
The first iteration of 'Basher Dowsing' was made for von ammon co in Washington DC in May 2021. I made that show by looking at building plans and photographs and deploying painter-decorators and installing over video call. Everything happened virtually for me. I’d never been in the space and still haven’t. I’ve been projecting something of the absence in the heart of my home out into places elsewhere while I too was elsewhere.
This time, I’m projecting the show back to a political capitol again, but also back to the place that was my home for the majority of my adult life. I’ve only understood how Protestantism influences the foundation of my identity since leaving this city 6 or 7 years ago.
In several pieces in this show at Sadie Coles HQ’s shop I reference elements from the Crucifixus Dolorosus, or forked cross, which began appearing in the late 13th and tend to depict the Christ in a shockingly corporeal manner: his arms either nailed splayed in a Y-shape to a cross, or, frequently, to a Y-shaped construction that represented the forked branches of a tree. These lurid manifestations of vulnerability and pain emphasise the frailty and fallibility of Jesus’s human body under strain. The blood coming from his wounds is often sculpted in three dimensions, not just painted onto his surface.
Although they do appear in Italy in abundance I associate these crosses with northern Europe: Warsaw, Prague and Cologne, and therefore have been projecting them into the absences of the previously Catholic churches of Cambridgeshire, which are now that white-washed C of E familiarity.
I’ve been thinking about the problem with the word ‘familiar’ and I’ve been meditating on my puritanical personality traits, I’ve been thinking about seeking pleasure in suffering, thinking about mock Tudor and desirable timber, and the absence of faith.
— Beth Collar
