Lewis Davidson: Electric Fall | DES BAINS
What did you think, said the gallerist, as I made to leave. I never know how performative to be on the rare occasions I get the question: do I leave it at “oh, great”? Do I reformulate something from the press release? Or do I give my actual opinion?
This time around (on the final afternoon of this exhibition), I went for the latter. It reminds me of festival tents in a field, I said. I think - but didn’t say - that this is probably because I saw the show on the final really warm day of summer, the very end of festival season, and tents like this had been a mainstay on my social media feeds for months.
As the press release makes clear, festivals absolutely didn’t inspire the artist Lewis Davidson when he made these mini-tents. They’re made from plastic carrier bags he picked up from the streets of London. They’re a comment on marginalisation and despair. Because, on many of these streets, you see tents, and even encampments of tents, put up by homeless people.
They’re urban leftovers, these tents. Made of fragile material, not thick enough to protect the tent-dweller from the harsh elements, outside. Back in the gallery, Davidson has nailed his mini tents to uncompromising steel shelves. They’re lit from within. They’re “speculative architectures of refusal and retreat”, as the press release puts it.
In this dark room, they glow like luxurious Christmas lights. As objects, they’re vulnerable, sure, but they’re also pretty. Almost festive. It wasn’t what the artist was going for. But it’s what I took from him. Oh well.
Anyway, after I gave him my dumb opinion, the gallerist raised his eyebrows and said, haven’t heard that one before. I was mildly embarrassed and left. Then I got home, recalled the festive glow, and wrote this.
Lewis Davidson: Electric Fall is at DES BAINS (London). 27 June - 06 September 2025