Castlefield Gallery is pleased to present Apocatopia, a group exhibition including the work of Ruth Ewan, Evi Grigoropoulou, Siobhán Hapaska and Pil&Galia Kollectiv. Through film, painting and sculpture the work explores the relationship between production, presentation and consumption of contemporary culture examining the role of money, ritual and desire in a changing cultural, political and economic topography.

Drawing on historic texts such as Sir Thomas More’s Utopia1 and Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World2 – in which state incited hedonism and simultaneous manipulation of class and eugenics is practiced between a narrowing gap of utopia and dystopia – the exhibition’s starting point for selecting the works hypothesises the aftermath of an economic ‘apocalypse’. Representing the echoes of these disparate ideas, in the shadow of current world events, the works in this exhibition investigate and subvert some of the socioeconomic complexities that exist in both socialist and capitalist systems. Through re-appropriation or re-interpretation of everyday objects and aspects of popular culture, the works in Apocatopia re-evaluate our relationship to the media, commerce, wealth and power and explore new ways to approach an uncertain world.

This exhibition will feature a number of premier showings including the new work by Ruth Ewan inspired by the book Le Gran Catastrophe, produced on her recent International Fellowship residency in Bolivia; new work by Evi Grigoropoulou and Pil&Galia Kollectiv’s full trilogy The Future Trilogy inspired by the IKEA riots of 2005.