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  • Democracies
This is a past display. Go to current displays

Glenn Ligon, Condition Report 2000. Lent by the American Fund for the Tate Gallery 2007. © Glenn Ligon; courtesy Thomas Dane Gallery, London.

Democracies

What does democracy mean to you?

This display brings together artworks that look at what it means to live in a democracy. A democratic society is based on equality, protecting each person’s individual rights and upholding ideals such as freedom of speech. Often presented as ideal, there are in fact challenges in democratic societies. Marginalised groups have fought and continue to fight for recognition and representation. While extreme political groups test the limits of freedom of speech and the right to protest.

On display are artworks by Artur Żmijewski and Jenny Holzer who explore political views from extreme left to far right. In her work I Want a President 1992, Zoe Leonard argues for LGBTQIA+ and class-conscious politics. While Glenn Ligon and Lubaina Himid reference issues that Black people have faced; fighting exploitation and struggling to gain and protect their rights. Although UK and global politics have changed since many of these artworks were made, the issues raised continue to be relevant today.

Read more

Tate Liverpool + RIBA North
Level 1 Dockside

Getting Here

14 November 2020 - 15 October 2023

Free

Ian Hamilton Finlay, Quin Morere  1991

1/28
artworks in Democracies

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Richard Hamilton, The state  1993

Hamilton’s image of a patrolling British soldier expresses the unease of the army’s equivocal position in Northern Ireland. Brandishing a weapon, yet moving protectively backwards, he is both on the offensive and defensive. The rural Irish landscape and city streets behind him pose equal threats. Hamilton has incorporated real fabric into the soldier’s fatigues, merging pictorial representation and reality. The construction of images through costume and artifice has been a consistent concern in Hamilton's works.

Gallery label, November 2006

2/28
artworks in Democracies

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Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE, Cut - Foot - Pupil- Uprisings  1981

This is one of a group of six unique prints in Tate’s collection from Chila Kumari Burman’s Riot Series (Tate T14090–T14095), each of which is individually titled. They were made in 1981 and 1982 with the master printmaker Stanley Jones (born 1933) in the Printmaking Department at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, where Burman was a student at the time. The Printmaking Department had established a reputation for experimenting with a range of techniques and this can be seen in this series. After a variety of trials, Burman and Jones decided to work with a combination of processes in each print – etching and silkscreen, etching and aquatint or etching and lithograph. The tensions generated by the combination and overlaying of two material techniques embodied the violence embedded within the subject matter of the work, echoing the theme of conflict as well as affecting the final appearance of the prints. The historian Lynda Nead has written about Burman’s process of layering images:

3/28
artworks in Democracies

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Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE, Red Riots on Indian Paper  1981

This is one of a group of six unique prints in Tate’s collection from Chila Kumari Burman’s Riot Series (Tate T14090–T14095), each of which is individually titled. They were made in 1981 and 1982 with the master printmaker Stanley Jones (born 1933) in the Printmaking Department at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, where Burman was a student at the time. The Printmaking Department had established a reputation for experimenting with a range of techniques and this can be seen in this series. After a variety of trials, Burman and Jones decided to work with a combination of processes in each print – etching and silkscreen, etching and aquatint or etching and lithograph. The tensions generated by the combination and overlaying of two material techniques embodied the violence embedded within the subject matter of the work, echoing the theme of conflict as well as affecting the final appearance of the prints. The historian Lynda Nead has written about Burman’s process of layering images:

4/28
artworks in Democracies

More on this artwork

Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE, Triptych No Nukes  1982

This is one of a group of six unique prints in Tate’s collection from Chila Kumari Burman’s Riot Series (Tate T14090–T14095), each of which is individually titled. They were made in 1981 and 1982 with the master printmaker Stanley Jones (born 1933) in the Printmaking Department at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, where Burman was a student at the time. The Printmaking Department had established a reputation for experimenting with a range of techniques and this can be seen in this series. After a variety of trials, Burman and Jones decided to work with a combination of processes in each print – etching and silkscreen, etching and aquatint or etching and lithograph. The tensions generated by the combination and overlaying of two material techniques embodied the violence embedded within the subject matter of the work, echoing the theme of conflict as well as affecting the final appearance of the prints. The historian Lynda Nead has written about Burman’s process of layering images:

5/28
artworks in Democracies

More on this artwork

Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE, Three Mug Shots in a Row  1982

This is one of a group of six unique prints in Tate’s collection from Chila Kumari Burman’s Riot Series (Tate T14090–T14095), each of which is individually titled. They were made in 1981 and 1982 with the master printmaker Stanley Jones (born 1933) in the Printmaking Department at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, where Burman was a student at the time. The Printmaking Department had established a reputation for experimenting with a range of techniques and this can be seen in this series. After a variety of trials, Burman and Jones decided to work with a combination of processes in each print – etching and silkscreen, etching and aquatint or etching and lithograph. The tensions generated by the combination and overlaying of two material techniques embodied the violence embedded within the subject matter of the work, echoing the theme of conflict as well as affecting the final appearance of the prints. The historian Lynda Nead has written about Burman’s process of layering images:

6/28
artworks in Democracies

More on this artwork

Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE, Militant Women  1981

This is one of a group of six unique prints in Tate’s collection from Chila Kumari Burman’s Riot Series (Tate T14090–T14095), each of which is individually titled. They were made in 1981 and 1982 with the master printmaker Stanley Jones (born 1933) in the Printmaking Department at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, where Burman was a student at the time. The Printmaking Department had established a reputation for experimenting with a range of techniques and this can be seen in this series. After a variety of trials, Burman and Jones decided to work with a combination of processes in each print – etching and silkscreen, etching and aquatint or etching and lithograph. The tensions generated by the combination and overlaying of two material techniques embodied the violence embedded within the subject matter of the work, echoing the theme of conflict as well as affecting the final appearance of the prints. The historian Lynda Nead has written about Burman’s process of layering images:

7/28
artworks in Democracies

More on this artwork

Zoe Leonard, I want a president  1992/2018

8/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Fountain)  2010

9/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Boy on tip toes)  2010

10/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (People saluting)  2010

11/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Balloons escaping)  2010

12/28
artworks in Democracies

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Marta Minujín, The Parthenon of Books  1983

The Parthenon of Books 1983 is the documentary record of a project by Marta Minujín in which she reconstructed the classical Greek temple of the Parthenon from the Acropolis in Athens out of books. In its current form the work consists of five black and white photographs showing various stages of the construction of the temple and a video recording the event and public reaction to it. The photographs are unique prints.

13/28
artworks in Democracies

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Cildo Meireles, Insertions into Ideological Circuits: Coca-Cola Project  1970

Meireles altered a series of Coca-Cola bottles, by printing slogans such as ‘Yankees go home’ or instructions for making Molotov cocktails on them. He put them back into circulation in what he described as an act of subversive ‘mobile graffiti’, enacted under Brazil’s military dictatorship. He saw the system of recycling empty bottles as a way of enabling a political message to circulate surreptitiously. He has compared the Coca-Cola bottles to ‘messages in bottles, flung into the sea by victims of shipwrecks’.

Gallery label, February 2016

14/28
artworks in Democracies

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Bob and Roberta Smith, All Schools Should be Art Schools  2016

All Schools Should Be Art Schools 2016 consists of twenty-eight placard signs, each of which is made of a square sheet of wood pinned to a wooden stake. Each sign is painted with a different capital letter on a blue background to fill the square. The letters have been variously painted in purple, green, cream and red and all are drawn in an angular style save for one ‘S’, the final letter of the work, which is curvilinear. The letter forms are outlined in yellow, cream or white and emphasised by drop shadows. Together they spell out the slogan and title of the work, ‘All Schools Should Be Art Schools’. The back of each board is unpainted bears a letter (corresponding to the letter painted on the front) and a number which indicates the order in which the panels should be installed.

15/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Girl looking)  2010

16/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Car on fire)  2010

17/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Chair balancing on stick)  Date not known

18/28
artworks in Democracies

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Lubaina Himid CBE RA, The Carrot Piece  1985

The Carrot Piece shows a white man failing to tempt a black woman with a carrot. Her arms are already full with everything she needs. Himid says that when the work was made, cultural institutions ‘needed to be seen’ to be integrating black people into their programmes and ‘we as black women understood how we were being patronised ... to be cajoled and distracted by silly games and pointless offers. We understood, but we knew what sustained us… and what we really needed to make a positive cultural contribution: self-belief, inherited wisdom, education and love.’

Gallery label, July 2017

19/28
artworks in Democracies

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Xiao Lu, Dialogue  1989, remade 2015

Dialogue is an installation that comprises two life-size aluminium alloy telephone booths, a mirror, a pedestal, a red telephone and cement paving stones. On the left phone booth, an image of the back of a female figure holding a receiver is silkscreened over the glass, and on the right phone booth the back of a male figure is depicted. In the middle of the two phone booths is a red telephone on a white plinth, with the receiver dangling down. Behind the phone is a mirrored panel with two bullet holes referencing an action carried out by the artist when the work was displayed in the exhibition China/Avant-Garde at the National Art Gallery, Beijing in 1989. The sculpture is raised on cement paving stones, and purposely resembles the public phone booths found on the streets of China in the late 1980s.

20/28
artworks in Democracies

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Ian Hamilton Finlay, Je Vous Salue Marat  1989

21/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Boy running with barrel)  2010

22/28
artworks in Democracies

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Artur Zmijewski, Democracies  2009

Aiming to blend into the crowd as much as possible, Zmijewski and his cameramen filmed a series of politically charged gatherings, including demonstrations, military parades and memorial services. Many of the events are extreme right-wing and nationalistic, reflecting what the artist sees as a general cultural shift in Europe. ‘I was less interested in the rightness or justice of the cause’, Zmijewski has said, ‘but more in this inner drive that moves people to debate, to publicly show their own needs, demands, requests, opinions – and to defend them with their own presence’.

Gallery label, November 2015

23/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Two women hiding)  2010

24/28
artworks in Democracies

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Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Right arm)  2010

25/28
artworks in Democracies

More on this artwork

Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin, Untitled (Riots shields in the high street)  2010

26/28
artworks in Democracies

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Glenn Ligon, Condition Report  2000

Untitled (I Am a Man), a 1988 painting by Ligon, takes its text from signs carried by striking black sanitation workers in Memphis in 1968. The slogan ‘I Am a Man’ was a way of protesting that they were equal to their white counterparts, who were paid more for doing the same job. Here Ligon juxtaposes a reproduction of the 1988 painting with another that has been annotated by a conservator making a condition report on the work. The imperfections noted might simultaneously be read as a questioning of the self as well as recording the frailties of the object.

Gallery label, June 2010

27/28
artworks in Democracies

More on this artwork

Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE, If There is No Struggle, There is No Progress - Uprisings  1981

This is one of a group of six unique prints in Tate’s collection from Chila Kumari Burman’s Riot Series (Tate T14090–T14095), each of which is individually titled. They were made in 1981 and 1982 with the master printmaker Stanley Jones (born 1933) in the Printmaking Department at the Slade School of Fine Art in London, where Burman was a student at the time. The Printmaking Department had established a reputation for experimenting with a range of techniques and this can be seen in this series. After a variety of trials, Burman and Jones decided to work with a combination of processes in each print – etching and silkscreen, etching and aquatint or etching and lithograph. The tensions generated by the combination and overlaying of two material techniques embodied the violence embedded within the subject matter of the work, echoing the theme of conflict as well as affecting the final appearance of the prints. The historian Lynda Nead has written about Burman’s process of layering images:

28/28
artworks in Democracies

More on this artwork

Art in this room

T12140: Quin Morere
Ian Hamilton Finlay Quin Morere 1991
T06775: The state
Richard Hamilton The state 1993
T14092: Cut - Foot - Pupil- Uprisings
Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE Cut - Foot - Pupil- Uprisings 1981
T14094: Red Riots on Indian Paper
Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE Red Riots on Indian Paper 1981
T14090: Triptych No Nukes
Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE Triptych No Nukes 1982
T14093: Three Mug Shots in a Row
Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE Three Mug Shots in a Row 1982
T14095: Militant Women
Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE Militant Women 1981
L04308: I want a president
Zoe Leonard I want a president 1992/2018
P13223: Untitled (Fountain)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Fountain) 2010
P13217: Untitled (Boy on tip toes)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Boy on tip toes) 2010
P13219: Untitled (People saluting)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (People saluting) 2010
P13222: Untitled (Balloons escaping)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Balloons escaping) 2010
T14343: The Parthenon of Books
Marta Minujín The Parthenon of Books 1983
T12328: Insertions into Ideological Circuits: Coca-Cola Project
Cildo Meireles Insertions into Ideological Circuits: Coca-Cola Project 1970
T14774: All Schools Should be Art Schools
Bob and Roberta Smith All Schools Should be Art Schools 2016
P13220: Untitled (Girl looking)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Girl looking) 2010
P13225: Untitled (Car on fire)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Car on fire) 2010
P13226: Untitled (Chair balancing on stick)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Chair balancing on stick) Date not known
T14192: The Carrot Piece
Lubaina Himid CBE RA The Carrot Piece 1985
T15540: Dialogue
Xiao Lu Dialogue 1989, remade 2015
T12812: Je Vous Salue Marat
Ian Hamilton Finlay Je Vous Salue Marat 1989
P13221: Untitled (Boy running with barrel)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Boy running with barrel) 2010
T13174: Democracies
Artur Zmijewski Democracies 2009
P13216: Untitled (Two women hiding)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Two women hiding) 2010
P13224: Untitled (Right arm)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Right arm) 2010
P13218: Untitled (Riots shields in the high street)
Adam Broomberg, Oliver Chanarin Untitled (Riots shields in the high street) 2010
L02822: Condition Report
Glenn Ligon Condition Report 2000
T14091: If There is No Struggle, There is No Progress - Uprisings
Chila Kumari Singh Burman MBE If There is No Struggle, There is No Progress - Uprisings 1981

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