About this artwork
Swarm reflects the socio-political tensions leading up to the general election in the UK in 2015 and the prospect of a referendum on leaving the European Union. The painting was included in Howson’s 2015 exhibition Demokratia, the ancient Greek term for ‘rule by the people’. Howson presents a cast of grotesque characters and the breakdown of social order. He references the Morlocks in H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine, a savage, post-human species who feed upon the passive.
Published September 2022
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artist:Peter Howson (born 1958) Scottish
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title:Swarm
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date created:2015
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materials:Oil on canvas
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measurements:183.00 x 244.00 cm
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object type:
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credit line:Gift of Chris Bartram, via the Flowers Gallery, 2022
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accession number:GMA 5766
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gallery:
Peter Howson
Peter Howson
Born in London, Howson moved to Glasgow at the age of four. He studied at Glasgow School of Art from 1975 to 1977, was briefly in the army, then returned to the art school from 1979 to 1981. He was a contemporary of Steven Campbell, Adrian Wiszniewski and Ken Currie. Howson's paintings are mainly...