The king of shock art strikes again.
He's eaten an actual corgi and a swan – mmm chewy – he's catapulted grannies, set fire to himself outside the Houses of Parliament and pulled on pink tights to dance outside Scotland Yard as a ballerina pig. And now he's announced that he's planning to recreate the death of Raoul Moat.
Who is this despicable figure? A criminal, an insane man in need of help? Well maybe, because it's Mark McGowan, bad taste king of the art world. Like an ageing superhero with a bit of a paunch, McGowan shocks like no other, fighting absurd losing battles as the people's missionary.
Well if you're slightly sickened by that, you're not going to take too kindly to this either, as McGowan rather likes to re-enact highly controversial news stories. He's taken on Jade Goody's death, Jean Charles de Menezes' murder, the kidnapping of Shannon Matthews and, let's not forget, the conception of Prince William. McGowan digs up the ridiculous and obsessive nature of how news stories follow events.
This time McGowan is to don a cardboard box with the face of Raoul Moat stuck on the side to recreate the events leading up to his death. Over the course of a 30-minute play, McGowan will play all the parts that make up the story: a newsreader, the policemen and Raoul himself – we want to know if Gazza's going to make an entrance?
The performance is set to take place at Bearspace on the 24th September, so expect a dramatic stand-off surrounded by a limited set of broken branches “to make it look like woods”. It'll be as rough round the edges as McGowan's seemingly troubled and fabulously critical mind. We're thinking that maybe he didn't get much attention as a kid?
Click here to read Tom's interview with Mark McGowan.
World Within Worlds is at Bearspace from 11th September to 9th October 2010.
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