Contain yourself (seriously) – this lavishly produced illustrated book forms the catalogue for Peter Doherty’s Berlin exhibition of the same name at janinebeangallery. On display are works of art by the visual artist Peter Doherty. The catalogue with texts by Phillip Oehmke and Christian Martinez Schwabbauer was published by finebooks Verlag Berlin on 9 September 2022. It is the first comprehensive publication of Peter Doherty’s visual work.
Image caption: Cover of the book by Peter Doherty “Contain yourself (seriously)”.
Philipp Oehmke, cultural journalist at Der Spiegel says in his foreword “Skin in the Game: “For more than twenty years he has been writing poetry and prose, composing songs, some of them immortal like himself, and since 2005 his visual art has also been on public display: Paintings and collages, blood, paint, pencil, typewriter tear-outs are his materials. Skulls, syringes, reptiles or pipes are some of his motifs. There is nothing to hide. For the great synthesis of the arts, into whose maw he has always thrown everything, and above all himself, with skin and hair, for which he has bled in the literal sense, that was always himself as well: He has his own skin in the game, as they say in English when you have invested a lot yourself. In this quality of throwing himself in, of putting everything on the line, Doherty is one of the last great rock stars of the long-gone 20th century. A dying type whose art always consisted in unconditionality, in the composition of impossible situational constellations: A stranger in his own skin, Stranger in my own Skin, as he sang in a song by his band Babyshambles and as it also says in one of the collages about himself shown here.”
Christian Martinez Schwabbauer says in his text “Through the Looking Glass – A Portrait of Peter Doherty as a Visual Artist”: “On a content level, Doherty’s visual work functions like an analogue hypertext, a non-linear web of information and cross-references characterised by ambiguity, intertextuality, associativity and recontextualisation.”
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As frontman of the Libertines and the later founded Babyshambles, Peter Doherty, born in 1979, is one of the defining figures of rock music of the past 20 years. Although not quite as high-profile, he is also continuously active in the field of visual arts. Already at the end of the 1990s, when Doherty and Karl Barât lived in a flat share, his ideas flowed into music, lyrics and pictures in equal measure.
In 2007, Peter Doherty had his first solo exhibition in London. This was followed by exhibitions in Spain, France, etc.
The group show “You, Venus and Me” in September 2018 was his first exhibition at Berlin’s janinebeangallery and marks the beginning of the gallery’s collaboration with the artist. In June 2022, the artist’s memoirs were published by Little Brown under the title “A likely Lad”. Peter Doherty co-authored the book with British writer Simon Spence.
The solo exhibition “Contain yourself (seriously)” of works by Peter Doherty will present mixed media, collages, original texts and typewriter art in interplay with installation objects from the artist’s everyday life from 10 September to 31 December 2022.
Both temporally and spatially, the exhibited artworks will provide an insight into different phases of Doherty’s life. The works were created in England, Spain, France and Thailand, among other places.
Original texts and manuscripts will also be on display in the gallery and accompanied by readings recorded by Peter Doherty especially for this purpose.
WHEN?
Exhibition period: 10. September until 31. December 2022
WHERE?
janinebeangallery
Torstraße 154
10115 Berlin
