Alpine Kitsch

“I drive a lot because of my work, and when I am cruising along the motorways between France and Belgium at night, I often think about where I would like to be driving to. Pictured in this work is an area of the French Alps that has been very important to me, called Ailefroide. I have visited Ailefroide regularly since I was eighteen, always to go hiking and climbing with my sister and brother in law. I feel like walking in any natural landscape is like walking through a dream, and many of my favourite memories exist there. My photos of the area launch me into an overwhelming sense of nostalgia, and bring up all the idealised visions I have about Europe. It is almost unbearable, and the overflowing emotions and thoughts and dreams spill out into a kind of kitsch morass that I scooped up and tried to put into this work.”

Jack Burton (b.1988, Barry, South Wales) lives and works in Brussels, Belgium. He is the studio assistant to Anselm Kiefer. His works can loosely be described as paintings, though they include a multi-media approach that includes both photography and collage. Influenced by movements such as pop, expressionism, abstract and street art, he merges each of these media within individual works to create an image where each jostles for primacy, and where the perceptions and expectations of each is also disrupted.