Trade RoutesHauser & Wirth London, Piccadilly3 May – 27 July 2013Opening: Thursday 2 May 6 – 8 pm
Trade routes have connected the major centres of civilisation in Europe and Asia since antiquity. These routes not only made the exchange of goods possible, but also fostered cultural exchanges between distant regions. The group exhibition, Trade Routes, on view at Hauser & Wirth's Piccadilly gallery from 3 May, presents a diverse picture of where these trade routes stand in today's globalised society through the lens of 15 artists.
Adel Abidin's three channel video installation Three Love Songs will fill the American Room with films of sultry and seductive blonde women serenading the viewer with what initially seems to be poetic ballads sung in an Iraqi dialect of Arabic. However, these songs are actually odes dedicated to the former leader of Iraq, Saddam Hussein. With Three Love Songs, Abidin brings to the forefront the underlying cultural friction and political tension by creating an uncomfortable juxtaposition between the sexualised performance, replete with Western clichés, and the meaning of the lyrics.