Viewing room

One Man's Trash

Dave Buonaguidi

Jealous North

06 Sep 2017 — 01 Oct 2017

‘One Man’s Trash’ is the result of Dave Buonaguidi’s inherent desire to create, with the challenge of printing onto almost anything. Sourcing the most unusual materials, including school biology posters, Beano comics, flags and lighters, he emblazons them with his stylised and instantly recognisable font, re-appropriating images and objects from mainstream and using his bold phrases to frame them in a new context.

A pop-culture quote, a witty phrase or a heartwarming message (see: I Fucking Love This Place), Buonaguidi feeds his need to create by screenprinting onto the most difficult surfaces, recreating the objects into something else entirely and producing prints unprecedented in their scale and ambition. The work manifests as a monument of our times or times past, making us look at the objects again, reassessing their worth and reevaluating their usefulness. A mindful nod to lighter times, the playful naïve-ness of the Beano comics, the ladybird pages, the harmless smut, the historic and reminiscent brought into the modern world.

The works in the exhibition will be a myriad of Buonaguidi’s collections and will be displayed as a house of curio, a delve into the past, updated with bold neon pink text overlays and a dash of wit. One Man’s Trash will exclusively reveal brand new work, fresh from Dave Buonaguidi’s print table, and will form the second leg of his first touring solo show.

Dave Buonaguidi

Dave Buonaguidi has worked in advertising for over 30 years, founding St. Luke’s, the worlds first advertising co-operative and labelled as ‘the most frightening company on earth’ by the Harvard Business Review. He has since worked as Creative Director at Channel4, founded the advertising agency Karmarama and Chief Creative Officer of the London office of Crispin Porter and Bogusky, just recently opening yet another start-up company of his own.
In 2003 he created the iconic ‘MAKE TEA NOT WAR’ poster for the anti-war march, which now forms part of the Victoria and Albert Museum collection and also hangs in the Trento Museum of Modern Art.
During a year-long hiatus from the advertising world, Buonaguidi set upon learning a new skill and undertook a screenprinting course, which in turn gave him the freedom to finally find an out-put for the many ideas that had been swimming around in his head.