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The Dating Show

The customs of courtship are exposed in this contemporary response to the dating game.

Darren Sylvester Just Death Is True 2006 lightjet print 90 x 120cm Courtesy of the artist and Sullivan+Strumpf Fine Art, Sydney

Editorial Review

27 June - 27 July, 2008
Institute of Modern Art
420 Brunswick St, Fortitude Valley

If you can't remember the last time your stomach churned with enough ferocity to turn milk to butter and your spine flowed with the voltage required to power a small city, then chances are fair that you haven't been on a date for some time. But before you dive into the love abyss you may want to catch up with the goings-on of the dating world, with some insight from the group of contemporary artists contributing their works to The Dating Show exhibition.

The sometimes bizarre, always awkward and occasionally successful encounters that we call dates are explored with video, photo and mixed media works that reflect a world of faceless desire and uncertainty compounded by the pressures of the noughties.

Messages left by potential partners in response to Mutlu Cerkez's dating profile are painted in gouache, while Darren Sylvester photographs a face pack-clad girl who stares out longingly from the end of her telephone receiver.

Video works are a feature of this exhibition with Robin Hely pushing the limits of privacy and secretly recording his blind date with 25-year-old single mum Sherrie. This revealing and unaffected piece is sure to incite many a guilty laugh.

Kat Harley