Cicek Gallery in London will be hosting , the first UK solo exhibition of Maltese artist and political cartoonist Sebastian Tanti Burlò. The timely show surveys the ever-declining decadence of Western societies, and levels an irreverent critique at the nationalistic sentiments sweeping the European continent. comprises a new collection of 14 oil paintings that includes a ribald cast of fictional caricatures – ranging from Major Mann to the artist’s signature “Sausage People” – set amid a series of stately and mundane surroundings.
As the political cartoonist for the , Burlò’s honed satirical commentary underpins the whole of . His cartoons have been published weekly in the since 2014. “My work is an artistic response to the jingoism that is seen proliferating across Europe today,” Burlò says.
“As the savage winds of the climate crisis crash around us, carrying the booms of war drums closer each day, we are once again caught dancing the antic hay. “This collection of paintings is a satirical take on our Western society, frivolously living through our troubled times.” The artist repurposes the public fixation on luxurious narratives of nobility and power, seen across popular culture from to .
He evokes the current state of Western democracy, a haggard society filled with a creeping sense of anti-establishment revolution. In his series , Burlò has created a triptych of theatrical and stately – if somewhat rundown – interiors, adorned with trophi.