Art on the Underground announces a major new commission from international artist Liam Gillick, titled ‘McNamara ‘68’, a new film and poster artwork, launching Monday 4 July. The works evoke the spy movie genre of the 1960s with the films focusing on the original architectural details of the Victoria line.
An ambitious project that introduces art into the daily experience of millions of people, Gillick has created 16 short films featuring footage shot by the artist for the digital screens across London Underground. To accompany the films, a series of large scale posters will be displayed across all 270 stations on the network.
Together the works act as short film trailers for a possible movie. The clips introduce the “stars” of the potential film, with one per station. Each star is an anagram of a station name. Whether the stars match the stations or not is something for the travelling public to work out.
‘McNamara ‘68’ forms part of Art on the Underground’s long-standing relationship with Gillick. In 2006 he created the cover for the pocket Tube map ‘The Day Before (You know what they’ll call it, they’ll call it the Tube)’; and in 2008 ‘onehundredandninetytwofeet’ a print to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the symbol of London Underground – the Roundel.
Part of Underline, a series of art commissions across the Victoria line in 2015 and 2016.
