Try as we might, we can't think of a recent art exhibition that ticks as many boxes marked 'awesome' as this one. Leading British artists such as Peter Blake, Tracy Emin and Rachel Whiteread (tick) have created works of art based around pandas (tick), on display at Selfridges (tick) to raise money for the World Wide Fund for Nature (tick, tick, tick).
The show, punningly entitled 'Pandamonium' (bonus tick), was inspired by those familiar WWF collection boxes shaped like the lovable two-toned mammals. Each artist has absorbed the ursine receptacle into their art work. Jason Bruges has gathered a menacing panda collective whose gaze follows you around the room. Laura Ford has obscured her bear with an encrustation of barnacles. Elsewhere, see bears cast from snow and ice and zinc. Even pandas with fricking lasers for eyes. We defy you to watch this video and not be enthused.
Finally, if you read the title of this post and immediately thought of wrestlers, you're in very respectable company.
Pandamonium runs at Selfridges from 4 September to 28 October, after which the bears will be auctioned off to raise money for the WWF (email [email protected] if you want to attend the auction). Check out images in their Flickr set (from which we've taken an image of Burges' panda collective).
