Sorcha Dallas

Stuart Cumberland used to paint gibbering, childlike copies of Old Masters; now he makes garish confections which the curators term ‘housewife abstraction’ – rococo swirls, misplaced blots and scudding semi-circles reminiscent of ‘ape makes modern art’ wind-ups’. These teasers – Is he serious? Is this progress? – are a painted variant on readymades, wherein value accrues from the gallery context. The show’s best moments come from such manufactured uncertainties – from apparently feather-light works whose deliberate refusals hint at emotional depth.

Hendrik Wittkopf’s sugar-pink, green and yellow prints of sunny gardens can’t possibly be as cheesily contended as they look; isn’t happiness a viable basis for art, though? Carola Michel’s portraits of family friends – painted from snapshots but using the bare minimum of pictorial information – are also mute about their intentions yet, simultaneously, they communicate the engagement of the artist and the discomfort of the startled subjects. Apparently, some viewers have still complained that there’s ‘nothing there’. You can’t say that about Jochen Klein’s pop-up sketchbook – originally a menswear catalogue. Images of beautiful suits and shoes have been collaged with visuals from gay porn magazines; penises leap from every pocket – a phantasmagoric excess of desire. More romantic are Alan Michael’s oils of gay men horsing around. These also work best when, from mixed signals, they conjure a contemplative space. The big question is whether the two locked in a passionate clinch really are Simon and Garfunkel. The decision is yours.