Artists, collectors and Demand's dealers from around the world flocked to the Serpentine on Monday night for the opening of his astonishing new exhibition, which was followed by dinner at the Rochelle School canteen in Shoreditch with sensational food by Margot Henderson, wife of the legendary Fergus of St John's. Behind each photograph in the exhibition is an extraordinarily lengthy and, if you will, 'demanding' process, from the initial reference or idea which is then turned into a sculpture (in the case of Grotto, the undoubted highlight of the show, a sculpture involving 50 tonnes of paper - to find out more about the making of this work click here) and to the final photograph. Tavern alone, inspired by a child murder case, took a year to make. What, you might wonder, happens to each sculpture after it has been photographed? 'Oh, they get trashed,' Mark Wallinger told me afterwards. Dafydd Jones was on hand to photograph the occasion.
Thomas Demand and Miuccia Prada
Hedi Slimane and Mario Testino
Bob and Roberta Smith
Mark Wallinger
Idris Khan and Geoff Dyer
Rachel Whiteread
Mercedes Stoutzker, Nicholas Serota, Judith Greer
Mario Testino, Miuccia Prada, Francesco Vezzoli
Thomas Demand
6 June-20 August
Serpentine Gallery
Kensington Gardens
London W2 3XA
Tel: 0207 402 6075
www.serpentinegallery.org
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