Richard Hamilton - Protest Pictures is a resolutely political art exhibition encompassing a bewildering array of media and styles. The exhibition takes the viewer on a journey through seven galleries, housing one installation and six themed collections of art-works. Works vary in size as much as the method of creation - from 61 x 61cm to life-size 100 x 200 human portraits.

The first room comprises nine 60 x 80 works all of the same image – a newspaper photo of Mick Jagger and Robert Fraser (Richard Hamilton's art dealer) handcuffed after being arrested on drugs charges. The repetition of the image using a number of materials and textures - oil on canvas, pencil, pastel, ink, watercolour, lithograph, screenprint and collage - is the epitome of the popular concept of pop-art and has the feel of a sampler, a CV, of the artist's talents.

Room Two has a series of exhibition posters demanding that museum charges in London should be abolished, in the names of famous artists and scientists - 'Free Leonardo, Free Raphael, Free Charles Darwin - suggesting that the great minds are locked up and held to ransom by the authorities. The images are at first sight disposable, but interestingly blur the line between art and advertising.

The third gallery is filled by one installation - a mock-up of what appears to be a full-size hosital radiology unit, complete with a sink for scrubbing up. The viewer looks through a protective window onto a bed with a monitor above it. It is only after walking around the exhibit that the image on the monitor - a party political broadcast by former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher - can be seen. The slightly eerie feeling coming in to the room gives way to a dark giggle. It's delightfully michievous and playful.

Room Four is called The Troubles. It has nine pictures, various sizes, of three images of people from Northern Ireland. The different interpretations of an Orangeman, IRA prisoner, British soldier, cleverly cloud any preconceptions and judgments about the rights and wrongs of any one group. Overall, there's a feeling of confusion relevant to the complicated political and human landscape. The Celtic theme continues in the next gallery with small portraits of the mythical Irish hunter-warrior Finn MacCool. These develop from rough pencil sketches to complex engravings and give a very satisfying overview of the artistic process from first study to completed article. Gallery Six has four emotive prints, photographs and drawings based on television pictures of students killed during a protest against the Vietnam War. Again, a repeated image is in various media. The repetition strengthens the image shown on television alongside the works - the familiar televisual horror is made more urgent by its transfer to canvas.

The last room has the most contemporary and emotive images. Next to computer prints of the two Gulf Wars played-out as video games, and three death-mask-like portraits of former Labour leader Hugh Gaskill, is a life-size portrait of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair. He's resplendent in a gunslinger's outfit, against a background of the burning oil fields of Iraq. The image is both funny and chilling. He has a light smile and arrogant stance - making the artist's feelings on both Blair and the Iraq war very clear.

Artist Credits: Artist - Richard Hamilton (b 1922).

Company Credits: Works courtesy of - Richard Hamilton, Rita Donagh, South Bank Centre, Tate Gallery. Curator - Victoria Miguel. Thanks to - British Film Institute, Arts Council England. Company - Inverleith House.

END

(c) David Hepburn 2008

reviewed Saturday 30 August 08 / Inverleith House, Edinburgh

Fringe Report (c) Fringe Report 2002-2012

www.fringereport.com