Love and War in Perpetual Motion
Love and War in Perpetual Motion was a large-scale commissioned work by Karl Murphy, presented at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), London, as part of the INFERNO Takeover in 2020. Curated by INFERNO London, the event brought together new works by queer artists including Sweat Mother and Nick Finegan, with documentation by Anne Tetzlaff.
Suspended within the ICA, it bore the provocation:
THERE IS NO TRUTH
THAT CANNOT BE CREATED
WRECK THE DIVINE
THEN YOU WILL SEE
Rooted in Murphy’s ongoing exploration of queer ritual, resistance, and language, the work sat in deliberate proximity to both the queer community and the institutional heart of power. It challenged fixed narratives and invited viewers to consider belief, mythology, and truth as constructed and reconfigurable forces.
Love and War in Perpetual Motion continued Murphy’s commitment to placing poetic language within immersive sculptural forms, using scale, material, and text to create sites of reflection and confrontation.
Images by Anne Tetzlaff.
“INFERNO at the ICA commissioned new works by Nick Finegan, Sweatmother and Karl Murphy, each engaging with the rave as a queer ritual of transformation, resistance, and relation.”
- Marcus Bell, University of Oxford, in Agôn – revue des arts de la scène
