The Ecstasy Collection

There’s No Such Thing As Society

Named after the statement made by British Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, this work, and its sister piece ‘I’ll Be Your Friend’, represents the paradigm shift that took place in British culture with the introduction and widespread use of MDMA.

In this piece, the artist has created a unique pattern (one which he will return to in later works) that is complex in its simplicity. The pills are arranged in concentric circles that emanate from the centre but, as they become larger, the spacing creates both an illusion of form and a mandalaesque, hypnotic set of patterns that appear and disappear in the viewer’s eye.

As the pills are held, floating slightly above the void of black, one can make out a pattern etched beneath them. The pattern also radiates, following the concentric layout, but there is also another set of lines that breaks through the separated circles and connects them all to each other, running through every individual pill, intertwining them.In There’s No Such Thing As Society, the pills are all uniform, devoid of colour, fitting in; never standing out. Their potential, contained and hidden. Their connection, undiscovered.

Background:

Although not actually deemed ‘a pair’, There’s No Such Thing As Society & I’ll Be Your Friend are ‘sister’ pieces, connected but not twinned.