CAG on museums: Ellen Gallagher at the Tate Modern

Ellen Gallagher in her studio Photograph: Christopher Thomond for the Guardian

I actually didn't know what to expect for the Ellen Gallagher show at Tate Modern, but I was pleasantly surprised. Gallagher's subjects ranged from textured wigs superimposed onto vintage newspaper ads to artistic representations of Herman Melville novels (which I particularly enjoyed).

Ellen Gallagher, Wiglette from DeLuxe , 2004-05

The oeuvre of Gallagher's work in the exhibition doesn't follow a time continuum, but really displays the diversity of her medium and artistic methods. There was a room of extremely large 'black paintings' and complex amalgamations of penmanship paper with inserted hand cut sheets of rubber called the Morphia series. These compositions were displayed free-standing in the room so one could see both sides of the paper which showed different images on either side.

Display of the two-sided Morphia series

Overall my favorite pieces were her 2006 piece Bird in Hand, which referred to Melville's character in Moby Dick, and an entire room of dark inked overlapping layered collages that included a video installation based on 'whale fall', "the scientific term for dead whales that have fallen to the ocean floor and are consumed by scavengers". I'm not sure I understood the point, but the words 'Polynesian reed mapping' and 'engraved coffin' were used to describe the installation and there was some cool jazzy music being played that is still stuck in my head. I really enjoyed the whole thing...

Bird in Hand 2006

An Experiment of Unusual Opportunity 2008

...especially the glorious Tate Modern bar at end.