Gavin Turk

The chameleonic Gavin Turk made his public debut with a statement of finality. His MA show at London's Royal College of Art consisted of one work, Cave, an English Heritage-style blue plaque commemorating his occupancy. The plaque read 'Borough of Kensington, Gavin Turk, Sculptor, Worked Here 1989-1991' and was set into the wall above an otherwise empty interior. He was denied his degree certificate (his tutors couldn't understand the work), but had successfully launched a critique of authorship, 'genius', and the history of the European avant-garde that he is still pursuing almost a decade later.

In the early '90s Turk made a series of paintings based on both his own signature. In Stain he recalled Italian sculptor Alberto Giacometti's habit of signing tablecloths as payment for restaurant meals, while Piero Manzoni featured both Turk's name and that of the Italian conceptualist in a deliberately confounding double bluff. In 1993 he staged Collected Works 1989-1993, an exhibition that included the ironic-iconic Pop: a life-size waxwork sculpture of the artist as Sid Vicious aping the pose of Andy Warhol's painting of Elvis playing a cowboy.

In 1998 Turk held a mini-retrospective at the South London Gallery, which he titled The Stuff Show. At the private view he played on the speculation about its content by wrapping everything up in unbleached canvas and string. This also refered to the sculptor Christo. Turk displayed another waxwork of himself in 2000, this time in the guise of revolutionary leader Che Guevara. His contribution to Ant Noises at the Saatchi Gallery was based on a famous poster image of Guevara, enlarged to billboard size.