The first thing you must do is go upstairs to see the hand-coloured etchings in the series called Etchasketchathon. Walk straight to the picture of the zombie clown shaking hands with the little boy. Look at the burning cottage. Black skeletal rafters, all that survives of the roof, are seen against soft red-and-pink fire. The effect is as tender as a watercolour, as shocking as the blazing village in Rubens’ The Consequences of War. The Chapman brothers are back.
The last time I saw a roof wasted like that was when I watched the last embers of the Saatchi fire. The Chapmans’ big work, Hell, was destroyed, and they seemed remarkably blasé. This exhibition explains why. Like the Renaissance Countess of Forli – who, when the besiegers of her castle threatened to kill her children, stood on the battlements, lifted her skirts and said, “Look, I’ve got the equipment to make more” – the Chapmans are not easy to defeat. Unusually in contemporary art, they have this thing called talent.
more fromk The Guardian here.