Ha ha! ‘It’s all gone woke’, so says this marvellous character by Merny. The phrase is one used by anybody who doesn’t like or disagrees with those elements of policy/regulation/rules/behaviour that they take issue with on account of it not complying with their own values. The peak example of the phrase was probably the quote from former Home Secretary Suella Braverman, who used the term ‘Guardian-reading, tofu-eating wokerati’ to describe Just Stop Oil protesters in 2022. I wonder how she would describe the pigs who are currently protesting against immigrants in the UK. Spot the tumbleweed.
This is a lovely Merny piece, so ‘of its time’, simple and powerful, like so much of his work. The piece was painted around the time of his excellent exhibition, which I understand from speaking to him since, went better than expected, and he managed to sell quite a few original pieces, which is great to hear. I would have loved to have bought one or two of his originals, but alas they were marginally outside my price range. See some of them below:
Natural adventures 