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Dundee Contemporary Arts Opens McGurn’s The Charm Offensive

8/18/2026

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Summary

McGurn Opens Exhibition

Dundee Contemporary Arts opens France-Lise McGurn’s The Charm Offensive.
McGurn prints photos and ads onto canvas, paints over them in a lo-fi retro style, and adds silhouettes of her daughter and late mother Rita McGurn in Motor.
She places a sofa, wallets and other ephemera in the gallery so visitors can sit and feel the space belongs to them, echoing her mother’s feminist view that painting can occur around life.

Summary

McGurn Satirizes Space

McGurn’s exhibition includes a printed archival image of Katy Perry kissing the Earth after a spaceflight.
The photo went viral online, with commentators noting its absurdity.
McGurn says the image shows a woman harming the planet by traveling to space.
She describes her work as walking a knife-edge between tongue-in-cheek irreverence and deadly serious critique, creating a feeling of real-life contradictions.

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McGurn Opens Exhibition

Dundee Contemporary Arts opens France-Lise McGurn’s The Charm Offensive.
McGurn prints photos and ads onto canvas, paints over them in a lo-fi retro style, and adds silhouettes of her daughter and late mother Rita McGurn in Motor.
She places a sofa, wallets and other ephemera in the gallery so visitors can sit and feel the space belongs to them, echoing her mother’s feminist view that painting can occur around life.

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