The Warmongery, by Lucy Sparrow

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The Warmongery is the latest installation by textile artist Lucy Sparrow.

Visitors walking into The Warmongery will be entering an armoury where the walls are lined with an arsenal of felt guns, knives, pistols and explosives. Purchasers of weapons will receive a felt firearm licence while behind the counter there will be a range of biological and chemical weapons, dispensed from sweetshop jars.

Sparrow says: The aim of The Warmongery is to draw people’s attention to what drives a few individuals to stockpile weapons and to ask why people are growing up in a world where a tiny minority feel so stressed and frustrated that they want to kill people.

“Although the exhibition isn’t intended to be a glorification of guns, what is clear is that obesity, alcohol, tobacco and drugs claim far more lives than firearms do in our high-stress society.

“Rather than banning guns we should look at better mental health treatment because if people are stressed they will always find a way to unleash their distress. The Warmongery hopes to decouple the subject of guns from mental illness.”

Lucy Sparrow’s Warmongery is at Boxpark, 2 Bethnal Green Road, London E1 6GY.

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