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Guerrilla Girls, Is it even worse in Europe? (2016), Whitechapel Gallery, London (photo by David Parry/PA Wire)

LONDON — The Guerrilla Girls strike again. The Whitechapel Galleryrecently commissioned the feminist collective to create a new artwork for the gallery, resulting in an exhibition. Is it even worse in Europe? resurrects the 1986 Guerilla Girls campaign “It’s Even Worse in Europe” by conducting an up-to-date survey on gender and racial inequality in European art institutions.

Earlier last year the collective distributed a questionnaire to 383 European museum directors. The Guerilla Girls went straight to the point, asking, among other questions, the percentage of artworks by female, African, Asian, South Asian, South American, and “gender non-conforming” artists in the museums’ collections.

The nature of the questions has changed little since the anonymous American collective started to challenge the art world’s inequity in the 1980s, reporting to the public facts and numbers about the domination of white male artists in the art world. The current show is just another confirmation of how slowly changes are taking place on the matter.

Guerrilla Girls, Is it even worse in Europe? (2016), installation view at Whitechapel Gallery, London (photo by Dan Weill)

The foreword to the survey, shared on a poster in the exhibition, reads:

The Guerilla Girls focus on the understory, the subtext, the overlooked and the downright unfair. Art can’t be reduced to the small number of artists who have won a popularity contest among bigtime dealers, curators and collectors. Unless museums and kunsthalles show art as diverse as the cultures they claim to represent, they’re not showing the history of art, they’re just preserving the history of wealth and power.

Roughly one fourth of the contacted institutions responded — 101, to be precise. A full list of those that didn’t reply or refused to participate has been placed on the floor, for visitors to step on. The replies, arranged in posters around one room of the gallery, are insightful of the current make-up of collections at European institutions. Predictably, the figures are not encouraging: among the museums that did reply, for instance, only two have 40% or more women artists in their collections, while 21 have fewer than 20%.

A less expected find is that the majority of European museums don’t even keep statistics on how many of their works are by underrepresented populations. This is worrying, as it reveals a general lack of self-awareness.

Guerrilla Girls, Is it even worse in Europe? (2016), installation view at Whitechapel Gallery, London (photo by Dan Weill)

As much as the questionnaire sheds light on pressing and relevant issues, some of its premises have limits. Asking museums about the numbers of works by female artists and minorities in their collections is certainly necessary to bring attention to and keep the pressure on the topic, but it’s definitely not enough. Acquiring such artworks is relatively easy; effectively communicating them, creating relevant narratives around them, is much harder. A recent example is Tate Modern’s major extension, which has pushed the museum to take a more inclusive and fair approach in displaying its collection, increasing the number of pieces by non-Western artists. However, if these curatorial decisions have honored the intention of giving exposure to overlooked artists — thus rethinking the modernist canon — the operation at times has resulted in an endless succession of artworks with no cohesive narrative.

On the one hand, the Guerilla Girls, 30 years later, are still reminding us that museums have overdue issues to address. On the other, we need to continue pushing the conversation around inclusive representation in a more nuanced direction — one that not only considers who institutions are representing, but also how.

Guerrilla Girls: Is it even worse in Europe? continues at Whitechapel Gallery (77 –82 Whitechapel High Street, London E1 7QX) through March 5.

LONDON — The first “hotel for artists” in the UK, Green Rooms, opened in Wood Green, North London, last Spring. Designed to attract artists, actors, and musicians, the hotel offers affordable accommodations at a discounted rate (starting at £18 per night) to any creative. Beside dormitories, doubles, and en-suite rooms, Green Rooms also features two studio apartments, a gallery space, and two bars.

The enterprise occupies an Art Deco building constructed in 1925 for the North Metropolitan Power and Electricity Company. It is owned by Haringey Council and was previously used as offices, although it had been vacant since 2009. When renovation works started last year, the site was in a state of disrepair. With the aid of a regeneration grant secured from the Greater London Authority, Green Rooms’ founder Nick Hartwright, a builder-turned-entrepreneur who is well trained in restoring buildings for art and theater groups, oversaw an operation that radically transformed the space, removing temporary walls and false ceilings that had been fitted over the years.

When I first visited Green Rooms early last spring, the hotel was still undergoing its finishing touches. Although it was not completely furnished, with some rooms still works in progress, I was able to have a look around and get a feel for the space. I spotted some of the original architectural features, such as the bathrooms’ mosaic tiling and the industrial iron beam structure that had been left exposed in some rooms, thanks to Hartwright’s thoughtfulness. My interest in the project was enhanced by the hotel’s location: not the over-popular and over-gentrified East London, but Wood Green, possibly the least hipster district in the whole city. Ask any Londoner: Wood Green is certainly not known for being a cool, artsy destination — which is exactly why the project had me immediately intrigued.

A few months later, once the hotel was fully up and running, I was invited to spend a night on the premises.

I arrive on a typical Saturday night. The ground floor lobby, with room to seat 50 in the hotel’s restaurant, is full of chatting people enjoying drinks. In a corner, a DJ mixes Cuban music with Billie Holiday songs.

I have a look around. The lobby is furnished with a mix of authentic vintage and contemporary British craft furniture, featuring original pieces from the 1920s and 1930s manufactured by the historical brand Heal’s. The sofa I sit down on comes from Barry Davison and is the firm’s original classic. Most of the pieces have been sourced by Green Rooms’ chairman Kurt Bredenbeck, the hotel entrepreneur who founded the successful “luxury-budget” hotel chain The Hoxton. While some elements of the clean, modern style that has made The Hoxton fashionable are on view also here, Green Rooms feels less urban. The austere lines of 1930s design are tempered by the glassware, the textiles, and the more playful character of 1970s furniture. Solid oak reigns, giving the room a generally unassuming and cozy quality.

It’s time to order some food. The hotel runs a kitchen incubator program: Every six months, a different up-and-coming restaurateur is given the chance to gain experience and offer their food to the guests. The program has begun with Esteban Arboleda’s Colombian Street Kitchen, and it’s already getting popular. Fame has preceded Esteban’s empanadas, so I have little doubt about what I will order.

The spontaneity and kindness of the waiters make up for the service, which is not always swift. While waiting for dinner, I have a chat with Ashley, a violinist from Sidney visiting London for work. “I discovered the hotel through social media,” he says. “It’s always tricky, as a musician, to stay in hotels when you’re visiting some new place and you have work to get done. I haven’t been making too much noise, but it’s nice to know I’m staying in an artist-friendly environment.”

Indeed, the hotel has a full program of events and concerts (which are always followed by after-parties), and on the third floor, lit by a skylight finished in patterned Flemish glass, is an exhibition space that is easily as good as quite a few galleries downtown.

For the record, the empanadas are excellent.

Even though I don’t get to sleep into one of the four rooms that include special pieces designed by cult UK fashion brand FOLK, my bedroom is decent. As with the downstairs areas, I appreciate the unassuming feel of the room. The atmosphere created by the vintage furniture is shaken up by a bespoke metal coat rail and the bedside tables, which were made by a local North London firm. Altogether it’s is cozy and elegant — and, quite importantly, quiet.

In the morning, I leave the hotel rested and content.

Green Rooms ticks all the boxes to become a hub for artists and creatives in an area of London that would be otherwise very unattractive. The public seems to have responded positively to it. The restaurant is nice and busy, and the interior design, which gives the place a lot of character, is drawing people in. The real challenge now will be to turn the initial buzz into lasting success. This writer’s fingers are crossed.