Marika Hackman: how a "brush with death" shaped the indie singer's new album Big Sigh
Midway through Sarah Lucus’ Happy Gas exhibition â a retrospective feast of smutty visual puns, phallic cigars, and strangely contorted bodies made out of taut, stuffed stockings â Marika Hackman takes a liking to one of the artist’s more recent sculptures, Slag.
“That’s how I feel most days,” she quips, taking in the 2022 piece, a headless grey body, draped half-seductively across a wooden chair. “Minus the high heels”.
Blending grotesque bodily imagery and a lust for delicious, self-destructive vices, with a healthy dollop of horniness for good measure, Lucas’ work has much in common with Hackman’s gnarled indie-rock. Though the London-based musician was inaccurately branded as a whimsical, softly-spoken folk figure early on, largely thanks to a support slot and the vague presence of a quietly-picked acoustic guitar, she’s always had a fascination with all things bodily and disgusting. Unsurprisingly, she’s also a fan of Lucas’ work, and we visit the exhibition together during a rare break in Hackman’s album promo schedule
