Attack of the 50 Foot Comrade (2026)

rhinestones, glue, acrylic, plywood, inkjet prints on paper, wheatpaste

approximately 300 by 227 by 7 centimetres

exhibited as part of Good Eye Projects at the Saatchi Gallery, London, UK

Attack of the 50 Foot Comrade reimagines Beyoncé as a supersized militant, selling a bedazzled copy of a Marxist newspaper. Appropriating a photograph from the 2003 MTV VMAs after-party, Chapman replaces Beyoncé’s copy of the New York Post with the first issue of The Communist, the fortnightly newspaper of the Revolutionary Communist Party, which the artist herself distributes as an active member.

Rendered in over 25,000 hand-placed diamantés, the work juxtaposes celebrity glamour with the often overlooked labour of grassroots activism. Combining rhinestones with wheatpaste, a material associated with political flyposting, Chapman draws on her own ‘tacky’ tibbles as a working-class Essex girl to challenge hierarchies of class and taste. By imagining her favourite pop diva as a fellow comrade, she simultaneously celebrates and advertises political organising as a collective endeavour through which seemingly mundane actions can effect extraordinary societal change.