Joshua Compston, an obituary

Compston will be remembered as a brilliant young man whose sheer ebullience founded a vibrant London art scene. After graduating from the Courtauld Institute in 1992, Compston moved to Charlotte Road, Shoreditch where he established Factual Nonsense—not just a gallery, but an artistic ideal. Stickers bearing the “FN” logo soon appeared on lamp-posts, buses and tubes. In 1993, after a flurry of flamboyant press releases, Compston staged a week of activities in a local pub with guest performances and artists serving drinks behind the bar. The following year, Compston curated “Other Men’s Flowers”—an edition of artists’ prints (including works by Gavin Turk, Sam Taylor-Wood and Gary Hume) exhibited in a derelict building with no roof. But by far the most ambitious “FN” production, “A Fete Worse Than Death”, 1994, consumed Hoxton Square with artist-run stalls, the Beijing Opera, traction engines and video installations. Compston’s untimely death leaves the art world stunned.