Grayson Perry’s Our Town (2022) is a striking etching that reimagines the format of a traditional town map as a satirical reflection of contemporary British identity and culture. With bold red, blue, and purple tones, the composition reads like a civic cartography, but instead of streets and landmarks, the map is inscribed with social labels, cultural references, and ideological signposts that chart the divisions and contradictions of modern life.

At first glance, the work mimics the clarity and order of a bird’s-eye view town plan. Yet Perry subverts this familiarity by populating the map with names such as Little England, Cool, PhD, Me Me Me, Sincerity, Chaos, and Sanity. These labels suggest not only physical places but also states of mind, generational traits, and cultural territories. The juxtaposition of areas like Extremis and Apathy with Sincerity and Nice underscores the tensions between political engagement, social disconnection, and personal authenticity in the current age.

As in much of Perry’s work, humor is a vehicle for critique. The absurdity of navigating a town made up of Awks, Contraria, and Identaria both amuses and unsettles, reminding viewers how identity politics, consumer branding, and social performance have become the landmarks of our time. The etched map becomes a mirror held up to society, one that reflects the fragmentation of national identity into competing cultural zones.

Executed in etching, a medium deeply tied to historical traditions of political satire and social commentary, Our Town draws a line between Perry’s contemporary vision and the long history of artists such as Hogarth and Gillray, who similarly used printmaking to expose hypocrisies and absurdities. Perry’s choice of saturated, almost patriotic colors—red, white, and blue—further sharpens the commentary, evoking both national pride and its contradictions in post-Brexit Britain.

Our Town ultimately reads as both map and metaphor: a visual satire of how communities define themselves, how divisions manifest geographically and ideologically, and how the individual navigates the contradictions of collective identity. By turning the language of cartography into cultural critique, Perry transforms the act of looking at a map into an act of reflection on the complexity and comedy of contemporary life.