The Moneytree Exhibition

I’ve been so pleased to have been included in The Moneytree exhibition at Hamilton House Gallery in Bristol.

The exhibition was brought together by Lara Luna Bartley in collaboration with the CoResist Collective, and features artwork about the financial and banking system.

The Moneytree Exhibition, Hamilton House, September 13th -19th 2018

Lara was kind enough to share some pictures of the exhibition space. Other artists featured are Jane Lawson, Darren Cullen & Mary Millner.

Lara Luna Bartley was the teller at the ‘Bank of CoResist’, printing banknotes which audiences could ‘borrow’ at 0% on a very long term basis, provided they would become a member of the bank for a small fee.

This concept resonates strongly with me, as I consider my money works to be ‘lent’ on a (very) long term basis as well, with the option to exchange.

Mary Millner’s House of (Post)Cards featured postcards of the Shard and other centres of financial power balanced like a house of cards.

Jane Lawson’s 4 metre long digital print How We Got To Where We Are shows the timeline of the global financial system.

Darren Cullen’s Pocket Money Loan Posters are spot on… prompting that uneasy double-take. The state of dysfunction that we’re in when it comes to our use and abuse of credit means that we’re never quite sure what next, new low is possible.

The exhibition marks 10 years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers, and featured a discussion with economist Tony Greenham entitled “Money, Trust and the Art of Local Banking”.

Promise 12/25. Screen print on Lloyds Bank cheque, 2017. | Screen printed cheque — I’ve decided to make my own money. I’m asking you to trust in me.
For money to exist, there must first be trust.
Money requires relationships, because since money is a measure of exchange, there must be someone else to exchange with. When we hand over money in exchange for something else, we don’t necessarily have to trust the person we’re buying from; instead, the trust lies in the institution behind the money. The more of us who put faith in the institution, the more value the money has.
What if we were to ask others to put their trust directly in us instead? As human beings, our trustworthiness only runs so far… but maybe being honest about that makes us more reliable than banks and governments, that present themselves as being strong and permanent, but still regularly let us down.
My currency art isn’t offered for sale as much as for exchange, if you trust me.

Haworth Annual Open 2017

The Haworth Annual Open 2017

The preview for the Haworth Annual Open Exhibition was on Friday, September 29th. I couldn’t make it, but I did go the next day to see the exhibition and visit my selected pieces, Fight and At Rest.

This is the first year that I’ve entered the Haworth Annual Open, and I was very happy to see that the exhibition was clearly very well chosen – no, I know what you’re thinking: I would say that, as I was included, right? Well, what I mean to say is that whilst smaller venues get the ‘provincial’ label, the quality of the work on display was clearly well beyond village tea room standard, and this exhibition should be on a stealthy collector’s list for picking up a hidden gem or two.

Whilst veering strongly towards representational realism, as you would expect, the variety of working methods employed by the selected artists is refreshing.

I thought that my painting did benefit from a good position, directly in the line of sight from a doorway; it did however have the disadvantage of being quite low and wrestling with the large, commanding work right above it. But the trio of artworks complement each other well, being loosely of the same subject matter.

At Rest has an odd position, but I like it – perched on an edge, adding to its uneasy (I think) quality.

These were hung in Room 4, which was entitled “People and Portraiture”.

Across the hall, Room 3 held “Abstract and Animals”, and upstairs the corridor and Exhibition Room held “Woodlands, Waterfalls, Still Life and Steam Trains”.

The hanging was carried out by the members of the Haworth Artist Network, who did a very good job.

The Haworth Annual Open 2017 in Accrington opened on the 29th of September and runs until the 26th of November. The gallery is open between Tuesday – Friday 12 – 4:45 pm, and Saturday – Sunday 12 – 4:15 pm.

Exhibitions – Stanley Spencer at the Hepworth

Stanley Spencer at the Hepworth

I can’t claim to have ever been a fan of Stanley Spencer, or even aware of much more than his chapel paintings, but I wanted to go to this retrospective.

For the most part, it was because I’ve been starved of a true gallery experience for years. Apart from that, I wanted to see the Hepworth Wakefield. We love driving into Yorkshire and have knocked around Yorkshire Sculpture Park several times, but hadn’t been to the other points of the Yorkshire sculpture triangle.

The Hepworth Wakefield via footbridge approach.

The building itself is commanding, and almost breathtaking once inside.

The exhibition wasn’t ordered chronologically, which was a jolt (despite the fact that we were informed of this at the start – funny how the mind expects certain things) but the galleries housing Spencer’s works thematically worked brilliantly.

Shipbuilding on the Clyde

Spencer’s wartime paintings of shipbuilding on the Clyde were genuinely full of energy and evocative of the period. They were particularly interesting to me when placed in conjunction with his landscapes; both had monetary motivations, but the accompanying text pointed out Spencer’s resentment of his financial dependence on the landscape paintings.

It was always going to be difficult to find work to engage a non-art lover, and Ste wasn’t particularly moved. He found it hard to grapple with the religious themes of the paintings when given the private details of the man’s proclivities – I found his all-pervasive and porous concept of religion amusing.

Of course, I found the portraits interesting, and his last, painted months before his death, was quite touching. Most of all, it was his handling of paint that caught me, although I’m purposefully moving in the opposite direction… its density was undeniably attractive. There was a lot to think about. (No photographs allowed, hence no photographs here.)

I could have wandered around the galleries housing Hepworth’s work for hours, but closing time put an end to that. Such a shame it’s as far away as it is – the building itself will draw me back, though.