Dispatches from the Field

Photography at UCLAN overlapped happily with social commentary in the work of Helen Stephens, who created portraits of young women aged 21-25 entitled ‘Adult Life’, and Mark Prescott who made touching composites of young teenagers on the thresholds of their homes and the places they like to hang out, all shot between 5 and 6pm […]

Brighton was an enlivening and uplifting, well-curated show, characterised by really strong, engaging painting, which had a raw quality and a naivete. Anita Kavaja created tender paintings often set in domestic spaces depicting human relationships. Elisha Enfield used a really exciting painterly touch – washes, stains, disturbances of paint and curious lighting – to form […]

Derby was a mixed bag. In Photography I liked the deadpan documentation of Samuel Deffley, whose series ’91 Campion Street’ depicted objects with a painterly touch against a tan background, reminiscent of American tromp l’oeil paintings, Wes Anderson’s way with objects and the dangerously bland backgrounds of Francis Bacon. Similarly deadpan, and with an in-built […]

Held at the Truman Brewery in Brick Lane the show sprawled out across 5 large spaces – the work was not densely arranged and each artist got their generous quota of space. The Illustrators displayed their works in a concertina, (snaking down a large space that also contained Photography) which acted as large scale portfolios, […]