Brilliant graduates continue to arrive at the gallery, and it’s a joy to curate them.
This week’s emerging artists show fantastic sensitivity to the possibilities of their medium – applied in very different research directions.
Eleni Maragaki works from her research into Platonic geometry – the regular, elemental shapes that the Greek philosopher sought to establish as basic to the universe. The geometric forms in Eleni’s work surpass and encompass us with their simplicity. In the sculptures they are poised in their dimensionality. This parallels how in the ink landscape prints there is an equilibrium between the forms: as decisive and as in flux.
Sarah’s take on Eleni:
This work is a great addition to the gallery. Her style and subject is unlike any other artist we are currently showing; always a valuable quality when viewing emerging artists work. The mystical meets the mathematical.
In Éabha Lambe’s paintings light is the hinge providing an indefinite, though ineluctable link between here and there, now and then. The windows and the flux in tone provide imaginative portals to an elided Irish past, which the artist reflects on from the diaspora. In particular Éabha is thinking of the Magdalene Laundries, as part of a wider cultural shift in Ireland to account for this difficult element of the country’s past.
Sarah’s take on Éabha:
These abstract paintings present portals from one space to another: doorways, windows, with a luscious, loose handling of paint. On the wall, they would open up an interior space in interesting ways. I enjoy her understanding of light and tone. and the fact that she is thoroughly engaged in one particular subject area. This evidences an emerging artist working with focus.
Fangying Lu’s paintings are a tactile arena of subtle spatial impressions. “I favour the fluid, stained pigments” writes the artist. They are zones of drift and autonomy; an amorphous place without an agenda – otherwise than to unfurl, and be. And colour is the zone of rumination: shades emanate from the one chosen as central to the palette.
Sarah’s take on Fangying:
Occasionally reminiscent of Odilon Redon’s lightest palette. Fangying demonstrates the gentlest side of this robust medium, oil paint: there is a real softness that she has managed to establish. I particularly love her series ‘Hiding & Escaping’.
You can browse all 2022 graduates here.
All work available to buy with an interest free art loan. Select OwnArt at the payment page
