Visited exhibitions November

George Rouy

Part of being a creative person is visiting new spaces to gain inspiration for your own art but also it’s good to appreciate others. Your own creative process is powerful, one which I like to share when people listen, and vis versa when it comes to other artists.

This year I’ve tried to visited at least one exhibition or gallery once a month. A challenge when it comes to money as at the moment, quite frankly, I don’t have much. So it’s finding those ‘free’ spaces be it small galleries, outside community artwork, or simply visiting an art/craft fair. When it comes to finding who what when were to go, I’ll either note down exhibitions I’ve seen online or in the newspaper I’d like to go to, have a little Google to see what exhibitions have been recognised at the moment on wallpaper.com, artfund, artreview, frieze…

The most recent exhibitions I went to was at a well known London gallery just off Saville Row in central London called Hauser & Wirth. Beautifully classic gallery in a white cube style, allowing the space to truely be manipulated by the artwork. The exhibition was by George Rouy, a solo exhibition based on bodies, movement, and painting technique. It was such a wonderful collection of work to see in person, better in person than it would be online; I think this was because the canvas are very large, so you can really get a sense of the scrambled movement and limbs. I also loved the painting style, with the large brush strokes and almost photographic snippets of limbs which were painted in detail. Would 100% recommend the visit, I’ll be keeping an eye out on future George Rouy exhibitions.

From Hauser & Wirth:

EXPLORE THE EXHIBITION - ‘The bleed’ is an expression used by Rouy to pertain to the relationship between figure and void—or ‘the surrounds,’ as termed by the artist—and how those two realms interact and manifest on the surface of his paintings, resulting in a physical seeping, blending and merging. ‘The surrounds’ refers to the zone where flesh and inner parts of the body meet their surrounding conditions—from intensive properties of temperature, density and speed to extensive forms of mass, volume and entropy. The paintings on view not only reflect the tension present between figures and their surrounds but also the tensions and harmonies among individuals or a group.’

Genesis Belanger

Next up was Pace Galleries exhibition by Genesis Belanger ‘In the right conditions we are indistinguishable’.

It was multidisaplinary/ ceramics exhibition made up of illustrative forms that were based on everyday objects, mimicking realism and humour. I was drawn to the exhibition because of the ceramics element, it was nice to see ceramics being represented but more importantly looking as ceramics without glaze- because it’s so often leant onto the glazing aspect.

I have to admit that the exhibition wasn’t for me, I could asmire the craftmanship and the dedication to actually putting on an exhibition- it’s a lot of work to create, years in the making I imagine! But overall I didn’t quite grasp the concept, maybe because there was no small blurb about the artist, her style, or the exhibition itself. Sometimes a blurb can hinder an exhibition as they stop you from actually looking at the work being exhibited and also stops the imagination of the viewer trying to decipher each piece however in this instance a small few sentences would’ve gone a long way.

From Pace Galleries:

‘For In the Right Conditions we are Indistinguishable, Belanger will probe the shifting complexities of self-curation, domestic labor, and our relationship with nature through fourteen new sculptural groups. These works, rendered in the artist’s most saturated palette to date, mark an exciting evolution of subject and material in Belanger’s practice.’

Francis Bacon

Finally- the last exhibition was a big one which I did have to buy a ticket for; The Francis Bacon exhibition at The National Portrait Gallery.

I think most people who know of him and his work, all of which I’ve only seen online, so it was a real insight seeing it in person. When I think of his work, it’s can come across as a bit of horror- maybe slightly unstable? Which he was. However, on the other hand, the exhibition gave an even bigger insight into him as a person and his person journey through life- with this artwork reflecting that at the time. He seemed to have a troubled life with love, death, and alcohol (lots of artists at that time in the 1930’s loved the champs in Soho). I did really enjoy learning about him and seeing photographic work of him, often I find we all go to these exhibitions just to look at the work but not him. The George Dyer exhibit at the tail end of the exhibition was my favourite; the cycling painting was wonderful to see in life, being able to experience the motion and also Georges character as a person. Of course the tryptic of George’s death is sad to see but again a wonderful small insight into Georges character, just simply seeing the way he died.

The exhibition was really well displayed, curated chronologically (quite common with that volume of work, 100 works). Would recommend the exhibition 100%!