Winter 2008
A Rational Aesthetic: The Systems Group and Associated Artists,11 January - 30 March 2008,Galleries 1 - 2
Curated by Dr Alan Fowler, A Rational Aesthetic will be the first major exhibition devoted entirely to the work of members of the 1970s Systems Group and some associated artists since the Arts Council exhibition, Constructive Context, in 1978.
The first part of the exhibition will be a small selection of work by the 1950s Constructionists, Anthony Hill and Kenneth and Mary Martin. This will illustrate the strong personal and artistic links between the Systems and Constructionist Groups, and show how the concept of rational systems-based art first developed in the immediate post-war period. The exhibition will close with a selection of recent work by surviving Systems artists - particularly Jeffrey Steele and Peter Lowe - together with two artists - Trevor Clarke and Steve Sproates - who as students studied under Steele and Lowe. The purpose of this part of the exhibition is to demonstrate that the systems approach - part of the long-running constructivist tradition - continues to be used to produce works of aesthetic and intellectual appeal. The exhibition will be the largest devoted to systems-based art frequently shown in galleries across continental Europe but rarely exhibited in the UK.
Key figures include: Malcolm Hughes, Jeffrey Steele, Richard Allen, Michael Kidner, Peter Lowe, Kenneth and Mary Martin and Anthony Hill.
Image Credit: Jeffrey Steele, Syntagma Sg IV, 118, 2005, oil on canvas. Copyright: The Artist, 2008.
Birth of the British Modern Movement: Early Twentieth Century Painting, 11 January – 30 March 2008, Galleries 3 and 4
This new display presents some of our finest early twentieth century paintings. Inspired by the French Post-Impressionists at the start of the twentieth century, young British progressive artists largely converged around two main groupings. The Camden Town Group, championed by Walter Sickert and influenced by Camille Pissarro, Vincent Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin, painted gritty urban realism. However, the Bloomsbury painters, dominated by Roger Fry, Vanessa Bell and Duncan Grant preferred the legacy of Paul Cézanne and even experimented with abstraction.
Image credit: Spencer Gore (1878 - 1914), Panshanger Park, 1908, oil on canvas.
Pastels Today,11 January – 30 March 2008, Galleries 7 and 8
We are delighted to invite members of the Pastel Society to exhibit in this unique selling exhibition. The Pastel Society is recognised as foremost in its field, showing the work of leading contemporary artists, with a diversity of style and subject matter from the purely imaginative to the representational, in any combination of dry media including oil pastel. Founded in 1898, the Society boasts many illustrious past members and exhibitors, Frank Brangwyn RA, Walter Sickert, Whistler, Degas, Dame Laura Knight RA, Ernest Shepard, and more recently, Gillian Ayres, Tom Phillips RA and Paula Rego. There are over fifty members in the society, all professional artists living and working in the UK.
Last updated: 21 April 2008
