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Debenhams
‘Home Is Where The Art Is’ The Exhibitors
Julia Brooker
Julia paints to have the most direct contact possible with
the materials and the surface of the image she is making.
Her paintings contain only the essentials. They are pared
down to what is important; light, colour, marks on the surface.
They are uncluttered and they concentrate and hold the viewer’s
eye stopping us in our tracks and providing a moment of stillness
and quiet contemplation. "Cool large-scale paintings
meet the metallic light of the Bay head-on. Each painting
is executed on aluminium, using acrylics; each measures forty-nine
inches square.
The first painting is called Girl, after Julia’s niece,
Mair. Horizontal bands of pink and lilac acrylic, instead
of conjuring up candyfloss or crinoline wedding dresses, echo
belts of wind or the banded structure of Jupiter’s atmosphere,
delivering movement, but also calm. The second painting, Drawn
creeps up on me. Slender skeins of an olive paint – so
dark as to be almost black – intertwine with bands of
pink vibrating light. Again, the painting illustrates a conflict.
The implied movement of the lines contrast with a larger feeling
of tranquillity induced by the incandescent quality of the
aluminium.
I ask Julia what she is trying to achieve with her paintings.
She tells me she is trying to create beauty, which she defines
in Schopenhauerian terms as ‘timeless moments of pleasure’
in which you are literally taken out of yourself." Extracts
taken from an interview with Sian Hughes 2002
Stella Corrall & CJ O’ Neill
Stella Corrall is enthused by translucent plastics, its flexibility,
as a medium is very similar to her versatile approach to design.
Stella is determined to investigate the potential of plastic
both aesthetically and technically. She challenges plastic’s
mass produced image by using her technique of colouring and
manipulating translucent plastic. Through this integral pattern,
colour and form she aims to push the boundaries of plastics
into new realms. This vibrant material has endless applications
for the contemporary interior ranging from lighting, large
scale installations through to coasters.
Stella has produced an installation, based on her interior
range, alongside ceramic works by CJ O’Neill who has
worked on a series of ceramic wares that incorporate Stella’s
plastic into the design.
Damian Cruikshank
Damian’s initial investigations into paper folding began
as an alternative to drawing as an aid to realising form.
This modelling soon began to centre around single sheets of
material undergoing gradual change until new, more sophisticated
forms are created – a process Damian has come to regards
as growth.
The transformation of a single sheet to an object of volume
both challenges and inspires Damian as he marries new discoveries
with old, creating individual or related forms, all with a
sense of their own internal logic. Folding takes place after
appropriate lines are mapped out and scored, surfaces evolve
and edges meet to create internal voids.
Throughout this work Damian has been concerned with issues
of frailty and transience, an opposition to our general expectation
of things mathematical, where we anticipate control, predictability,
security and hope.
Kate Davies
In Kate Davies’ evocative and compelling paintings, figures
gaze out from atmospheric landscapes. Engaging with these
works is a little like walking into a film halfway through,
in that the figures have a powerful presence but their context
and history are unknown. This reference to film is pertinent
because although Davies is deeply committed to painting as
a medium, her work also uses photography. She often collages
photographic images onto the canvas bringing an abrupt point
of focus into a loosely sketched landscape. This devise has
unexpected echoes of the minute detail found in the background
of Renaissance portraiture.
Bernard Georgeson
Bernie Georgeson’s work sets up dialogue in areas surrounding
the "screen". The "screen" as the interface
between the human and the ‘techno-simulation’ which
informs our lives. His paintings explore the real and metaphorical
spaces in which much of today’s communication takes place.
"My images are never out of focus, they suggest areas
for thought whilst offering no conclusions. They allow for
vacillation and yet appear to provide signposts."
Bernard Georgeson
Bernard completed his MA Fine Art at Manchester Metropolitan
University in 2002.
Hilary Jack
Hilary’s work addresses issues surrounding value, authorship
and the recycling of art histories and contributes to current
debates surrounding painting as an expanded practice. The
death of painting has been obsessively proclaimed throughout
the history of modern art and in this new series of work Hilary
pushes the boundaries of painting to an extreme point of tension,
going beyond the normal confines of painting towards its near
destruction.
Subjecting her canvasses to various industrial and manual
recycling processes her work is simultaneously destroyed and
metamorphosed; moving off the canvas stretcher towards the
three-dimensional, confounding typical conceptions of painting.
The resulting hybrid works span painting, drawing, site specific
installation and video, focusing on painting as the main protagonist
and are both an extermination and celebration of her chosen
medium.
Recent public and private commissions include a site specific
installation for the relaunch of Manchester Art Gallery, a
work on canvas for the relocation of Castlefield Gallery and
two large canvasses for the foyer of No. 1 Deansgate, Manchester.
Jayne Jones
Jayne’s paintings are a sensual exploration of a metallic
medium. The rhythm of the painted surface holds the trace
of the paint’s movement and reflects both the fragility
and the resilience of skin itself. The viscous flow spreads
over the primed canvas and as it hardens and dries, another,
slower movement occurs. Uncontrolled, the paint moves imperceptibly,
following its own unpredictable course. Cracks form in the
surface as the paint continues to shift beneath. In places
the surface acts as a container, puckering and sagging as
the fluid swells and bulges.
It is the unpredictable nature of this process that fascinates
Jayne. Allowing herself only a certain amount of control,
she leaves the painting to dry and in her absence it continues
to settle. When she returns the changes that have occurred
surprise the artist and provide a visual cue which prompts
her next move. It is a dynamic relationship that combines
experience, reflection, response and action.
Charlotte Karlsen at Synchronized Liquid
Norwegian designer, Charlotte Karlsen has given up ice sculpture
for now, electing instead to add a degree of permanence to
her minimalist chic by producing works blown in glass.
Charlotte is exhibiting a range of multipurpose glassware,
which she describes as Scandinavian in its simplicity. The
designs are given codes; FC 66 & FC 67 consisting of a
vase and stopper which, can be used together or separately
as a vase and candle holder. BX 17 is a box which, when separated
becomes a tray and a bowl. The products come in standard colours
of white opaque, blue, green, pink and amber. For those looking
for something a little different, Charlotte can add a mirrored
effect to the finish.
Junko Mori
Junko Mori, a Japanese designer based in Liverpool, is drawn
to the visual impact of aggregate assembled with many small
components. Junko finds infinite possibilities of the form
multiplied by the vital power beyond the physical space, such
as cell division through a microscope.
Junko’s work consists of multiples of individually forged
steel or other metals, and the subtle difference of each piece
results from hand hammering. No piece is individually planned
but becomes fully formed within the making and thinking process.
Repeating little accidents, like a mutation of cells, the
final accumulation of units emerges within this process of
evolution. The uncontrollable beauty is the core of Junko’s
concept.
"I hope my objects become highlights in a contemporary
minimal space as catalysts of a new decorative art."
Junko Mori
David Stokes at Fink Lab
David Stokes, a multi-disciplinary designer exhibits and works
between Paris and Liverpool. David graduated from Glasgow
School of Art in 1989 and was based in Paris between 1993
and 2001. Together with Antoine Claux he established in 1999
bankal., a laboratory of reflection and creation within the
context of domestic products and lighting.
David is now permanently based in UK, where he dedicates his
professional activities to furniture, product and lighting
projects. A personal research exploring the creative interface
between an individual [consumer] and the performance of a
functional artefact.
"My approach to any given design intervention will vary
depending upon the requirements and parameters of each individual
context. However, within this complexity there are common
areas, personal interests, and which are expressed within
the group of propositions / projects.
They touch upon the following issues:
Daily life in all its banal rituals is a creative act. Can
the originator of an idea, designer, accurately place him
/ herself in the role of the consumer?
And
Can we anticipate a single / correct use for any designated
object or are all possible functional interpretations justifiable
as appropriate gestures? An object-product which intervenes
within this context must in some manner respond to this criteria."
David Stokes.
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