Exhibit has worked in partnership with Harrow Arts Centre (HAC), and has successfully been supported using public funding by the Arts Council, England to establish a new experimental contemporary gallery that invites professional national and international artists to exhibit with us and to initiate new European networks for Harrow based artists. The Gallery at Harrow Arts Centre is our first step toward these goals. It is a platform for artists who need exposure for their work to develop and further their ideas.
Culture presents their work alongside sculpture, video, painting and drawing by twelve other artists. Four are based locally to The Gallery: Jane McAdam Freud, Claire McDermott, Susan Williams and Erika Wengenroth. Two international artists have been invited: Hartmut Stielow, based in Germany, and Maria Oriza Perez, based in Spain. Paul Murphy, Andrian Melka, Julian Wild, Judith Nicholson, Damilola Odusote and Emma Cooper are all based in different locations across Great Britain. Culture will start new conversations in Harrow that we hope will spread new ideas nationally and internationally. Supported by Arts Council London, Harrow Council and The Harrow Heritage Trust
One of our inspirations for this project was the group exhibition at Camden Arts Centre in 1975 The Young Contemporaries. Jeff Lowe and Rob Ward were two artists included in this exhibition, which is still talked about more than 35 years later. We have invited Lowe and Ward to exhibit with us in Harrow in a group exhibition, titled Culture, bringing them together for the first time since the 1980.
Jeff Lowe
Rob Ward
Jeff Lowe presented his first one-man show in Cork Street at the age of 21 and represented Britain in the Biennial in Paris. Numerous shows include, Hayward Gallery, Serpentine, National Gallery of Australia and The Guggenheim Museum, Venice. He spends part of the year at his home and studio in Portugal.
This series of unique works on paper were made during the last year in London and Portugal. The works have a strong sculptural quality, but are not made as a preliminary stage in the making of a sculpture. Using the traditional process of woodblock, but experimenting with different ways of laying the colour, they are made simply and directly. Lowe is excited by the fact that the process allows an organic, creative and sculptural way of working.
Above image by Jeff Lowe. Title: Untitled, Unique work on paper, H56 x W76 cm, Year - 2011
Above Image by Rob Ward, Title: Home Bird, Acrylic on Ceramic Paper, H76 x W95 cm, year - 1985
Rob Ward is a sculptor, and has exhibited extensively including a retrospective at the Henry Moore Study Centre, the Sydney Biennale, and British Sculpture at The Guggenheim Museum in Venice. He recently published a book of 40 years’ of work in conjunction with a major exhibition at the Shanghai Sculpture Park.
Home Bird is a drawing on ceramic coated paper, influenced by the studio paintings of George Braque, which explore the studio and its contents. The image is autobiographic and self explanatory, the bird is flightless and bound to the studio, its objects, and space. The drawing has the appearance of an etching; elements are scratched into the ceramic surface and create a dynamic space, which is sculptural rather than painterly.
Hartmut Stielow was born in Hannover, Germany and studied sculpture at The Hochschule der Kuenste, Berlin. He became the Master Sculptor under Prof Bernhard Heiliger in Berlin. Lecturer at Werkakademie Fuer Gestaltung in Hannover and was awarded the Darmstadter Sezession Prize and is the Vice President of Sculpture Network.
Hartmut positioned himself to be independent of the contemporary art world and placed his work in the tradition of the steel sculpture. His preferred materials are steel and granite, which interact with each other in a fascinating way - the iron encloses the stone forming a whole, a dualism of environment and engineering. Stielow’s sculpture are a symbol of reliability, candor and indescribable calmness.
Above image titled Dawn, Granite & Cor Ten Steel, 55 h x 43 t x 51 b cm, year 2012
Maria Oriza Perez
Contenedor De Sonidos, stoneware with oxides, H 72 x W40 x D 26cm, year 2010
Maria Oriza Perez was born in Spain. In 2007 she become a member of the International Academy of Ceramics and is a member of Sculpture Network. She has had ten solo exhibitions and several group exhibitions in different countries. Currently exhibiting in Spain, France, Holland and China.
Oriza works with the plain’s capacity to generate volumes. The resulting work is always close to nature’s primeval structures. Working with abstract concepts that can be associated with constructive ideas of space. Oriza uses her material to express perceived energy that flows between shapes and seeks ways in which the relationship between inside and outside can give meaning to her work, in order to show matter in emptiness. Establishing relationships between the form and surfaces through the drawing. The net type patterns are used is to increase the expressive shape and enhance the rhythm of geometry.
Jane Mc Adam Freud MA (RCA) FRBS
Claire Mc Dermott ARBS
Jane McAdam Freud studied at Central School of Art and the Royal College of Art. Awarded the BAMS Rome Scholarship in 1986, elected Fellow of the Royal Society of British Sculptors and Freeman of the City of London. Currently Associate Lecturer at Central St Martins and Sculpture Tutor at Morley College.
The After Bacon series was made using a rapid process of modelling clay with the figure in mind. The loose modelling style references Medardo Rosso. Working from the unconscious McAdam Freud wanted to make physical the working of my illicit mental process. While shaping the clay leaving no time to edit, she was then informed by the resulting images to further work the figures until arriving at a satisfying form.
Title: Michaelmas JC3,
metal painted aubergine, aluminum, perspex, chrome. H27 x W32 x D45 cm, year - 2012
Claire Mc Dermott is a British artist who lives and works in London and has produced a portfolio of mixed media works using Photography, Painting and Sculpture. Inspired by the natural world and by experimentation taking the viewer on a journey into a world of exploration.
Mc Dermott has used spent michaelmas daisies as her subject for their contorted forms that create perfect serpentine curves. Using these forms sculpture is made, by drawing in mid air to simplify them. Mc Dermott has used a screen to break from the twee flower subject and to change how object art is viewed.
Hartmut Stielow
Above Image, Title: After Bacon 2(Ab-@) Head and Heart, bronze H17 x W32 x D45, year 2012
Above Image, Darkness Over Calvaria,
Transparency and Light Box, H23 x W20 x D11.5 cm, year - 2011
Paul Murphy was introduced into the London art world during the Taylor Wessing Prize of 2009 and as winner of the Rose award at the Royal Academy Summer Show, 2010.
Murphy is interested in creating a layered human narrative by observing and photographing ordinary, sometimes mundane locations and objects. He feels that the spontaneous and risk the infused aspect of making photographs has been lost, due to the excessive use of digital cameras, and thus still works in analogue format.
Murphy’s current body of work comes out of the desire to break away from the defining connotations and association of photography, wether that is thought the use of specific techniques, subject matter, or visual presentation.
Title: Up and down left and right I, Mixed media acrylic, ink, oil pastel, H50 x W70 cm, year - 2012
Erika Wengenroth is a German artist living and working in Britain. Trained as designer/maker she now concentrates on printmaking and mixed media, produced from her workshop.
Much of her printmaking and mixed media work is concerned with abstraction and emphasis on texture Recurring themes are landscapes and nature, often abstracted, but central to her work in colour. Wengenroth layers abstract prints giving them an extra dimension and depth. On a larger scale improvisation played a role in recreating printmaking techniques without having to use a printing press and challenging m her usual working methods which was both challenging and satisfying.
Erika Wengenroth
Emma Cooper was born in Nottinghamshire and is now a Scottish based artist. Graduate in Fine Art and postgraduate Fine Art from DJCAD, Dundee and was awarded the William Sangster Phillips Trust Fund where she experimented with ideas and an innovative approach in which she continues to develop.
Coopers work stems from the mind under the influence of its surroundings, which ceases to be concerned with anything, but the consciousness of being positive and the emotions of intoxicating joy. Expressing the concept of being happy is the core to Cooper’s work and is a subject that has a wide meaning of which she explores in her artwork.
Emma Cooper
above image, Title: Sentinels, audio cassette tape, H210 x W50cm x D50 x cm, year - 2012
Paul Murphy
Judith Nicholson was born in Lancashire and grew up in Moray, Scotland. Graduated with a BA in Fine Art from Moray College, UHI, Scotland she has since exhibited at the Royal Scottish Academy, Jack Tierney Gallery in Aberdeen and The Secret Art Show in aid of the MS Trust, London.
Nicholson’s artwork is about communicating with the viewer on a personal level. Connecting with this visual reference is to evoke a response, or an effect, in a meaningful way. Her exploration of painting is driven by technique. The use of watercolour on the synthetic polypropylene is challenging, but rewarding. By capturing the transparency and fluidity of the watercolour paint, Nicholson reveals a depth to her work, which plays with the light as it hits the surface of her work. This creates a condensed visual insight into an emotional response to the movement, depth and volume of her landscape of colour.
Judith Nicholson
Above Image, Title: Essence, Watercolour on polyproplylene, H90 x W65cm, year - 2011
Julian Wild graduated with a BA in Fine Art from Kingston University. He has exhibited at The Saatchi Gallery, The Victoria & Albert Museum, Maddox Arts and the Chelsea Physic Garden. He has held solo exhibitions at Burghley House & Bishops Square, Spitalfields. Commissions include: Millfield School, Cass Sculpture Foundation, Jerwood Sculpture Park & Schroders.
Julian Wild’s artwork is a form of three-dimensional drawing. The linear structures that he makes, either explore the boundaries of a pre-determined shape or the space that they exist in. Wild is interested in the semiotics of materials and how the surface of a sculpture can reference a specific material function.
Presence is made of lacquered hardwood, a construction process commonly used in bespoke furniture. The immaculate surface of the sculpture works in contrast to its arbitrary doodle-like form. The title for this work comes from a Led Zeppelin album cover of the same name, featuring a strange black object, in different settings.
Julian Wild
above image, Title: Presence, painted and lacquered wood, H28 x W40 x D28 cm, year - 2011
Andrian Melka graduated in sculpture from The Academy of Fine Arts in Tirana. Achieved head sculptor status at Dick Reid studios, of York, by his mid thirties and excelled on many high profile commissions. Melka has built up his own studio since 2003 in Yorkshire concentrating on contemporary sculpture.
Andrian Melka has mastered the art of stone and marble sculpture creating a pure and simple style of his own expression. Using the challenge of the human form he captures a realistic energy with astonishing honesty. Melka takes this passion into his figurative, abstract sculpture as he has an inner sense of knowledge that creates awe inspiring artwork. On top of all of this, he then turns his attention to detail and, the finish, taking his work to another level, putting Melka at the top of his field by defining his space within the contemporary art world.
Damilola Odusote was born in London. He graduated from Camberwell College of Arts, receiving a BA( hon.) in illustration. His commitment to keeping his work real is embedded in social interactive groups, events and symbols and his portrayal in what he sees and does is reactionary and instinctive.
Odusote brings different elements and interest into his work to highlight questions in society, but also things that people accept without thinking. He does this through using tiny nameless and generic characters to his personalized ideas.
Odusote is a London based artist who uses the buzz from the City to form ideas and his all or nothing attitude is revealed in his work. This process is often put down with pen and ink and evolves from the surface of the paper creating an organic edge to his artwork. Inspiration is found in politics, race, fantasy and fiction.
Damiloa Odusote
above image, Title: Live to Work,
Acrylics and Graphic Pen on Canvas, H42 x W30 cm, year - 2012
Susan Williams studied at Kingston University and the Royal Academy and was Royal British Society of Sculptors Award Winner 2000. She has exhibited widely throughout the UK and undertaken numerous residencies including Wysing Arts, Cambridge and the Vermont Studio Centre, USA.
Williams makes site specific installations some of which are kinetic and become video works. Working directly through the materials she exploits their in-built characteristics and develops ideas as the work progresses. Her aim is to make what is already there more visible, at times capturing what we don’t normally see, light, wind, shadow, space, flatness, the potency of a colour. Illusions such as floating and evanescence reoccur in her work making links to magic and spirituality in its broadest sense.
Susan Williams
Andrian Melka
Above image, Title: Motherhood, marble, H32 x W27 x D8 cm, year - 2010
above image Title: Untitled, video of developed from sticky tape kinetic work, year - 2012
