For our Spring exhibition we present a collection of calm and contemplative works that express ideas through simplicity of form.
Award winning painter Helen Booth uses a language of dots and muted colour to explore the molecular wonder of the atmospheric world. Snowfall, the atomic structure of frozen water and the subtleties of winter light are expressed in a limited palette of whites and dotted marks which merge space and sensory experience. Devon based sculptor Jilly Sutton MRSS uses simplicity of line and shape to explore the sculptural possibilities of trees, birds, animals and the human form. Her work combines the warmth of wood with pared down forms to celebrate the unique beauty of living things. Ceramicist Jane Sheppard explores shared human experience, connecting us with our distant past using ancient methods of working with clay. Through hand coiling, smoke firing and burnishing, she creates forms that echo our earliest experience of hand shaping the earth, using resist techniques to add primitive surface details such as dots and circles. Painter Hannah Luxton’s work explores ideas of Animism, which attributes living souls to inanimate objects and natural phenomena. Using single pigment oil colours, she works on unprimed linen to signify ideas of a supreme 'nothingness', using simplified shapes, lines and circles to express features of the material universe. Susan Laughton’s background as an architecture technician is reflected in the nature of her painting, which takes an almost mathematical approach to line to create fleeting glimpses of rural and urban landscapes. Restraint, simplicity of form and an understanding of the spatial potential of line and shape give these works a purity and quiet power.
