Kerri Pratt, 'Point Place Time' At Tarpey Gallery, Castle Donington

Kerri Pratt, 'Room With A View', Acrylic On Canvas, 2014

It’s been a busy summer for me this year, with large portions of time taken up with my preparations for a project I’ve agreed to undertake for the Melbourne Arts Festival next month.  I don’t want to talk too much about that now, but will write some kind of report, as and when it reaches a culmination.  However, it does explain why I’ve been spread a little bit thin of late, and why I’m a little late writing this post.

Kerri Pratt, 'Detached',  Acrylic On Canvas, 2014

I found myself in the small, North Leicestershire Town of Castle Donington not long ago, accompanying my close friend Suzie to the Private View of Kerri Pratt’s exhibition ‘Point Place Time’ at the Tarpey Gallery.  Kerri is a Derbyshire-based painter, represented by the gallery, and a recent recipient of the prestigious Jonathan Vickers Fine Art award.  That prize represents a substantial financial sum, and will help Kerri to fund her practice effectively full-time over the coming year.  This will see her relocate to Derby, from her current workspace [1.], whilst undertaking some additional community-based art work and mentoring Fine Art students at the University of Derby.

Kerri Pratt, 'Anonymity', Acrylic On Board, 2013

Viewing the work on display, it was easy to see what may have caught the judges’ eyes.  The paintings operate within the general mode of cityscape, but with an emphasis on the ambiguity of locations that feel vaguely familiar but difficult to place.  This is clearly indicated by at least one view of Venice, focusing on its obscure, shadowed backwaters, rather than its spectacular but over-familiar aspects.  Were it not for a subtle flavour of architectural historicism, the mood of such pieces might just as easily recall Birmingham or some post-Industrial Northern locale.  In addition, there’s as much emphasis on optical viewpoint as on subject selection.  There’s a relish for dramatic perspectives and several subjects acquire increased dynamism through dramatic diagonals and sharply converging orthogonals.

Kerri Pratt, 'Still Waters Run Deep', Acrylic On Board, 2012-13

I’m guessing that at least some of her images derive from her own East Midlands back yard.  ‘Room With A View’ particularly impressed me, with its nod towards the beginnings of Cubist abstraction and delight in the atmospheric potential of anonymous vernacular architecture.  I also love Kerri’s willingness to just fill a portion of middle ground wall with an almost arbitrary passage of flat, custard yellow paint, in almost as direct a manner as the actual masonry might have been coated.  Devices like this, and the flattened perspectives and interlocking wedges of contrasting tone feel like a British Heartlands take on Richard Diebenkorn’s mid period views of anonymous built environments.

Richard Diebenkorn, 'Chabot Valley', Oil On Canvas, 1955

Throughout the show, Kerri demonstrates her confident paint handling.  She utilises a wide vocabulary of eloquent marks and happy accidents, and is adept at counterpointing passages of fluid and dry brushwork.  There are numerous examples of how to modulate nominally blank, surfaces with visual textures.  Returning to ‘Room With A View’, there’s an exciting ambiguity about the curtain of dragged brushwork that blocks our view into the far distance.  It manages to suggest either trees, or some harder, scaffolded edifice, whilst being equally just about paint too.  

Kerri Pratt, 'Urban Vista', Acrylic On Board, 2012-13

Kerri’s no stranger to the atmospheric potential colour either.  For all her delight in shadowy tonality, paintings like ‘Seeing Red’, show a bold confidence with glowing reds, whilst elsewhere, I was delighted by a passage of daring electric ultramarine employed to describe the reflected light from an obscure Venetian canal surface.

Kerri Pratt, 'Seeing Red', Acrylic On Board, 2012

‘Point Place Time’ is a small but genuinely satisfying exhibition and I found plenty to absorb me as I viewed and re-viewed each painting.  My own take on the urban environment tend to be more synthetically abstract and freighted with textual components, but I do sometimes wonder if, one day, I might end up simply trying to depict it.  Paintings like this show just how rewarding that might actually be.  Kerri herself also proved highly approachable and more than happy to talk about her practice in engagingly down to earth terms.  If this is what she’s achieved since graduating as a mature student in 2011, (and whilst holding down a day-job and raising a family), it will be fascinating to see the results of her coming year of full-time immersion.

Tarpey Gallery, Castle Donington

Should anyone find themself in the Castle Donington area, I’d definitely recommend a visit to The Tarpey Gallery, (as a detour en route to the nearby East Midlands Airport, perhaps).  Housed in an attractively converted barn, behind the town’s oldest house, it showcases an impressive roster of represented artists and transcends both the scope and quality of work one might typically expect from a small, commercial gallery in such a location.  Proprietor, Luke Tarpey is clearly committed to the artists he represents and the premises extension now taking shape, and plans for a sculpture garden beyond, speak of his ambitions to create a significant outlet for contemporary art in the region.

Mandy Payne, 'Void', Aerosol Paint On Concrete,  Date Unknown

In addition to Kerri Pratt’s work, I was also interested to see a couple of pieces by Mandy Payne, whose images of the (im)famous, Modernist edifice of Sheffield’s Park Hill Flats particularly chime with my own current interests.  She has herself been recently shortlisted for the John Moore’s Painting Prize and I am particularly intrigued by her recent experiments with painting on concrete.

David Manley, 'DDA5 - Swine Flu', Acrylic On Aluminium, 2013

I was also pleased to find one of the circular ‘Epidemic’ paintings by David Manley that impressed me in Nottingham, earlier this year.  David is another artist who exhibits and sells through the Gallery and I’ve been regularly following his blog for some time.  An enjoyable evening was therefore capped when I discovered David himself was in the room and was able to introduce myself and chew a little fat with him in person [2.].  Again, it seems that online activity has led to a little enjoyable real time contact.

Kerri Pratt, ‘Point Place Time’ Continues until 20 September at Tarpey Gallery, 77 High Street, Castle Donington, Leicestershire, De74 2PQ.

[1.]:  At Long Eaton’s Harrington Mills Studios. 

[2.]:  Coincidently, David teaches in my own hometown of Lincoln and is a fellow Cornwall enthusiast.  We chatted for several minutes about his plans to revisit Moushole, the Cornish village I reported from myself, earlier this year.

David Manley: 'Epidemic'/'Black North' And 'Since 1843: In The Making' In Nottingham

David Manley, 'Conficiutur (DDA22)', Acrylic On Aluminium, 2013

While I was viewing the exhibition, ‘Pop Art To Brit Art:Modern Masters From The David Ross Collection’, in the Djanogly gallery at the University of Nottingham’s Lakeside Arts Centre, my eye was also caught by some paintings by David Manley, displayed in their adjacent Angear space.  The work represented two series, ‘Black North’, and ‘Epidemic’, with the second selection interesting me especially.

David Manley, 'Epidemic', Lakeside Arts Centre, Nottingham, January 2014

‘Epidemic’ consists of numerous circular paintings, in acrylic on aluminium, which initially appear abstract in a painterly way, and decorative in intent, but actually represent microscopic views of various viral cultures.  This duality between something operating formally at one scale, and representationally at a very different one, really interested me.  I was also engaged by the tension between Manley’s employment of joyful, heightened colours, - refreshingly and directly applied, and the sinister implications of the viral strains depicted.

David Manley, 'DDA4', Acrylic On Aluminium, 2013

The distribution of a large number of these discs, of various diameters, across a wide expanse of well-lit wall worked really well.  Although each has its own intrinsic qualities, it was their compilation into a greater whole that created the most impact (the micro versus macro is there again), and reinforced the suggestion of germs multiplying before the eyes.

David Manley, 'Epidemic', Lakeside Arts Centre, Nottingham, January 2014

I thought about the paintings a lot in the few days between my two visits to Lakeside and, amongst other things, found myself reflecting on the sheer painterliness of his work.  It seems very different from my own rather methodical, paint & collage approach to picture making and something that, part of me secretly envies.  As I also work predominantly in acrylics, I was intrigued by the seductive juiciness of his paint, - something that’s not always easy to preserve with the medium.

David Manley, 'Yellow Fever (DDA13), Acrylic On Aluminium, 2013

I’ve since discovered David Manley’s website and blog too, both of which appear to be full of interesting stuff.  I suspect I’ll be spending some time browsing through them in coming days.  He seems to be pretty active within the Midlands, but on the wider painting scene too, and I notice with interest that he also teaches at my hometown of Lincoln’s own University, (Lincolnshire College Of Art & Design In my day, - how time moves on).

David Manley, 'Epidemic', Lakeside Arts Centre, Nottingham, January 2014

David Manley, 'Black North', Lakeside Arts Centre, Nottingham, January 2014

The last of my recent exhibition visits in Nottingham was also University-based but this time, at Nottingham Trent Uni.  That institution, (Trent Poly as was), has acquired a strong reputation of Art and design education over the years, both nationally, and within the region.  Their exhibition ‘Since 1843: In The Making’ featured work by alumni of various courses during that period, and included a selection of interesting bits and pieces and some pretty high profile names.

Andy Earl, 'BowWowWow' ('See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang, Yeah! 
City All Over, Go Ape Crazy!), Photograph, Printed 1991 

Jonathan Glazer, Still From: 'Sony Bravia (Paint)', TV Ad., 2006

Amongst these were Andy Earl, whose sleek photography for Pink Floyd and Post-Punk Pop band Bow Wow Wow is instantly recognisable, and Jonathan Glazer, whose TV and Cinema ads could be regarded as masterpieces of the form.  I’m reluctant to pay too much respect to such a compromised genre; this is Capitalist Spectacle in the raw after all.  However, it would be foolish to ignore the wit, elegance and high production values of his work for Guinness, Stella Artois, Nike and Sony.  His tower block exploding in a rainbow of paint, in particular, is a truly delightful image, but I just wish it existed for some reason other than to flog tellys.

David Bachelor, 'Idiot Stick 25', Plastic Bottles, Polycarbonate
Sleeve & Fluorescent Lighting Tube, 2013

Instead, the piece that really charmed me was David Bachelor’s ‘Idiot Stick 25’.  Comprising a totemic column of brightly coloured, plastic bottles, assembled around a fluorescent lighting tube and propped in a dark corner, - it was suffused with a simple, synthetic beauty.  One could argue it utilises a similar chromatic immediacy as Glazer’s Sony ad, but the differences in usage (or uselessness) and intention, seemed to make all the difference.

David Bachelor, 'Idiot Stick 25', Plastic Bottles, Polycarbonate
Sleeve & Fluorescent Lighting Tube, 2013

I often contemplate the distinctions, between ‘Art’ and ‘Design’, and I know you’re going to tell me it matters less and less these days, and that ‘Idiot Stick 25’ is actually just another form of saleable artifact with an ‘Art’ label attached.  Perhaps, I just sense that Bachelor’s exploration of the contemporary relationship between colour, light and synthetic materials came independently of the pay-off, rather than merely to facilitate it.  End of lecture.


David Manley's 'Epidemic/Black North' ran from 16 November - 02 February 2014 at: Angear Exhibition Space, Lakeside Arts Centre, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD.  He is represented by: Tarpey Gallery, 77 High Street, Castle Donington, Leicestershire, DE74 2PG.

'Since 1843: In The Making' ran from 09 January - 07 February 2014 at: Bonnington Gallery, Nottingham Trent University, School Of Art & Design, Bonnington Building, Dryden Street, Nottingham, NG1 4GG.