Feature in Saatchi Gallery Art and Music
December 7, 2015
Really pleased to have been featured in an article about the thriving cultural arts scene in Manchester in the Saatchi Art and Music North issue.
The featured work was for 2014 Enlighten Manchester Festival of Light Art. It’s called ‘A Solid Wish Scatters’ and was installed in Manchester Piccadilly Gardens. The earthly presence of the blocks scatter into an ephemeral light piece on the concrete wall to show all that is solid is still fragile and all that is perceived to be permanent never will be. Read more about the work here.
I will be exhibiting in this year’s Enlighten Manchester 10th-12th December, showing ‘The Stories Under Our Feet’ around the benches of Manchester Central Library and ‘Lost and Found’ within the library itself. For more information and to book free tickets to the festival visit the Enlighten Manchester website. These works have been created with the support of Arts Council England.
Solo exhibition – Light Weather (12th – 16th March 2012)
March 15, 2012
Light Weather is my first solo exhibition in the Link Gallery, Manchester. The exhibition comprises of two parts: the Link is a large-scale installation, at one end of the gallery there is an abstract sky lit up with coloured flashes of light, throughout the rest of the gallery there are coloured pools of light suspended above the floor. The Foyer space shows some of my abstract light photography and an experimental light sculpture.
The installation is a complete experiment. It’s not often I have the opportunity to work in such a large and unusual space where I can let my imagination run wild (time and health and safety restrictions aside). So I have responded to the space to create an installation which is similar to a stage set. Nothing is naturalistic, the sky and pools of light are abstractions of what they represent, and are lit up with bright colours appealing to the senses. People can walk through the set, as both participants and audience, and hopefully enjoy it as a memorable interruption to their day.
Throughout the week there have been many people who have stopped and stared up at the flashing sky suspended from the ceiling of a hexagon in the Link. People have commented that they have spent a good 10 minutes or so looking at the exhibition and listening to my specially matched playlist of music, enjoying the calming effect it has had. The Link is essentially a walkway from one building to the next, many people just walk through and only glance at what is on the walls, so it is nice to know that my work has made some people pause from where they are going. Others said they enjoyed the use of the space as a full-scale installation as this has not happened for quite some time.
Overall I’m pleased with the exhibition and how well it has been received. As I said before, it was an experiment, plus I only had a day and a half to install it all, so there are things I’d change. I only learnt these during the installation and when it was up – the main one being that the hallway windows were too light during the day, and unfortunately I was not allowed to black them out due to health and safety regulations. However, the overall look and effect was as intended (especially at night), and it has encouraged me to continue to be ambitious with my ideas and set ups.
Fieldtrip Mushrooms
March 3, 2012
This is a video exploring a light sculpture I made recently. I then edited it to Boxcutter’s tune ‘Fieldtrip’.
Falling Triangles
March 2, 2012
Light Sculpture and Threads Exhibition
January 13, 2012
I recently exhibited my Light Paintings and a Light Sculpture at the ‘Threads’ exhibition with Roger Bygott and Hannah Leighton-Boyce at the Link Gallery.
I used electrical tape to frame my Light Painting projections, this was necessary to create a defined area for these works as they work with light and shade, so the shaded parts would have been lost without the frame.
I made my sculpture in response to the unusual shape of the gallery. I used white thread to reshape the space in a mix of sharp angular shapes, some covered with paper as platforms for the bright slowly moving projections to bring the sculpture to life. The light from the projections catches on the strings, illuminating them and giving a sense of movement. The shadows cast from the sculpture also moves across the back wall as the light and dark areas of the projection slowly shift across the space.
Here is an extract from the installation view of my Light Sculpture:
Words and Lights 