Photos: Peter Griffiths
Hypha Studios
Gallery 1, Sugar House Island
6 Sugar House Lane,
London E15 2QS
Exhibition open:
12th December 2024 – 18th January 2025.
An exhibition of abstract sculpture and painting by nine multigenerational women and non-binary contemporary artists from London, the North and Ireland, curated by TSM.
TSM invited three sculptors and, for the first time, three painters to show with them.
Jackie Askew, painter (Ireland)
Day Bowman, painter (London)
Katrina Cowling, sculptor (Bradford/London)
Charlotte Cullen,sculptor (Leeds)
Beatrice Galletley, sculptor (London)
Ellen Ranson, painter (Durham)
Many contemporary artists make works that are abstract, yet they do not define them as such. TSM want to reclaim the word and open up conversations about how abstract sculpture and painting speaks to many through their visual languages which, through use of material and space refers indirectly to the complex world we live in. Visual concepts of form, spatial relationships, presentation and visual independence will become apparent across the works in the show, fuelling discussions that explore and dissect the language surrounding the artists’ respective practices and how they each engage with ideas.
Informal artists’ tour – Sunday 15th December, 2-4.
Public discussion, 18th January 2025, chaired by curator and writer Natalie Rudd who has also written the introduction to the exhibition booklet .
Exhibition Booklet
Introduction by Natalie Rudd
Towards an Abstract Vernacular
Abstract Vernacular is the latest exhibition in a programme of activity curated by Gillian Brent, Alexandra Harley and Sheila Vollmer under the collective name, Talking Sculpture Making (TSM). Since 2019, these sculptors have forged valuable exhibition opportunities and facilitated inclusive conversations around abstraction, materiality and methods of making. Their proactive endeavours contribute to the work of a growing community of artists, curators and writers invested in supporting women’s practices. In recent years, there have been several multidisciplinary exhibitions that have addressed the exclusion of women from art-historical accounts of abstraction, including Women in Abstraction at the Centre Pompidou in Paris (2021), and, earlier this year, Beyond Form: Lines of Abstraction 1950-1970, at Turner Contemporary in Margate. Although these large institutional surveys provide important opportunities for correction and recalibration, they are unable to tacking the ongoing challenges facing women making abstract art in studios today. This is why the sustained artist-led strategies of TSM are so valuable. Working with grit and determination in a landscape of limited funding options, this group is sustaining a rich dialogue, connecting artists and audiences, promoting visibility, and supporting women at various career stages.
Abstract Vernacular presents the work of nine women living and working in the UK and in Ireland. Brent, Harley and Vollmer have invited three sculptors (Katrina Cowling, Charlotte Cullen and Beatrice Galletley) and three painters, (Jackie Askew, Day Bowman and Ellen Ranson) to participate in the show. This is the first time that TSM has extended the invitation to include painters, thus enabling an expanded dialogue embracing a wider range of materials and processes. Across the pages of this publication, each artist has introduced their practice in their own words. Together, these personal reflections reveal highly distinctive approaches, indicating the continuing breadth of possibilities available to artists working with abstraction. Equally compelling are the points of connection between practices, even between those that may at first appear distant.
Reflection on the title of this exhibition provides a useful entry point into shared concerns. The word ‘vernacular’ commonly denotes a spirit of the ordinary. Vernacular architecture, for example, is modest in scale, harnesses local materials, and avoids grandiosity and pomposity. Intriguingly, the works in this exhibition radiate similar energies. There is a discernible interest in found or reclaimed materials, including items associated with domestic situations. In sculpture, workaday matter is repurposed and combined with considerable craft and care to generate new forms and multiple readings. In painting, surfaces are imbued with everyday references; sometimes canvases are reused or collaged, creating layered material histories. All of this work is of a manageable size. It is moved, rendered and manipulated by a single body, emerging from close physical engagement; personal, intuitive, intimate.
Given these vernacular empathies, it is no surprise to discover that these works thrive on a spirit of vulnerability and flux, rather than on allusions to static monumentality. This determined lack of fixity manifests in multiple ways. There are allusions to nature, water and flow, evident in works that embody a spirit of restlessness and movement. Elsewhere, artists have harnessed the natural forces of gravity, presenting objects that appear to balance or lean with a provisional poise. Contradictory ideas and references often collide within a single work, creating a spirit of energy and tension. Objects and painted surfaces are made and unmade, reconstituted and reconfigured; fixed outcomes are dislodged, and singular interpretations avoided. The vernacular domain is a place of considerable creative freedom.
The vernacular also refers to language, specifically to an informal and authentic dialect emerging within a particular region or place. The idea of a shared local discourse resonates across the selected works. Despite a diversity of materials and methods, there exists a clear desire to use the languages of abstraction to communicate highly subjective ideas, memories and personal histories. For these women, abstraction does not involve the tight fixing of meaning through formal geometries, but instead involves the unravelling of a communal and allusive zone where issues of empathy and solidarity can percolate. Of course, this notion of a common language returns us back to the core objectives of TSM. By engaging with fellow artists based across the UK and in this exhibition, Ireland and working intergenerationally to find points of connection across material, time and place, Talking Sculpture Making is building a strong community. This is a highly creative process; a matter of piecing it together.
Natalie Rudd, 2024.
Natalie Rudd is a curator and writer. In her former role as Senior Curator of the Arts Council Collection, she managed the sculpture collection at Longside, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, and produced many UK touring exhibitions including Breaking the Mould: Sculpture by Women since 1945. She has published widely on art and artists including Tee Jaray, Permindar Kaur and Veronica Ryan.
Natalie is currently a Midlands4Cities PhD researcher at University of Birmingham, studying precariousness in sculpture. She is based in Leeds.