From 25-29th October 2011 Espacio Nomadic at the Menier Gallery showcases new work by twenty artists from the Espacio Gallery Project.

A private view will be held on Thursday 27th October from 6-8.30pm and the show continues until 29th October.

With printmaking, painting and mixed media pieces, the show offers a glimpse of each artist's personal perspective on modern life from buildings to bodies, landscapes to dreamscapes, and sacred to secular.

While Espacio Gallery Artists are seeking their own permanent gallery space in London, these ‘nomadic’ shows will travel between established galleries creating ‘artistic oases’ from the energy and creativity of project members.

Featuring:

Mark Bell, Laura Bello, Judith Bieletto, Jane Bolden, Jenny Bush,
Lesley Croxford, Carlos de Lins, Mickey Dell, Zelda Eady,
Laura Gompertz, Sally Grumbridge, Stephanie Herbert,
Yolande Kenny, Anil Nijhawan, Ralph Overill, Renee Rilexie,
Liz Whiteman Smith, Justyna Szpygiel, Nora Velazco, Tina Viljoen.

Curator/Event Organiser: Renee Rilexie
Graphics/Website/General: Carlos de Lins
External Assistance: Matteo Sarto

_Mark’s work generally runs in distinct series, either influenced by urban environments, dealing with social and political concerns, or influenced by a love of the natural world and the aesthetic qualities of its varying forms and guises.

_Laura Bello’s work is influenced by her fascination with all aspects of nature. She was born in South America and it was during her early visits to the El Tablazo Mountains that she first fell in love with nature. Bello explores the energy of Mother Earth in paintings inspired by her native Colombia.

_Judith’s current work explores nocturnal landscapes, based on her personal experiences when walking during the hours of darkness in different parts of Europe. 'Every day I ventured into the unexplored darkness of the forest before dawn and, as I hurried along, I savoured the atmosphere with a mixture of wonder and fright.'

_Many recent artworks consider the urban landscape. Jane's response is influenced by images and signs from early civilizations, street patterns and traces of earlier occupation.  This is evoked through using mixed media and building up the image in layers with printing, drawing and pasted papers.

_Jenny lives and works in East London and enjoys working in a variety of media reflecting her continuing engagement with different projects. She finds inspiration for her art from occurrences in everyday life.

_Lesley’s paintings are representational but literal accuracy is not her main concern. Instead she tries to recreate what she sees by heightening colour and exaggerating shape. By keeping the memory of the first visual experience through repeated painting of the same subject she distils it to make the image more potent.

_Carlos explores the relationship between modern city-dwellers and the giant concrete and glass edifices which delimit their horizons. He is particularly intrigued by the contradictory emotions evoked for him by such buildings where a sense of awe at their majestic scale and thrilling geometry often co-exists with feelings of emptiness and desolation.

_Using photographs as a starting point Mickey produces images by mechanical means. Then, by combining the methods of silk screen printmaking with photography she abstracts elements, multiplies and manipulates the image to produce an alternative, 'second look' at people, objects, buildings and landscapes she comes into contact with.

_Zelda uses a combination of Bauhaus methods and spontaneous mark making to create her paintings and prints. She is interested in the boundary between representation and abstraction. Painting with acrylics enables her to investigate multiple viewpoints on a single picture plane whilst experimenting with form and colour.

_Laura combines working as both an artist and a designer. Painting has been a continuing passion throughout her life, inspired by natural forms and colour. Her oil paintings focus on the abstract patterns in everyday objects - onions, lemons, a full moon or seaside rocks.

_Colour is one of the main driving forces in Sally’s work.
Often using life studies or photography as a starting point, her work explores the bounds between abstraction and figuration. She works mainly with oils but also uses drawing, mixed media and printmaking in a wide variety of format and size.

_Stephanie's practice explores being alive. 'Whether we’re searching for something to give life purpose and meaning, passing through experiences joyful or difficult, engaging with past, present or future, art can express this existential puzzle powerfully and completely.'

_In the worlds Yolande creates with paint or photography, all living things are given equal status. How we fit into the natural world is her departure point. Her work has muted tones and small detail. It is intended to seek an intimate and quiet, but intense, relationship with the viewer.

_As an artist the language Anil speaks is always the simplest and most direct. He takes recollection of a particular social encounter, landscape, or effect of the weather as a starting point. He tries to give his paintings strong physical character using vibrant colours and shapes.

_Ralph’s Work explores an environment in which space, objects and figures are gestured rather than defined. This place sits between a conscious reality of the understood and familiar and a subconscious dream world of uncertainty and instability.

_Painting, Music and Movement, Writing and Poetry are all part of Renee's ongoing life. Expression of emotions at any level through the arts initiates the discovery and rediscovery of oneself. Nature, energy, vibrations and colours intermingle to express her immediate emotions. Each painting is a journey, bringing awareness, spiritual growth and unravels the human spirit in motion.

_Justyna's main source of inspiration lies in nature. She has been choosing ‘silence’ as the subject of her paintings for the last six years in an attempt to grasp what is often a result of meditation or contemplation – the undisturbed inner peace.

_Nora explores colour interactions as a means to express moods and rhythm. Her paintings are generated by spontaneous gesture-driven brushwork, transparencies and the superposition of layers. The dripped-paint technique evokes melancholic memories mixed with future expectations.

_Tina works with digital photography, watercolours, oils and encaustic - wax. She is worried about climate change, and what is happening to the ice-caps. She has also started to explore the power of nature (and man) in images of nuclear explosions. 'I am fascinated by the sublime beauty of the images, together with a sense of horror.'

_Liz is a figurative painter who works in oils. Her work focuses on the idea of identity, what is it that makes us who we are. She is drawn to the quirky and the unusual in the world around her.  She is interested in what is going on behind the face that we present to the world.

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