Acquisitions & Art Consultancy April 2022-March 2023

Acquisitions & Art Consultancy

Contemporary Art Society Acquisitions & Art Consultancy

APRIL 2022 – MARCH 2023

Foreword

The past year has seen us all slowly get back to something approaching normal after the years of lockdowns, with a welcome return to travelling and meeting in person. Confronting the challenges of times that continue, nonetheless, to be very tough, we have been thrilled to offer brand new purchasing schemes and to admit two distinguished new Member Museums, taking our total membership to 77. It has been a pleasure to welcome White Cube and AON as new corporate supporters, and we are grateful for the ongoing patronage of Frieze, Gagosian, Cristea Roberts, Lisson Gallery and Weil.

A major focus of the year just ending has been the completion of our new website, which features access to the catalogue of all the gifts made by the Society since our founding in 1910. With documentation of over 10,500 artworks, 3,000 artists, 250 recipient museums (of which 77 are current members), and 2,000 other associated individuals and organisations, it has been a herculean task to bring the project to this point. For the first time, modern and contemporary works in all media can be discovered in collections across the UK, uncovering hidden treasures such as the original Andy Warhol polaroids of Joseph Beuys and Liza Minnelli in the collections of the Danum Gallery, Library and Museum in Doncaster, or the portrait of Amy Winehouse by Marlene Dumas in the Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle. We hope this will be a welcome addition to the online resources that open up access to UK public collections, encouraging new scholarships, borrowing, and lending between institutions. We are particularly indebted to two of our trustees, Michael Bradley and Keith Morris, for their unwavering support of the database project over the course of its development.

We were thrilled to welcome two new Member Museums to the Society during the year: The Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge was originally a member from 1969 until 1996, during which period we donated 20 works, including paintings by Bridget Riley, Sandro Chia, Roger Hilton and Howard Hodgkin. The Sainsbury Centre in Norwich has joined for the first time, and we look forward to working with them in the future.

This year has been notable for the launch of two new purchasing schemes: the Griffin Award for craft and the Ada Award for later-career women artists. We were delighted to select Francisca Onumah as the artist for the first Griffin Award. Onumah is a silversmith working in Sheffield, and she was commissioned to make a group of silver and copper vessels to join the

important metalwork collections at the Sheffield Museum. I would also like to acknowledge the generous in-kind support of the commission from the Sheffield Assay Office. The Ada Award was won by Tate with an application to acquire work by Rita Keegan, an artist whose contribution to the history of art in Britain far outstrips her representation in UK public collections, therefore amply fulfilling the ambitions of the Award. We offer our heartfelt thanks to the sponsors of these new awards, Sarah Griffin and Helen Faccenda, for creating new and exciting opportunities for artists, all the more so as they come at this especially difficult time.

The Collections Fund at Frieze and our purchasing scheme with Valeria Napoleone continue to go from strength to strength. Thanks to the outstanding generosity of Béatrice and James Lupton, along with all the members of the Collections Fund Committee, we were thrilled to acquire a complete set of ten photographic works by the leading Ghanaian artist Ibrahim Mahama in October. Eight works in the set enter the collection at the Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery; the remaining two works go to Danum Gallery, Library and Museum, with the indispensable support of the Friends of the Museum there. A rather thrilling secondary outcome of this acquisition is the planned patron trip to Ghana in November this year, where we will visit Mahama’s extraordinary Savannah Centre for Contemporary Art in Tamale.

Once again, our partnership with Valeria Napoleone has enabled us to identify an exciting emerging talent in the US. This year we have acquired a large-scale painting by Iranian-American artist Maryam Hoseini for York Art Gallery. It is quite rare for US-based artists to find a home in UK collections, so it is especially significant that the VNXXCAS project has consistently created a conduit between the two countries.

Our ongoing partnerships with the National Gallery, Henry Moore Foundation, and Film and Video Umbrella have produced a stellar list of museum acquisitions this year. The third and final commission through our collaboration with Film and Video Umbrella, The Song, is a sensitive portrait of a Syrian refugee in Germany, made by Berlin-based artist Bani Abidi. It debuted at the John Hansard Gallery in February 2023, and a copy will enter the permanent collection of Gallery Oldham in Greater Manchester.

Ali Cherri was the second Artist in Residence at the National Gallery, in a partnership generously supported by Anna Yang and Joe Schull. His exhibition at the gallery in 2022 received a highly positive response in the press and went on to be shown at the partner museum, Herbert Art Gallery & Museum in Coventry, in August of the same year. Possibly the most lyrical of all the works Ali Cherri made during his residency remains permanently in Coventry, thanks to the enlightened philanthropic vision of Anna Yang and Joe Schull.

The past year has seen many of our Member Museums returning to their scheduled programming after the seismic disruptions of successive lockdowns

in 2020 and 2021. Increasingly, the support of museum friend groups is key to the vitality of the institutions, and we would like to make a special mention here of the Friends of Reading Museum, whose generous contribution made it possible to acquire a wonderful new carving by Halima Cassell.

The partnership with the Henry Moore Foundation, supported by our trustee Cathy Wills, has achieved acquisitions for both Leeds Art Gallery and The Hepworth Wakefield in one year. Bringing the first four years of partnership to a triumphant conclusion, we acquired major works by Hew Locke, Emii Alrai, Ro Robertson and Veronica Ryan. One of the great virtues of our new website is that it will make it possible for the first time to review all the works acquired through each of our separate purchasing strands, so that achievements across a number of years can be properly understood together.

As always, our Acquisitions Advisory Committees for art and craft have been a huge part of all our successes, bringing invaluable insights to our deliberations. In a commercially and ethically complicated world, we are hugely grateful to them for their wise guidance. Our special thanks go to the outgoing Fine Art Advisory Committee, whose tenure has been extended through the pandemic years. As a consequence, they have been alongside us through a particularly intense period of activity, not least of which was the Rapid Response Fund, and we are grateful to Patricia Bickers, Ben Cook, Helen Legg and Haroon Mirza for their friendship and wise counsel. Please stay close.

For some reason, Gifts and Bequests always take the last slot, but in every way, they are at the very heart of all that CAS does. People come to us to gift works of art because they know we have the networks of relationships required to find the appropriate home for their donation. The Contemporary Art Society is deeply rooted in the public collections of the UK. This year we celebrate a number of notable anniversaries: York Art Gallery has been a member for 110 years, since 1913; the Laing Art Gallery in Newcastle joined in 1923, an unbroken 100 years as a Member Museum; Tullie House in Carlisle, the McManus in Dundee, and the Towner art gallery in Eastbourne all joined us in 1953, and therefore celebrate their 70th anniversaries with us.

In 2022, we were honoured to collaborate with the estate of the distinguished potter Richard Batterham to place a large number of pots from his personal collection. Before he died in 2021, Batterham worked with curators at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, to prepare a handsome, year-long display of his work in the Ceramics galleries, showcasing the breadth and beauty of his output over the course of his long career. Working with Batterham’s son and daughter, Reuben and Imogen, we selected Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (MIMA), the Crafts Study Centre in Farnham, The Box, Plymouth, The Shipley Art Gallery in Gateshead and The Hepworth Wakefield to be recipients of groups of pots, and in so doing, helped cement Batterham’s presence within the canon of British studio pottery.

In the financial year 2022–23, we have placed a total of 108 artworks by 35 artists in 35 different museum collections in the UK. The total value of the works donated was £744,479. These achievements are in large part thanks to the financial support we receive from our patrons, both individual and corporate. We would like to extend our thanks in particular to the artist Jeremy Deller, who delivered an unforgettable Artist’s Table evening for us in November at the historic Hoxton Hall in East London, and to all those who attended the event and the Event Committee who contributed to making it such a success in every way.

While we were delighted to learn in November that our application to the Arts Council England NPO scheme had been successful, it remains the case that nearly 90% of our funding comes through private donations. In these straitened times, we are deeply grateful for the trust that is placed in the Society to make the best and wisest use of these funds for the benefit of the museum-going public across the UK. We hope that when you encounter CAS gifts on display, you will feel proud to have been a part of bringing them into being. We also hope that you will enjoy exploring the online catalogue of all the gifts we have ever given, making your own discoveries and perhaps determining to visit places you have never been to before as a result.

Marco Compagnoni, Chairman

Caroline Douglas, Director

Remember us in your will

In 1910 the Contemporary Art Society was inaugurated by Roger Fry and six other individuals largely from the Bloomsbury Group, including Lady Ottoline Morrell, the great patron and hostess of young emerging modern artists. As we approach our 113th anniversary, we continue the legacy of our founders by championing today’s most exciting artists.

We want to ensure that our core mission – to donate the best new art and craft to museums around the UK – continues for many years to come. In 2019 we launched the CAS Future Fund, to support the future of our highly successful museum acquisitions programmes.

You can be part of the CAS Future Fund by remembering the Contemporary Art Society in your will. Every legacy gift we receive will be invested in the CAS Future Fund to support future museum acquisitions, making a vital difference to contemporary art and creating enduring support for new generations of artists and museum audiences.

You can also choose to support the CAS Future Fund during your lifetime.

The CAS Future Fund will ensure:

• the best artists of our time are discovered and nurtured

Your gift will ensure that the Contemporary Art Society can continue its great track record of spotting talent ahead of the curve, and accelerating artists’ careers by placing their work in public collections, thereby giving them the public endorsement they deserve at a critical moment.

• the best contemporary art is placed in public collections for future generations

Your gift will also ensure that the Contemporary Art Society can continue to donate work to important museums and galleries across the UK, many of which would not be able to collect any contemporary art without our support.

Thank you for considering the future of contemporary art in the UK.

Museums Receiving Artworks

Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales

Birmingham Museums Trust

The Box, Plymouth

Crafts Study Centre, Farnham

Danum Gallery, Library and Museum, Doncaster

Ferens Art Gallery, Hull

Government Art Collection, London

Guildhall Art Gallery, London

Hatton Gallery, Newcastle University

The Hepworth Wakefield

Herbert Art Gallery & Museum, Coventry

The Hunterian, University of Glasgow

Leeds Art Gallery

Leicester Museum & Art Gallery

Manchester Art Gallery

Mercer Art Gallery, Harrogate

Middlesborough Institute of Modern Art (MIMA)

National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh

Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery

Gallery Oldham

Peter Scott Gallery, Lancaster Arts

Reading Museum

Sheffield Museums Trust

The Shipley Art Gallery, Gateshead

South London Gallery

Southampton City Art Gallery

The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, University of Leeds

Swindon Museum and Art Gallery

Tate

Towner Eastbourne

University of Salford Art Collection

Victoria Gallery & Museum, University of Liverpool

Walker Art Gallery, National Museums Liverpool

Williamson Art Gallery & Museum, Birkenhead

York Art Gallery

Member Museums

57

60

69

70

71

72

73

74

Wales

Special Projects

‘The opportunity to acquire this series of photographs by Ibrahim Mahama will have a significant impact on the future of contemporary collecting at Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery. Mahama’s use of multiple materials reveals interconnected narratives, alert to a much more nuanced understanding of global structures and economies – themes which permeate every area of our collection.’

Rosy Gray, Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery

Collections Fund at Frieze

Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery

Ibrahim Mahama

Abulai Kpatargu GRC, Abulai Rehi

Location, Bintu Abrasipu Sekondi, Mamuna Azara Loco, Azara Seidu, Abulai Mariama, Kamaria Shaharu Accra (opposite) and Kamaria Kpatasco GRC

2019

C-print on Dibond

Each 97.5 x 65 cm

The Contemporary Art Society’s Collections Fund was set up in 2012 and is designed to support the acquisition of significant contemporary works for Contemporary Art Society Member Museums across the UK, drawing together the knowledge and experience of private collectors with that of museum curators.

This year the Collections Fund at Frieze was awarded to Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery. The eight photographic C-prints by Ibrahim Mahama acquired through the Collections Fund at Frieze will form part of the opening display once Norwich Castle’s major redevelopment project is complete in 2024.

Mahama explores themes of commodity, migration and globalisation. His work is concerned with the movement of people and goods. The photographs depict the tattooed arms of long-term collaborators of Mahama’s in Ghana. Some are overlaid on historic colonial maps of key locations, cities and villages across the country. Others are photographed against decaying leather train seats salvaged from the Gold Coast railway. Tattooing a family name or location of birth on your forearm is a common practice throughout rural Ghana due to a lack of basic identification papers such as birth certificates or driving licenses.

This series of works by Mahama builds on Norwich Castle’s existing collection, providing insight into global narratives around land ownership and human migration. Contemporary collecting at Norwich Castle is often positioned within the context of the Norwich School, a collection of nineteenthcentury landscape paintings alert to both the specificity of the local environment and to broader concerns such as the enclosure of lands and social unrest. The acquisition of works by Mahama significantly expands these narratives and, with specific reference to British colonial rule in Ghana, platforms the impact of human activity on both historical and contemporary environments.

Ibrahim Mahama (b. Tamale, Ghana, 1987) lives and works in Accra, Kumasi and Tamale. Solo exhibitions include White Cube, London; Reiter Galleries, Leipzig; The High Line, New York (all 2021); The Whitworth, Manchester; and Norval Foundation, Cape Town (both 2019). Group exhibitions include FRAC des Pays de la Loire, Carquefou (2022); National Gallery, London (2021); 22nd Biennale of Sydney; Stellenbosch Triennale, Cape Town (both 2020); 6th Lubumbashi Biennale; 58th Venice Biennale; Rockefeller Center, New York; and Museum of African Contemporary Art AI Maaden (all 2019). Since 2019, Mahama has established three cultural centres in Ghana: the SCCA in his hometown of Tamale, Red Clay Studio in nearby Janna Kpeŋŋ, and Nkrumah Volini.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Collections Fund at Frieze, 2022/23

Special Partnership with Henry Moore Foundation and Cathy Wills

Leeds Art Gallery & The Hepworth Wakefield

The Contemporary Art Society has acquired sculptures from four important UK-based artists through a special partnership between the Henry Moore Foundation and the Contemporary Art Society, supported by Cathy Wills. The four-year scheme supports The Hepworth Wakefield and Leeds Art Gallery, which are both in Yorkshire, the UK centre for sculpture. Seven pieces – by Hew Locke, Ro Robertson and Emii Alraii – have been acquired for Leeds Art Gallery, and two works by Veronica Ryan have been acquired for The Hepworth Wakefield.

Leeds Art Gallery

Hew Locke

Souvenir 10 (Princess Alexandra)

2019

Mixed media on antique Parian ware

40 x 23 x 14 cm

Opposite

Ro Robertson

Torso III

2022

Corten steel, oil paint and found objects (white vest, white boxer shorts and rock)

169 x 108 x 69 cm

p21, bottom

Birth build shift

2022

Performance for camera, single-channel video

6 min

Edition 1 of 1

p21, top

Emii Alrai

Coude

2022

British gypsum plaster, polystyrene, water, glue, copper leaf, steel, vinegar, fertiliser and salt

245 x 70 x 80 cm

p23, top

Flail

2022

Ink on paper

37 x 46.5 cm

p23, bottom left

Croucher

2022

Ink on paper

27.5 x 37 cm

p23, bottom right

Tempest Walker

2022

Ink on paper

27.5 x 37 cm

Hew Locke, who is known for his large-scale installations, explores themes of power, relationships, monuments and identity. By taking different symbols and putting them in conversation with each other, he gives space for a greater understanding of iconography. Public statuary, coats of arms and weaponry are revealed and recontextualised.

Souvenir 10 (Princess Alexandra) is a work from Locke’s series Souvenirs, which grew from his research into Parian busts of royals. Parian ware was an innovative imitation marble produced on a mass scale that allowed middle-class

Victorians to proudly display statuary in their homes. Locke has taken these rare souvenirs and adorned or weighed down the heads with jewels, crowns, royal crests, skulls, and military and metal masks. This draws attention to the stories behind the figures, not destroying them but instead highlighting their pasts.

Hew Locke RA (b. Edinburgh, Scotland, 1959) is a Guyanese-British sculptor based in London. Recent solo shows include Duveen Hall, Tate Britain, London (2022); Ikon Gallery, Birmingham; Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City; and Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine (all 2019). Recent group exhibitions include Tate Modern, London; Brooklyn Museum, New York; Royal Academy, London (all 2021); and Museum of Cultural History, Oslo (2019).

Ro Robertson’s practice spans sculpture, drawing, photography and performance to explore the boundaries of the human body and its environment. An overarching theme throughout their work is the idea of a ‘raincoat layer’ of the body, as borrowed from lesbian and trans activist Leslie Feinberg’s novel Stone Butch Blues (1993). This is concerned with the space between the inner landscape and external forces, and how one can be protected from the other.

Torso III is part of a series that takes a critical look at the gendered associations of a torso and presents it instead as an archipelago. The biomorphic form is paired with found objects –in this case, boxer shorts. Underwear recurs in Robertson’s performances and sculptures, and its role shifts from that of the base layer to the outer layer in full view. It also references the outdated masquerade laws that were enforced in the US in the nineteenth century.

Birth build shift is a video that draws on the energy of the tidal zone to traverse the terrain of the queer body. Moving from the shoreline to a cliff crevice, the forces of erosion, movement of the tide and shifting of rocks dissolve the boundaries between body and landscape.

Ro Robertson (b. Sunderland, UK, 1984) lives and works in Cornwall. Solo exhibitions include Maximillian William, London (2022); and The Hepworth Wakefield (2019). Group exhibitions include Yorkshire Sculpture Park; Frieze Sculpture, Regents Park, London (both 2022); Gallery 78, Reykjavik (2018); Castlefield Gallery, Manchester; and Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead (both 2016). Robertson was awarded the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award in 2020.

Emii Alrai is an artist whose practice is informed by history, geography, mythologies and inherited nostalgia. Her work criticises Western museological structure and the complexity of ruins, rooted in her own identity growing up in an Iraqi family in Britain. Her installations often mimic museum displays. Alrai explores how the body is situated against the rigidity of history to interrogate how collections and dioramas reinforce systems of empire.

Alrai’s work posits the viewer as an intruder, hunter or voyeur. The form of Coude is punctured by arrows and is on a platform that appears to be crumbling. The theatrical nature of this presentation gives the sculpture an energy of performance. Each time Coude is displayed, it will be slightly different, due to its ephemeral material quality. This is a rebellion against the impossible conservator’s dream of perfect preservation.

Three accompanying drawings – Flail, Croucher and Tempest Walker – show Alrai’s exploration of forms, blurring the space between human, animal and landscape.

Emii Alrai (b. Blackpool, UK, 1993) lives and works in Leeds. Solo exhibitions include Grundy Art Gallery, Blackpool (upcoming 2023); The Hepworth Wakefield; Iniva, London; Eastside Projects, Birmingham (all 2022); and Threshold, Leeds (2021). Group exhibitions include The Bluecoat, Liverpool (2022). Alrai was awarded the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award in 2020.

The Hepworth Wakefield

Veronica Ryan

Cluster 2021

18 bronze magnolia pods and fishing line

110 x 17 x 8 cm

Opposite, top

Sweet Dreams are Made of These

2022

Ceramic stoneware, glaze and jute mat

15 x 213 x 213 cm

Opposite, bottom

Veronica Ryan is a sculptor who is inspired by the shapes and forms of the natural world. Fruits, seeds and nuts are recurring motifs that function metaphorically for the artist’s sense of dislocation, and allude to a history of global trading. Their symbolism also relates to the cycles of life and death. Ryan experiments with scale, material and technique, allowing the significance of different objects to be played with.

Cluster was commissioned as part of Ryan’s dialogue with plasters in The Hepworth Wakefield’s collection in 2021, to celebrate its 10th anniversary. The artist found a magnolia pod in Barbara Hepworth’s garden and cast it in bronze. Sweet Dreams are Made of These is a major floor-based piece incorporating ceramic casts of cardamom pods on a fabric base, bringing in another important material facet of Ryan’s practice. Cardamom pods are traditionally stewed in milk to create a drink that improves the metabolic rate during sleep and helps manage blood pressure.

Together with an earlier work of Ryan’s in the collection, the addition of these two recent works displays a more comprehensive overview of her practice, including the incorporation of colour. This acquisition also serves to better reflect the gallery’s close relationship with the artist over the past years.

Veronica Ryan (b. Plymouth, Montserrat, 1956) is based in London. Recent solo exhibitions included Alison Jacques, London (2022); Spike Island, Bristol (2021); and Paula Cooper Gallery, New York (2019). Group exhibitions include Sharjah Biennial 15 (2023); Whitney Biennial, New York; Leeds Art Gallery; Tate Liverpool; Warwick Arts Centre, Coventry; Arts Council Collection (all 2022); Henry Moore Institute, Leeds; The Hepworth Wakefield; and Whitechapel Gallery Archive (all 2021). Ryan won the Turner Prize 2022 for her Hackney Windrush commission.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through a Special Partnership with the Henry Moore Foundation, supported by Cathy Wills, 2022/23

Tate Ada Award

Rita Keegan

Love, Sex and Romance

1984

Series of 12 photocopied monoprints on sugar paper with paper collage elements

Each: 20 x 28 cm

The Ada Award supports the acquisition of work by UK-based, mid-career woman artists who have a track record of exhibiting and critical recognition but are under-represented in public collections. The award is open to artists working in different media, from paperbased pieces to those that are more difficult to collect, such as works in performance and film.

Rita Keegan is a highly significant and, until recently, overlooked artist who has not been represented widely in public collections in the UK. Keegan was a key figure in the UK’s Black Arts Movement in the 1980s, and her work documenting artists of colour was visionary. She co-founded the Brixton Art Gallery in 1982, established the Women of Colour Index in 1987, and was director of the African and Asian Visual Artists Archive until 1994. For many years, she was a lecturer in multimedia arts at Goldsmiths, University of London. Keegan’s oeuvre explores memory, costume and adornment, usually referring to her extensive photographic family archive – a record of her Black middle-class Canadian family from the 1890s to the present day.

Love, Sex and Romance is a unique example of Keegan’s CopyArt technique, which was innovative at the time and central to the artist’s career. The series will be celebrated

in the major touring exhibition Women in Revolt! (Tate Britain, 2023–2024). Love, Sex and Romance speaks directly to works by other artists in the Tate collection, especially those engaged with Black feminism and the Blk Art Group.

The acquisition of Keegan’s CopyArt series not only corrects a historic omission but also supports Tate’s wider commitment to increasing the representation of diverse women artists in the collection. Love, Sex and Romance provides invaluable content to engage local and international audiences in research initiatives and education programmes, encouraging important conversations around womanhood and Black culture in the UK. The funds are to be used to support The Rita Keegan Archive Project, which is awaiting charitable status.

Rita Keegan (b. New York City, USA, 1949) is an artist, lecturer and archivist of Caribbean and Black Canadian descent who is based in London. She studied Fine Art at the San Francisco Art Institute from 1969 to 1972 before moving to the UK. Solo shows include South London Gallery (2021); Lewisham Arthouse; Horniman Museum, London (both 2006); and 198 Gallery, London (1998). Group shows include Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute, New York (1997); British Museum, London (1995); and Bluecoat, Liverpool (1992).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Ada Award, 2022/23

The Contemporary Art Society Partnership with the National Gallery, London

Herbert Art Gallery & Museum

Ali Cherri

The Madonna of the Cat (after Federico Barocci’s ‘La Madonna del Gatto’)

2022

Installation comprised of a display case containing a taxidermy goldfinch and a porcelain hand

Display case: 147.5 x 81.2 x 40.5 cm

Goldfinch: 12 x 10 x 7 cm

Porcelain hand: 12 x 37 x 37 cm

Ali Cherri explores the meaning of the built environment and its histories, often using archaeological relics and sites as a starting point. Through different artistic media, he traces archaeological processes and correspondences between political and geographical disasters in his native Lebanon and neighbouring territories. He uses them to show how the construction of nation states often relies on archaeology.

In 2021, Cherri became the Artist in Residence at the National Gallery in London. While research-ing the archive, Cherri uncovered accounts of five paintings that were vandalised while on display. He was struck by the emotional response of the public and the urge to heal through correcting and hiding the damage. He created a series of installations, one for each vandalised painting, which recalled aspects of each painting and imagined its life following vandalism. By translating each damaged work into a series of strange objects, Cherri reminds us that we are never the same after experiencing violence.

The work has a strong resonance with Coventry, where the city and cathedral endured the violence of bombing during the Second World War. Traces can still be seen today, particularly

in the ruins of the destroyed cathedral. This experience eventually led to the city contributing to international advocacy for peace and reconciliation. The Herbert reflects this story in a permanent Peace and Reconciliation Gallery, which, like Cherri’s work, considers how we understand the legacies of trauma through museum and gallery collections. The Herbert has built a significant collection of artworks on themes of conflict, peace and reconciliation; Cherri’s work will complement this.

As part of the residency, Cherri spent time in Coventry, viewing the museum’s collections in storage with the curators. The acquired work features a taxidermy goldfinch, referencing the goldfinch clutched by John the Baptist in the painting by Federico Barocci in the museum’s Natural Sciences collection. The work will be displayed in a traditional showcase that reflects how objects were often presented in early ethnographic displays and cabinets of curiosities. It will be displayed in the Herbert’s gallery of European paintings from the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries, where paintings are hung as if in the grand home of a wealthy collector. The display includes a modern replica cabinet of curiosities featuring objects from the collections. Cherri’s work will introduce an intriguing and thought-provoking element to this gallery.

Ali Cherri (b. Beirut, Lebanon, 1976) lives and works in Beirut and Paris. Recent solo exhibitions include the Herbert Art Gallery & Museum, Coventry; The National Gallery, London and Uppsala Art Museum (all 2022). Recent group exhibitions include 59th Venice Biennale (2022) and The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (2021).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through a partnership with the 2021 National Gallery Artist in Residence programme, with the support of Anna Yang and Joseph Schull, 2022/23

Sheffield Museums Trust

Francisca Onumah

Clothed Akin

2023

Britannia silver and oxidised copper Group of five vessels: 40 x 40 x 40 cm

Francisca Onumah’s ambiguous vessels embody a juxtaposition of vulnerability and strength through their anthropomorphic forms. The commission walks the line between sculpture and functionality.

Onumah works from sheet metal, using a variation of mark-making techniques, contrasting neat and irregular patterns. The tactile nature of the surface is complemented by the sensuous forms of her figurative vessels, inspiring a desire to handle.

Taking inspiration from textiles, Onumah’s emotive vessels are clothed in layers of different textures and patterns that mimic the motifs and reliefs found in fabric. The folds, drapery and textures are incorporated into the surface pattern of the vessels she creates. Seams and expressive marks created during fold forming – features that tend to be polished away in traditional silversmithing – are intentionally made a dominant feature of the surface pattern. The employment of these so called ‘imperfections’, whose beauty is seen and highlighted, challenges the hierarchy of values within silversmithing.

Clothed Akin is a family of vessels commissioned by Sheffield Museums for the Griffin Award. Although each vessel has a different surface texture and form, what makes them ‘akin’ is a similarity in posture and disposition. Onumah

says that the vessels are characterised ‘by vulnerably precarious postures’ and that these characteristics are enhanced by the contrasting of the dark oxidised finish with the matt silver finish. She continues: ‘they lean into each other as if in quiet conversation, sitting in a shadowy sombre scenery of tactility.’.

Sheffield Museums cares for and displays a designated metalwork collection of over 13,000 objects within the Sykes Metalwork Gallery, Millennium Gallery, Sheffield. It is the home of over 600 years of metalworking history, representing designers, makers, silversmiths and innovators. In the last 20 years Sheffield has collected metalwork by emerging and established local, regional and national designer–makers and it continues to collect significant works, reflecting civic pride and ensuring the collection is representative of the city today.

Francisca Onumah (b. 1992, Accra, Ghana) lives and works in Sheffield. Recent exhibitions include Galerie Revel, Collect, Somerset House London (2023); Crafts Council Gallery, London; Harewood House Craft Biennial, Leeds; Bluecoat Display Centre, Liverpool (all 2022). Onumah was selected for the two-year Starter Studio Programme for jewellers and silversmiths at Yorkshire Artspace in Sheffield (2017– 2019), where she was awarded the ‘Precious Little Gems’ commission from the Sheffield Assay Office. She was one of the selected makers for Jerwood Art Fund Makers Open in 2022/23.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Griffin Award with the support of Sheffield Assay Office, 2022/23

Griffin Award

‘Having, lived and worked in Sheffield for five years and built a relationship with Sheffield Museums, I’m so pleased that a family of my vessels are now a part of the city’s collection. The recognition and incredible support of the Contemporary Arts Society Griffin Award and of Sheffield Museums means so much for me and my practise.’

Francisca Onumah, Silversmith

Commissioning Partnership with Film and Video Umbrella

Gallery Oldham

Bani Abidi The Song

2022

Single-channel video 22 min 24 sec

Bani Abidi is a visual artist who works with video, photography and drawing. Abidi comments on politics, culture, power and memory. Her work blurs the boundaries between fact and fiction and illuminates the absurdities of everyday life. She often focuses on individual experiences to pose nuanced questions, telling the story of anonymous figures struggling to make small gestures of resistance.

In The Song, an elderly man arrives at what seems to be his officially designated new abode. He sets down his solitary suitcase, opens a welcome pack of German food (which he will later replace with items he prefers), and unlocks the door to his balcony. Air and street noise come rushing in – as do recollections of equivalent moments in the places he has left behind. We watch as he plays with the lid of a whistling kettle, as if tuning it, and look on as he experimentally opens and closes windows, adjusting the acoustics of airflow, as if pressing or releasing the valves of a buildingsized musical instrument. As time passes, he fashions makeshift kinetic objects, whose low-key, repetitive sounds seem to echo those from other rooms he has known (the whirr of an overhead fan, perhaps, or the hum of a generator). Symbols of comfort and consolation,

this growing family of objects surrounds him like the resonant appendages of a one-man band and cheerfully offers the back-up rhythm and accompaniment that allow him to give voice to his own unique and highly personal song.

The city of Oldham has attracted migrant workers throughout its history. In the 1950s and 1960s, citizens of the Commonwealth nations were encouraged to move to Oldham to make up the shortfall of workers and revive the local industry. Many people from the Indian subcontinent and the Caribbean responded, and today Oldham has established Pakistani, Indian and Bangladeshi communities. This film gently shows the realities of migration and homesickness and the associated yearning, traumas and losses.

Bani Abidi (b. Karachi, Pakistan, 1971) lives and works in Karachi and Berlin. Solo shows include Salzburger Kunstverein (2022); Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (2021); Sharjah Art Foundation; and Gropius Bau, Berlin (both 2019). Group shows include Jameel Arts Centre, Dubai (2022); Experimenter, Kolkata; 13th Shanghai Biennale; and the 10th Asia Pacific Triennial, Queensland (all 2021).

The Song (2022) by Bani Abidi was commissioned by Film and Video Umbrella, the Contemporary Art Society, John Hansard Gallery and Salzburger Kunstverein

Supported by Arts Council England. Presented by the Contemporary Art Society to Gallery Oldham, 2022/23

Valeria Napoleone XX Contemporary Art Society

York Art Gallery

Maryam Hoseini

Private Quarter (Midnight-Midday)

2021

Acrylic, ink and pencil on wood panel

216 x 216 cm

Iranian artist Maryam Hoseini’s work Private Quarter (Midnight-Midday) has been acquired for York Art Gallery through the Valeria Napoleone XX Contemporary Art Society award, which supports the acquisition of significant works by a living woman artist for a museum collection every year.

Through her practice, which she sees as an extension of the medium of painting, Hoseini investigates the political, social and personal conditions of identity and gender. Hoseini returns to drawing throughout the process of making a work, often adding detail in pencil to her flat painted surfaces. She describes the process of making as a battle, as she is constantly physically turning and grappling with the panels, incising and reworking as she goes. The fractured spaces and fragmented bodies within her work reflect her own personal experiences as an immigrant and as a person who is effectively exiled from her home country of Iran. These figures express a feeling of anxiety, but they are also powerful and certain of their place in the world.

Private Quarter (Midnight-Midday) takes inspiration from the andaruni, a location in a traditional Persian household where women are free to relax and socialise together without adhering to specific dress codes, including the wearing of the hijab. In doing so, the works reflect on the relationship between perspective,

power and desire. The aperture in the centre of the work references architectural structures such as vertical openings in medieval castles, peepholes or prison bars, presenting questions around our relationship with the figures in the painting and blurring the lines between captive and voyeur. This relates to Hoseini’s consistent fascination with ‘in-between spaces’, which she believes provide an openness for bodies to move fluidly between public and private, painting and drawing.

Since 2012, York Art Gallery has pursued a unique collecting strand inspired by Yorkborn painter William Etty (1787–1849) and his innovative exploration of the nude. This has resulted in an ever-growing group of modern and contemporary works that respond to the theme of the body. One of the underlying ambitions has been to challenge the often malecentred perspective of the subject. In doing this, it is essential to engage in current politics around bodily autonomy at a time when global attitudes towards the rights of women and gender-diverse people are regressing rather than improving. Maryam Hoseini depicts bodies without heads in order to reflect the politics of identity. This is pertinent given the current situation in Iran, where protests defending the rights of women and girls are resulting in imprisonment, violence and death. Private Quarter (Midnight-Midday) offers a necessary antidote to the conflict in Hoseini’s home country.

Maryam Hoseini (b. Tehran, Iran, 1988) lives and works in New York, USA. Recent solo exhibitions include High Art, Paris (2022); Deborah Schamoni, Munich; Green Art

Gallery, Dubai (both 2021); and Rachel Uffner Gallery, New York (2020). Recent group exhibitions include Neue Galerie Gladbeck (2022); New Museum, New York (2021); and 56 Henry, New York (2019).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through Valeria Napoleone XX CAS, 2023/24

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales

Anya Paintsil Blod

2022

Acrylic, wool, synthetic hair, alpaca, mohair and human hair on hessian 140 x 110 cm

Anya Paintsil creates rugs using wool, braiding hair and human hair. Rugmaking brings her back to her Welsh roots, paying homage to the creativity that emerged when she was taught the rug hook technique by her maternal grandmother. Paintsil noticed the similarities between that craft and the adornment and intricacy of West African hairstyles, ultimately weaving these together with her Ghanaian heritage. The subject of Paintsil’s works is often her family, and she draws from stories and memories of childhood and the world around her.

Blod takes its inspiration from the story of Blodeuwedd, one of the many tales to be found in the Mabinogion. The Mabinogion is a collection of ancient Welsh legends, myths and tales. Blodeuwedd was created to be the wife of Llew, who was decreed unable to marry a mortal woman. Magicians Math and Gwydion created a beautiful woman from nine flowers, among which were oak, broom, primrose and meadowsweet. They called their

creation ‘Blodeuwedd’, meaning ‘Flower-Face’. Blodeuwedd is also the ancient name for an owl, into which she was turned as punishment for falling in love with someone else. Blodeuwedd is considered by some to be the Welsh goddess of spring, bringing warmth and new life in the form of flowers after the barrenness of winter. In modern interpretations, she is seen as a feminist deity, rebelling against her male creators and the destiny they set out for her.

Through its connection to Welsh myth and tradition, this textile fits well within the Amgueddfa Cymru collection. Paintsil’s Welsh titles and focus on Black figures make it clear there are many ways to be Welsh. This is a conversation the museum is keen to address.

Anya Paintsil (b. Wrexham, Wales, 1993) lives and works in Chester. Recent solo shows include Ed Cross Fine Art, London (2022); Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea (2021); and Somerset House, London (2020). Recent group shows include Christie’s, London; Lychee One, London (both 2021); and The Whitworth, Manchester (2020). Paintsil won the Wakelin Award 2020 at Glynn Vivian Art Gallery.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society and with the support of the Derek Williams Trust, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Danum Gallery, Library and Museum, Doncaster

Ibrahim Mahama

Zakaria GRC (opposite) and Sumaya

Abukari Obuasi

2019

C-print on Dibond

Each: 97.5 x 65 cm

Ibrahim Mahama explores themes of commodity, migration and globalisation. His work is alert to the impact movement can have on the local environment as well as concerns around land-use change and social unrest. Mahama produces large-scale installations, often employing materials gathered from urban environments, most recognisably jute sacks. This is intended as a critical reflection on the value system, relationships and acts of production inherent to the historical spaces the materials have inhabited. Since 2019, Mahama has established three cultural centres in Ghana: the SCCA in his hometown of Tamale, Red Clay Studio in nearby Janna Kpeŋŋ, and Nkrumah Volini, a renovated brutalist silo. All are artistrun project spaces, exhibition and education centres, cultural repositories providing artists’ residencies. These institutions are Mahama’s contribution to the development and expansion of the contemporary art scene in Ghana, with the aim to inspire and empower his local community through engagement with art.

The two photographs that were selected for Danum Gallery, Library and Museum are part of a larger series, with the other eight works entering the collection of Norwich Castle Museum & Art Gallery (see p.16). Both images show the tattooed arms of long-term collaborators Mahama has worked with in

Ghana. The tattoos are used instead of official papers to identify individuals by their place of birth or family name. This is common practice for itinerant workers, often from northern Ghana. Zakaria GRC references the Ghanaian rail network, a British colonial venture, as is evident from the letters GRC (Ghana Rail Company) on a decayed leather seat. Sumaya Abukari Obuasi focuses on a coastal map that includes the capital city, Accra, where many migrant workers end up in search of work.

Mahama’s arresting images speak powerfully about the impact of migration and displacement, bringing another perspective to the Danum Library, Museum and Gallery’s collection. The city of Doncaster and Accra share commonalities through the colonial legacy of the railway industry. They both attract migrant workers; for example, a large Polish community recently settled in Doncaster.

Ibrahim Mahama (b. Tamale, Ghana, 1987) lives and works in Accra, Kumasi and Tamale. Solo exhibitions include White Cube, London; Reiter Galleries, Leipzig; The High Line, New York (all 2021); The Whitworth, Manchester; and Norval Foundation, Cape Town (both 2019). Group exhibitions include FRAC des Pays de la Loire, Carquefou (2022); National Gallery, London (2021); 22nd Biennale of Sydney; Stellenbosch Triennale, Cape Town (both 2020); 6th Lubumbashi Biennale; 58th Venice Biennale; Rockefeller Center, New York; and Museum of African Contemporary Art AI Maaden (all 2019).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Ferens Art Gallery, Hull

Sin Wai Kin

Today’s Top Stories

2020

Single-channel HD video, colour, sound 6 min 30 sec

Opposite, top

becoming with, becoming apart

2020

Make-up on facial wipe

34.5 x 31.5 x 7 cm

Opposite, bottom

Sin Wai Kin is a non-binary artist who draws on the experience of existing between fixed categories to realise fictional narratives about the social body. Sin works across performance, moving images, writing and print. Originally known for using drag, which remains an important part of their process, they address themes such as desire, identification, objectification and binaries.

Today’s Top Stories and becoming with, becoming apart are a pairing of a film and make-up wipe. Sin references Zhuangzi’s ‘Dream of a Butterfly’, a Taoist philosophical provocation that tells the story of Zhuang Zhou, a man who one night went to sleep and dreamt he was a butterfly. When he woke, he could not tell whether he was a man who dreamt of being a butterfly or if now he was a butterfly dreaming of being Zhuang Zhou.

Today’s Top Stories takes the form of a surreal news broadcast. Instead of reading factual news, the Storyteller reports on philosophical propositions on existence, consciousness, naming and identity. The Storyteller is a recurring character played by Sin in their

work. The video becomes distorted as it goes on, with glitches and voice edits increasing in frequency. This further builds on the idea that reality can often be indistinguishable from an illusion, not unlike the rumours and propaganda news accounts we encounter daily.

Becoming with, becoming apart is a make-up wipe, a product of the careful removal of the make-up Sin wore as the Storyteller in the video Today’s Top Stories. The wipe, instead of being disposed of, becomes an art object. Through this act, the character is put into stasis. At the same time, Sin shows how identities can be put on and removed like an article of clothing.

Ferens Art Gallery has a dedicated modern and contemporary gallery with a significant collection of portraiture and studies of the human figure. Sin Wai Kin’s work is another form of self-portraiture, offering greater representation to its visitors. The acquisition coincides with a programme exploring identity, curated by young people aged 18–25 from The Warren Youth Project and Future Ferens.

Sin Wai Kin (b. Toronto, Canada, 1991) lives and works in London. Recent solo exhibitions include Somerset House, London; The Guggenheim, New York (both 2022); Blindspot Gallery, Hong Kong (2021); and Soft Opening, London (2020). Recent group exhibitions include Tate Liverpool (2022–23); The British Museum, London; ICA, Los Angeles (both 2022); LIMA, Amsterdam; 65th BFI London Film Festival; and Polygon Gallery, North Vancouver (all 2021). They have been nominated for the Turner Prize 2022.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Government Art Collection, London

Harminder Judge

Untitled (opening cage and ribs displayed)

2022

Plaster, polymer, pigment, scrim, oil, wax

235 x 224 x 5 cm

Harminder Judge’s exuberant paintings transport viewers beyond the flat planes of his images into a cosmic realm of open horizons and rich colour fields. Inspired by sources as diverse as Indian Neo-Tantric painting and Euro-American Abstract Expressionism, Judge’s works are produced through a multistage alchemical process that begins by layering pigments into pools of wet plaster that, when dry, produce what Judge has called ‘augmented plaster’, and which Judge then excavates by sanding, polishing and oiling. This distinctive method allows Judge to create vibrant planes of colour and churning abstract forms, which are revealed through unfolding chemical processes.

Untitled (opening cage and ribs displayed) is one of Judge’s more recent works, formed from two abutting pieces. The work is composed of abstracted figures that span both surfaces and loosely gesture to the painting’s title, an oblique reference to the artist’s own experience as a teenager visiting Amritsar, in

India’s Punjab region. During this trip, Judge participated in funerary rites and witnessed the transformation of corporeal matter into ash. These materials and the experience of observing these transitions between states seem to inform this painting, imbuing it with a potent mix of light and shade and giving rise to the dark shape at its centre.

This painting is a significant addition to the Government Art Collection, reflecting British Abstract Expressionism’s long legacy and the exciting new directions in which this tradition, and British painting more generally, is being taken. The work also conveys a sense of continual flux, making it an ideal addition to a collection that is constantly on the move and in which, as Judge has envisioned, it can act as a ‘portal’ to other worlds.

Harminder Judge (b. Rotherham, UK, 1982) lives and works in London. Recent solo exhibitions include The Sunday Painter, London; and Humber Street Gallery, Hull (both 2022). Recent group exhibitions include Galeriepcp, Paris; Kube Museum, Ålesund (both 2021); White Cube, London; Public Gallery, London (both 2020); and Jhaveri Contemporary, Mumbai (2019).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Guildhall Art Gallery, London

Grayson Perry

Animal Spirit (blue)

2016

Woodcut

194 x 242.5 cm

Edition 7 of 21

Grayson Perry is a contemporary artist, writer and broadcaster known for his ceramic vases, tapestries and cross-dressing. There are often strong autobiographical elements in his work, focusing on his childhood, family and identity. His richly detailed work draws the viewer into the different narratives.

This print shows the symbolic representation of the irrational beast that controls the market – half bull, half bear. He is surrounded by symbols taken from the names of patterns seen in Japanese candlestick charts. These were supposedly invented by sixteenth-century Japanese rice traders to help them understand the fluctuations in their market, and they are still used today on the computer screens of city traders. Certain patterns have colourful names, such as Abandoned Baby, Hanging Man, Shooting Star, Dark Cloud Cover, Gravestone Doji, Three Black Crows and Concealing Baby Swallow. Animal Spirit (blue) was produced in response to the 2008 market crash, acknowledging the growing public awareness that the neutral ‘invisible hand’ of the market was not as neutral or infallible as assumed.

Guildhall Art Gallery has several works of art that explore themes associated with the City of London, such as money, power, boom and bust, trade and commerce, and the financial services. These themes have been a focus of collecting since 2013, and the gallery has encouraged open debate around these topics. Animal Spirit (blue) is the first artwork collected under this theme that responds directly to the financial crisis of 2008, and it will be displayed in the City Gallery alongside other works that explore the different facets of London.

Sir Grayson Perry (b. Chelmsford, UK, 1960) works in London. Recent solo exhibitions include KIASMA, Helsinki (2018); Serpentine Gallery, London; Arnolfini, Bristol; and Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool (all 2017). Group exhibitions include Dellasposa Gallery, London (2021); Victoria Miro, Venice (2019); Victoria Miro, London; Imperial War Museum, London; Seoul Museum of Art; Arter, Istanbul (all 2017); and Studio Voltaire, London (2016). He has received several prestigious awards, including the Turner Prize (2003). He is a Royal Academician (2012), a Commander of the British Empire (2013), Chancellor of University of the Arts, London (2015), a British Museum Trustee (2015), and a RIBA Honorary Fellow (2016).

Gifted by Hamish Parker through the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Hatton Gallery, Newcastle University

Eva Koťátková

Blankets, Monsters, Anna and the World 2022

Collage, red ink on paper, glass, wood collages

Each: 29.7 x 21 cm

Eva Koťátková creates work that exists and acts at the intersection of fantasy and reality. Koťátková’s most recognised works are her large-scale installations that use sculpture, collage, drawings, text, sound and scenography. She hopes to provoke emotion, with the goal that this emotion connects us with others beyond categorical subdivisions and hierarchies. Her work often refers to surrealist and psychoanalytic theory.

Blankets, Monsters, Anna and the World explores how we can communicate the realities of the world to children and what we can learn from their viewpoint. The name Anna is that of Koťátková’s eldest daughter, who inspired and helped develop the series. Each element of the title has a story behind it. Blankets have many uses for Anna; they are curtains, partitions, refuges from danger or objects of comfort. Monsters feature in Anna’s everyday life, which means they must be addressed, and learning to understand the World is difficult. Like most children, Anna is full of ‘what if’ questions

and, like most parents, Koťátková is faced with the difficult task of being unable to explain the injustices of the world to their child. She asks the viewer, ‘How can we – from under the table – effectively prepare for the world outside, without losing our hiding and dreaming places in the future?’

This acquisition will complement the legacy of collage and paper that is already present in the Hatton Gallery, which features works by Kurt Schwitters, Linder, Thomas Bewick, Thomas Hair and William Henry Charlton. Blankets, Monsters, Anna and the World is created by a contemporary woman artist and adds diversity to the collection by addressing gender balance for future exhibitions.

Eva Koťátková (b. Prague, Czech Republic, 1982) lives and works in Prague. Solo exhibitions include National Gallery, Prague; La Casa Encendida, Madrid; Meyer Riegger, Berlin; Bildmuset, Umeå; Museum of CAPC, France (all 2022); Kunsthalle Lab, Bratislava (2021); and galerie OFF/FORMAT, Brno (2020). Group exhibitions include documenta 15, Kassel; Callirrhoë, Athens (both 2022); and The Metropolitan Musuem of Art, New York (2018).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Manchester Art Gallery

Hetain Patel

To Dance Like Your Dad

2009

Single-channel video with sound

6 min 16 sec

Edition 3 of 5

Opposite, top

Baa’s House I

2015

Digital print on archival paper

165.1 x 137.2 cm

Opposite, bottom

Hetain Patel employs humour and the tropes of popular culture in his work as a performer and visual artist. He explores the formation of identity through language and physical movement, challenging assumptions about how we look or where we come from. As a child, Patel escaped from the racism he experienced into the world of superheroes.

In the video To Dance Like Your Dad, Patel imitates his father speaking about his work. Patel initially captured footage of his father talking about his coach-building factory as a trailer to advertise the business. Upon rediscovering the unused footage, he came up with the idea of restaging it by performing his father’s words, accent, mannerisms and movements in an empty studio. This work speaks of family relationships and expectations, generational opportunities, inheritance, work and labour, and the loss of industry and skills. The film led to further collaborations with his father. It was also a turning point in terms of how Patel featured his family in his work – not as a representation of something that might be deemed ‘exotic’ by a Western gaze but instead as

a source of enriching familial relationships to which anyone might relate.

In Baa’s House I, Patel turns the idea of a family photograph on its head. Squatting on a chair next to his seated grandmother, an adult Patel takes on the guise of Spider-Man. As a child, he was drawn to Spider-Man and how the costume covered the wearer’s identity. The artist was born in his grandmother’s house in Bolton, and they pose together in the living room in front of 40 years of family portraits. While this unexpected juxtaposition is initially humorous, underneath is a serious demand for freedom from stereotyping.

Manchester Art Gallery has wanted to acquire work by Patel since his hugely popular 2017 solo exhibition at the gallery. His work connects with and speaks to people of multiple generations and cultural backgrounds. These two works, both made in Bolton, have strong local relevance and connections to the histories and lives of people in Greater Manchester.

Hetain Patel (b. Bolton, UK, 1980) lives and works in London. Solo exhibitions include Chatterjee & Lal, Mumbai (2022); Copperfield, London; and John Hansard Gallery, Southampton (both 2021). Group exhibitions include British Art Show 9 (2021–22); the Asia Society Triennial, New York (2021); Bow Arts, London (2020); Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane; Somerset House, London; and the Devi Art Foundation, Delhi (all 2019). He won the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award (2021) and Best International Film at Kino Der Kunst, Munich (2020).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society with the support of Tara Lal and Mortimer Chatterjee, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Mercer Art Gallery, Harrogate

Dorothy Cross

Poll na bPéist

2008

Archival pigment print

79 x 104 cm

Dorothy Cross works in sculpture, film and photography to examine themes such as personal history, memory and relationships. She works with a range of materials including organic matter and found objects, alongside more classical materials such as bronze and Carrera marble. Cross often acts as an alchemist, using these different materials to explore the relationship between living beings and the natural world.

Poll na bPéist translates as ‘The Wormhole’, ‘Péist’ being a reptilian sea monster from Gaelic folklore. It is the name of a tidal pool located by the Western Cliffs of Inishmore, near where the artist is based. The almost perfect rectangular shape appears to be man-made but was in fact formed naturally in the limestone rock. Underwater channels connect to the sea, allowing water to flow in and out. Sometimes waves crash over it at high tide, filling it from the top, which makes it a dangerous place to swim.

The photograph Poll na bPéist shows the artist floating in the pool, exploring the elemental relationship between the human form, specifically female, and the water. Water is a symbol of purification and a metaphor for the

cyclical nature of life. There may also be an indication of religious connotations to the image, with the cruciform positioning of the artist’s body. An energy of rebirth and renewal is evident within this image, but there is also an underlying tension between the female form, forces of nature and the landscape.

Mercer Art Gallery has been building a collection that explores Harrogate’s spa heritage. Contemporary art interrogating current thinking about health and wellbeing serves as a counterpoint to historical images of spa bathers. Pieces by Caroline Walker, Tacita Dean and Jacqueline Moreau are included. The gallery also seeks to showcase more work by women artists, and the acquisition of Dorothy Cross’s Poll na bPéist addresses the gender imbalance in their collection.

Dorothy Cross (b. Cork, Ireland, 1956) lives and works in Connemara. Solo exhibitions include Frith Street Gallery, London (2022); and Kerlin Gallery, Dublin (2019). Group exhibitions include The Classical Museum, University College Dublin; Herbert Art Gallery & Museum, Coventry (both 2021); Crawford Art Gallery, Cork; Fries Museum, Leeuwarden (both 2020); IMMA, Dublin; RAMM, Exeter; and National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin (2019).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society with support from Emma Goltz and the Friends of the Mercer Art Gallery, 2022/23

‘The Worm Hole is an extraordinary natural pool that lies beneath the cliffs on Inishmore, Aran Islands, Galway, Ireland. To my mind it is a wonder of the world … a perfect sculpture formed by nature over millenia. The ocean enters through a subterranean cave and tides rise and fall within. I asked a friend to photograph me lying at its centre, to present a sense of scale and create the notion of a limited ocean. It is simple and precarious.’

Dorothy Cross, artist

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Peter Scott Gallery, Lancaster Arts

Sena Başöz

Füruğ/Forough

2018

Digital print on vellum paper, fans

Dimensions variable

Sena Başöz investigates healing processes after trauma, focusing on the regenerative possibilities for what is frozen, dead, stale or lost. At this point in her practice, the Turkish artist mainly looks at the importance of care and an organism’s capacity for self-repair.

Füruğ/Forough is composed of hundreds of photographic portraits of taxidermied birds from the collection of the Natural History Museum of St. Joseph French High in Istanbul. These images are printed on vellum paper, with fans directed towards them. The movement created by the artificial wind results in a sound reminiscent of a bird’s wings in flight and motion-like murmurations.

In the 1990s, enforced disappearances took place in Turkey. In demonstrations against these disappearances, taking place up to the present day, family, friends and members of the public carry photographs of individuals affected. Each bird in Füruğ/ Forough represents a missing person and acts as a small gesture to their memory and the ongoing search for justice. Some of the birds photographed are endangered or extinct, adding another layer of meaning to this installation.

The title comes from the first name of Iranian poet and film director Forough Farrokhzad and references her famous line, ‘Keep the flight in mind, the bird may die.’ Farrokhzad is now seen as a pioneer in modern Farsi poetry, though, unfortunately, she did not receive this recognition during her lifetime.

The Peter Scott Gallery is part of Lancaster Arts, based at Lancaster University, reaching audiences on the university campus, online and in public spaces in Lancaster and across the North West. Lancaster Arts has a multidisciplinary programme addressing environmental and social justice. Başöz’s immersive work reflects on universal topics such as grief, loss, memory and climate change, which will resonate with audiences and with the wider creative programme.

Sena Başöz (b. Izmir, Turkey, 1980) is an artist and filmmaker based in Istanbul. Selected solo exhibitions include Librairie Yvon Lambert, Paris; Bilsart, Istanbul (both 2021); Lotsremark Projekte, Art Basel; Krank Art Gallery, Istanbul; MO-NOHA Seongsu (all 2020); and DEPO, Istanbul (2018). Selected group exhibitions include Artists’ Film International (2021); Kunstraum Dreiviertel, Bern (2020); and Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin (2018). She participated in artist residencies at Delfina Foundation, London (2022, 2020) and Cité Internationale des Arts (2017).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Reading Museum

Halima Cassell

Vestige

2023

Hand-carved, unglazed stoneware clay

27.8 x 47 cm

Combining strong geometric elements with recurrent patterns and architectural principles, Halima Cassell utilises definite lines and dramatic angles to manifest the universal language of number but also to create an unsettling sense of movement in her clay sculptures. Informed by her South Asian heritage and her long-established interest in Islamic art as well as historical British architecture, Cassell is fascinated by the place of decoration in architectural settings.

In 2022, Cassell was invited by Reading Museum to develop a new commission, a carved clay sculpture, in response to the Romanesque Reading Abbey stones. These are arguably the most historically significant works of art in the Reading Museum collection and are some of the few remaining examples of the flowering of stone carving in England in the eleventh century. There are strong connections between Cassell’s deeply carved, brilliantly calculated surfaces and the Romanesque aesthetic, which was itself influenced by Moorish art and architecture.

Cassell’s stoneware is heavily imbedded with grog – crushed or ground ceramic material,

reintroduced to raw clay prior to shaping and firing – and as a result, the texture of Vestige is akin to sandstone. This creates an aesthetic synergy with the stones but also a surprise for visitors discovering the medium. Vestige will sit among the abbey capitols in Reading Museum’s collection to bring a new artistic perspective to the abbey stones and to celebrate their international significance. The art collection at Reading Museum has strengths in both sculpture and ceramic work, and the new sculpture will add a contemporary vision. The Reading Museum’s Contemporary Collection aims to address specific communities in Reading – in this case, art lovers and people of Islamic heritage – reflecting the diverse nature of Reading’s communities and creating relevance, reflection, linkage and contrast between the past and the present.

Halima Cassell MBE FRSS (b. Kashmir, Pakistan, 1975) lives and works in Shropshire. Recent solo exhibitions include Watt’s Gallery, Compton, Guildford; Blackwell, Windermere (both 2023); and Manchester Art Gallery (2020). Recent group exhibitions include Sculpture Trail Wakefield; Aberystwyth Museum (both 2023); The Hepworth Wakefield (2022); and Gallery Pangolin, Chalford (2021). In 2018, Cassell won the Sovereign Asian Art Prize, Hong Kong.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23, with support from the Heritage Lottery Fund, Reading Abbey Revealed Project and the Reading Foundation for Art

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

South London Gallery

Rene Matić

Kirby Estate Bermondsey

2022

Inkjet print, framed

46.4 x 70 cm (unframed)

Edition of 5 plus 2 AP

Opposite, top

Rene at Home

2022

Inkjet print, framed 40 x 26.5 cm (unframed)

Edition of 5 plus 2 AP

Opposite, bottom

Rene Matić’s work addresses themes of identity and nationality, as well as feminism and queerness. Matić takes their departure from different subcultures, dances and music movements, most prominently skinhead, ska and Two-tone. Matić’s work uses these to queer and show the connections between West Indian and white working-class culture in Britain. Their work spans several disciplines in a meeting place they describe as ‘rude(ness)’ –to interrupt and exist in/between. This is partly a reference to the rude boy subculture, which the Jamaican diaspora brought to Britain.

These photographs are part of the ongoing series flags for countries that don’t exist but bodies that do, which began in 2018. This series is a personal diary documenting Matić’s community and family, both chosen and otherwise, as well as being a portrait and deconstruction of contemporary Britain. Matić had a solo show at South London Gallery in

2022, which featured a room focused on the artist’s recordings of their lived experience in Peckham, and two artworks were chosen from this room for acquisition. Flags recur in Matić’s practice: they can be symbols of concepts as disparate as patriotism and protest. Kirby Estate Bermondsey shows the St George’s Cross, and through this, Matić seeks to question who is included and excluded from a claim to ‘Britishness’.

Rene at Home is a self-portrait by the artist. Themes of faith emerge through subtle details such as a crucifix tattooed on the artist’s hand, placing identity and spirituality in dialogue. The artist is interested in exploring the contradictions and diversity within these chosen or assigned categories.

These photographs strengthen the photographic collection of the South London Gallery while also affirming their commitment to diversity. Acquiring work about and from the local community ensures relevance for those that visit.

Rene Matić (b. Peterborough, UK, 1997) lives and works in London. Recent solo shows include South London Gallery; Quench Gallery, Margate (both 2022); Arcadia Missa, London; and VITRINE Gallery, London (both 2021). Recent group exhibitions include High Art, Arles; Sadie Coles HQ, London (both 2022); Bold Tendencies, London; South London Gallery (both 2021); and Schlossmuseum, Linz (2020).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Swindon Museum and Art Gallery

Dee Ferris

Sleepy Hollow

2014

Acrylic on canvas

153 x 184 cm

Opposite, top

The Places We Go

2022

Acrylic on canvas

153 x 184 cm

Opposite, bottom

Dee Ferris uses large-scale canvases to immerse the viewer in fields of colour, emotive brushwork and enigmatic imagery. She treads the line between abstraction and figuration, resisting a finite narrative while evoking a sense of light, space and energy. Ferris uses an intense process where she finds reference images that are then dissolved and re-emerge in her paintings.

The Places We Go is from Ferris’s latest series, Azyl/Azul, which explores humanity’s uncomfortable and contradictory relationship with landscape imagery. Epic vistas, deep blue voids and humble figures propose a narrative that lies just beyond our reach. What may be perceived as tranquil escapism could just as easily conjure ideas of danger and isolation. With its sublime quality and links to the natural landscape, The Places We Go complements the Neo-Romantic paintings of John Piper and Graham

Sutherland, whose artworks are already represented in Swindon Museum and Art Gallery’s collection. It also brings narratives about migration and social isolation to landscape painting, inviting conversations pertinent to issues of the present.

Sleepy Hollow presents an intricate network of pastel tones pierced by moments of luminous light. The trace of a plant form prevents Sleepy Hollow from being completely abstract and suggests an intimate perspective on a large scale.

The Places We Go and Sleepy Hollow will be temporarily displayed at Swindon Museum and Art Gallery when it reopens in 2023. These two paintings by Ferris represent different stages of her career. Yet, in equal measure, they enrich the strong representation of landscape painting and large-scale gestural canvases in Swindon’s collection. They also speak to other recently acquired contemporary artworks, which address themes of place, memory, individualism and image consumption.

Dee Ferris (b. Paulton, UK, 1973) lives and works in Brighton. Recent solo exhibitions include Corvi-Mora, London (2022, 2017); and Taro Nasu, Tokyo (2007). Recent group exhibitions include PI Artworks, London (2022); Attercliffe, Sheffield (2018); Nottingham Contemporary; and Tate St Ives (both 2013).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

The Hunterian, University of Glasgow

2022

Archival inkjet print, MDF board with oak veneer

200 x 100 x 3.5 cm

Jimmy Robert interrogates the idea of inclusion and exclusion through a multidisciplinary practice that includes performance, photography and sculpture. Robert is interested in how the body can become an object and vice versa. He often cites art history, film and literature, which add to his layered narratives and give the audience different avenues through which to engage with the work.

The series Frammenti is the result of collaging and photographing images of classical sculptures in and around Naples. Robert positions together photographs of his own body, of various polychrome sculptures around Naples, and other images. Each work is framed in different ways, extending the possibilities of paper as a sculptural medium. Robert’s collages also contend the aesthetics of white imperialism generated by the false belief that ancient Greek and Roman sculptures were white. In reality, these sculptures usually had brightly painted clothes, skin, hair and even make-up. As sculptures were subjected to the

elements, the pigments faded and, when they were unearthed, the pigments mixed with dirt and calcite were brushed away in the cleaning process.

In 2023, The Hunterian redisplays its entire art collection, aiming to make the art gallery more meaningful to a wider audience. The filmmaker and scholar Manthia Diawara and art historian and curator Terri Geis collaborate to create an exhibition, The Trembling Museum, which showcases and reinterprets The Hunterian’s collection of African art. In this context, Frammenti V will be valuable in reflecting the representation of the Black body and Blackness in classical statuary.

Jimmy Robert (b. Saint-Claude, Guadeloupe, 1975) lives and works in Berlin. Solo exhibitions include Moderna Museet, Malmö; Centre National de la Danse, Paris-Pantin (both 2023); Kunsthalle Baden-Baden; Thomas Dane, Naples; Kerenidis Pepe Foundation, Anafi (all 2022); The Hunterian, Glasgow (2021); and Nottingham Contemporary (2020). Group exhibitions include Artsalon, Berlin (2023); the 5th Aichi Triennale; The Green Gallery, Milwaukee (all 2022); and the 6th Ural Industrial Biennial, Ekaterinburg(2021).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Jimmy Robert Frammenti V

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery, Leeds University Library

Phoebe Boswell Sentinel (Green)

2021

Graphite, pastel, Indian ink and watercolour on paper

58 x 42 cm

Phoebe Boswell’s practice is anchored in drawing but also includes animation, sound, video, writing, installation and, more recently, painting. Her, mainly figurative, work is concerned with diaspora and migration, bodies and protest, as well as climate change and capitalism, and explores how these themes interconnect across time.

The series Future Ancestors: Sentinels (2021), to which Sentinel (Green) belongs, portrays fishermen whom the artist encountered on the beach near her family home in Zanzibar, Tanzania. These men’s generational relationship with the sea is being challenged through a combination of climate change, tourism and overfishing. Boswell reimagines and honours these men as ‘future ancestors’ in search of a ‘new place’ – beyond the history of Zanzibar as a slave port and the current climate crisis. As she explains, the series is ‘a call to remember and also a call to arms. We need to know how resilient and adaptive we are in order for our imaginations to begin to envision a new place.’

Boswell’s practice resonates with issues of migration, climate change and sustainability that have become crucial for the University of Leeds Art Collection and the temporary exhibitions programme in recent years. Her work also contributes to the gallery’s longstanding collection of drawings, to aid the teaching of technique to university students. Finally, as a centre for feminist art history, The Stanley & Audrey Burton Gallery is happy to receive work by an artist whose wider practice regularly engages with Black feminism.

Phoebe Boswell (b. Nairobi, Kenya, 1982) lives and works in London. Recent solo exhibitions include Wentrup Gallery, Berlin (2022); New Art Exchange, Nottingham (2021); Sapar Contemporary, solo booth at The Armory Show, New York (2020); Autograph, London (2019); and Tiwani Contemporary, London (2017). Recent group exhibitions include Gagosian, London (2023); Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg; and the 16th Biennale de Lyon, France (both 2022). Boswell was the Whitechapel Gallery’s Writer in Residence (2022) and the Bridget Riley Drawing Fellow at the British School of Rome (2019). She was awarded the Future Generation Art Prize’s Special Prize (2017) and won the Paul Hamlyn Foundation Award (2019).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

University of Salford Art Collection

Christiane Baumgartner

Nordlicht – 6.08pm

2018

Woodcut on Japanese Koso paper

Paper: 138 x 106 cm

Image: 119.5 x 89.7 cm

Edition of 6

Dark Water

2018

Woodcut on Japanese Misumi paper

Paper: 48 x 59.5 cm

Image: 33.8 x 45.3 cm

Edition of 12

Opposite

Prometheus I-III

2021

A series of three woodcuts on Japanese Misumi paper

Paper: 59.5 × 45 cm

Image: 48.2 × 36 cm

Edition of 12

Promise

2021

Woodcut on Japanese Misumi paper

Paper: 55 x 70 cm

Image: 44.7 x 59.9 cm

Edition of 12

Christiane Baumgartner’s work employs old and new technologies, using traditional woodcut printmaking techniques to create images based on her own film and video stills. She carefully considers themes of time, flow, motion, stasis and place in her detailed monochrome prints. Earlier works drew imagery from urban environments, warfare and technology, juxtaposing the high speed of

modern life with the slow and careful process of woodcut carving: a ‘convergence of speed and standstill’, as the artist describes it. Later works, including this acquisition, focus more closely on natural environments, considering the increasing importance of slowing down and connecting with or longing for the beauty of nature in a fast-paced world.

Promise, Prometheus I-III, Nordlicht - 6.08pm and Dark Water each explore these momentto-moment connections with nature and, in particular, the qualities of constantly changing light across land, sea, sky and horizon. Promise captures the moment the sun breaks through a cloud. The triptych Prometheus charts the sun setting at dusk, a reference to the myth of Prometheus and the meeting of fire and water. Nordlicht - 6.08pm is based on a series of photographs that Baumgartner took on the island of Rügen in the Baltic Sea, looking through trees to the north coast at minutelong intervals as the sun is beginning to set, perhaps a reminder to savour each moment as it happens. Dark Water, meanwhile, merges landscape even further with abstraction, describing the ever-shifting surfaces and depths of the sea.

The prints join a strong body of modern and contemporary printmaking held at the University of Salford Art Collection. They support the About the Digital strand of collecting, which includes works made with, or about, digital technology and its wider implications and uses in modern life. They also enhance the current thematic strand of collecting around nature and natural environments, particularly in the context

of climate change. Since 2014, the Collection has also worked to increase the representation of women and non-binary artists, from less than 10% historically to over 50% in contemporary collecting and commissioning.

Christiane Baumgartner (b. Leipzig, East Germany, 1967) lives and works in Leipzig and Hiddensee, Germany. Selected solo shows include Galerie Thomas Zander, Cologne (2022); Cristea Roberts Gallery, London (2021); and MFA Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA (2017).

Selected group shows include Detroit Institute of Arts; Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery (both 2022); The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; and Leipziger Jahresausstellung (both 2021). Her work is held in over 40 international public collections, including that of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the British Museum in London, and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Victoria Gallery & Museum, University of Liverpool

Yinka Shonibare CBE RA

Unstructured Icons

2018

A set of six woodblock prints with fabric collage on Somerset Tub sized satin 410gsm paper

Paper: 84 x 62 cm

Image: 70 x 50 cm

Edition of 25

Yinka Shonibare’s work reflects his BritishNigerian heritage, exploring themes of (post) colonialism, race and class in a globalised world. Shonibare’s process is interdisciplinary, using sculpture, painting, photography and film to tell the story of identity formation. Ankara fabric has become a signature of his work. Also known as Dutch wax print, it was introduced to West and Central Africans by Dutch merchants during the nineteenth century, imitating the batik technique they had encountered when colonising Indonesia.

Unstructured Icons is made of six woodblock prints housed in a wooden portfolio box. In this series, Shonibare responds to historical Western portraiture, overlaying images with fabric and stylised African ritual masks. King shows Henry VIII c.1537, and Queen I and Queen II show Elizabeth I (c.1546 and c.1575, respectively). The original portrait of Henry VIII, which is part of the Walker Art Gallery’s collection in Liverpool, shows the king as taller, younger and healthier than he was at the time it was painted. If this portrait was commissioned to show his power, how does its message change when his face is obscured by an African mask and his body covered with Ankara patterns?

The Victoria Gallery & Museum (VG&M) is part of the University of Liverpool, which originated in the 1880s and is inextricably bound up in colonial legacies. Both VG&M and the University hope to redress historical injustices through a focused effort on diversifying their collections. This includes being part of The World Reimagined Project, a national initiative to give a platform for learning about the Transatlantic Slave Trade, colonialism and Black achievement, for which Shonibare is one of the lead artists. Portraits make up a large portion of the VG&M collection, and these prints will offer a springboard to discussion.

Yinka Shonibare CBE RA (b. London, UK, 1962) lives and works in London. He spent his childhood in Nigeria before returning to London to study. He contracted transverse myelitis when he was eighteen, resulting in a long-term disability. Recent solo exhibitions include Goodman Gallery, Cape Town (2022); Stephen Friedman Gallery, London; Museum der Moderne Salzburg (both 2021); James Cohan Gallery, New York; The Arts House, Singapore (both 2020); and The British Museum, London (2019). Recent group exhibitions include Royal Academy, London; Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Magasin III, Stockholm; and Chiostro del Bramante, Italy (all 2022). He was awarded an MBE in 2004, and then a CBE in 2019 in recognition of his contribution to the arts. In 2013 he was elected a Royal Academician.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society with the support of the University of Liverpool, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Fine Art

Walker Art Gallery, National Museums Liverpool

Rene Matić

Chiddy doing Rene’s Hair

2019

Photograph, framed

40 x 27 cm

Edition 3 of 3 plus 2 AP

Opposite, top left

Rene and Maggie III

2019

Photograph, framed

29.7 x 16.9 cm

Edition of 1 of 3 plus 2 AP

Rene’s Jacket

2018

Photograph, framed 40 x 26.7 cm

Edition 3 of 3 plus 2 AP

Opposite, bottom

Christmas Decorations

2021

Photograph, framed

29.7 x 16.9 cm

Edition 1 of 3 plus 2 AP

Opposite, top right

Rene’s Studio

2021

Photograph, framed 40 x 27 cm

Edition 1 of 5 plus 2 AP

Rene Matić’s work spans several disciplines in a meeting place they describe as ‘rude(ness)’ – to interrupt and exist in/between. Matić takes their departure from different subcultures, dances and music movements, most prominently skinhead, ska and Two-tone. Skinhead culture was born of the exchange

between Caribbean and white working-class people in the 1960s and then later, the aesthetics were co-opted by white supremacists. Matić’s ‘rude(ness)’ is partly a reference to the rude boy subculture, which the Jamaican diaspora brought to Britain. They are interested in exploring conceptions of being an outsider and ‘Britishness’, as well as the contradictions and diversity within these chosen or assigned categories.

These photographs are part of the ongoing series flags for countries that don’t exist but bodies that do, which began in 2018. They document twenty-first-century Britain and Britishness, as interwoven with intimate portraits of the artist, their family and friends. The photographs feature candid moments as well as staged displays. Additionally, they serve as a constructed archive for Matić, as the artist has very few photos of their dad’s side of the family. In this way, they answer their own questions about whether the information they have is enough to construct an identity showing different parts of life that create their world.

The Walker Art Gallery has a small but representative collection of documentary photography, including works by Martin Parr, Tom Wood and Zanele Muholi. The Walker’s collections illustrate important cultural events and moments in recent history, including the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020 and Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee. The gallery also aims to actively collect works by LGBTQ+ people, global majority artists and those that engage with Black British history. Additionally, one of the Walker’s collection priorities is to have emerging artists associated with the North West, and Matić previously lived in Liverpool.

Rene Matić (b. Peterborough, UK, 1997) lives and works in London. Recent solo shows include South London Gallery; Quench Gallery, Margate (both 2022); Arcadia Missa, London; and VITRINE Gallery, London (both 2021). Recent group exhibitions include High Art, Arles; Sadie

Coles HQ, London (both 2022); Bold Tendencies, London; South London Gallery, London (both 2021); and Schlossmuseum, Linz (2020).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society with the support of Bianca Roden, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Omega Fund

‘I’m thrilled that my work has found a new and permanent home at Birmingham Museums Trust. Birmingham city has a longstanding history as the centre of the silversmithing industry in the country. I’m excited to have my work on display at the museum and exposed to new audiences.’

Adi Toch, artist

Acquisitions Scheme: Omega Fund

Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales

Zoe Preece

The Way the Earth Remembers our Bodies (Material Presence)

2018

CNC-milled walnut table

75.5 x 152 x 87 cm Opposite, with detail below

Zoe Preece is a ceramicist who focuses on the domestic realm. Her creations invoke ordinary and human scenes in order to focus attention on what might be overlooked. Usually, Preece carves plaster before moulding and casting white porcelain. In the case of this piece, she collaborated with Fablab Cardiff and used 3D scanning and CNC milling to produce milled walnut furniture.

The meaning of Material Presence lies in the question, ‘How do you dignify an ordinary life?’ The table defies expectations, with the remains of a meal carved – or, more correctly, CNC-milled – into its walnut surface. The choice of walnut as a material relates to the history of its value in the making of high-status furniture. This choice also puts it in dialogue with the porcelain of An Archive of Longing – a piece already acquired by Amgueddfa Cymru, consisting of an assemblage of unglazed porcelain objects; collectively, the

two elements form a three-dimensional still life – the work Material Presence – using highstatus materials to mark ordinary moments and objects and questioning how we accord status and what aspect of our lives we most value.

In contrast to the precise lines and blemish-free surfaces of the porcelain forms in An Archive of Longing, where all evidence of use and making has been removed, the defining edges of the items on the table’s surface are blurred. The history of a particular lived moment has been made solid, and the table has become a monument to those ordinary moments in everyday life.

Zoe Preece (b. Littlehampton, UK, 1973) lives and works in Cardiff and is based at the city’s Fireworks Clay Studios. Solo exhibitions include Aberystwyth Art Centre (2022); Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea (2021); and Llantarnam Grange Arts Centre (2018). Group exhibitions include Two Temple Place, London; Collect, Somerset House (both 2022); National Museum Wales, Cardiff (2021); and Oita Prefecture Art Museum (2019).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Omega Fund with the support of the Derek Williams Trust, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Omega Fund

Birmingham Museums Trust

Adi Toch In Motion Whispering Vessel

2022

Hard gold-plated recycled copper alloy

12 x 20 x 20 cm

Adi Toch explores the vessel form through manipulating metal and examining its conductive, sonic and reflective qualities. She starts with a flat metal sheet and contorts it by hand into the desired shape using different tools. As part of her process, Toch investigates the relationship between people and objects, which is reflected in the final object she creates. Her work is generally based around the form of the container or vessel, which she sees as a means of communication, telling stories of gathering, holding and storing. These vessels are often inspired by the forms of ancient Mediterranean archaeological objects, connecting us to historical practices.

The works in the Whispering Vessels series are hollow and double-layered. They contain substances like sand or tiny gemstones, which can move freely inside but cannot be emptied out. The content is visible from the opening and can be experienced as the vessel moves, creating sounds or elusive patterns. The vessels exist somewhere between domestic objects, like bowls, and percussion instruments. Toch sees sound as a way in which metal communicates. Her interest in this topic is inspired by her experience as a maker, knowing how to respond to the material and adjusting her approach

based on the noise the metal makes when hammered or worked.

From the sixteenth to the nineteenth century, metalworking made up most of Birmingham’s industry, making it the centre of metalworking in the UK. The streets would have rung with the sound of hammers hitting anvils, creating a large variety of metal objects. In Motion Whispering Vessel will enable Birmingham Museums Trust to explore this aspect of the city’s history in a creative and sensory way, particularly as it looks to develop new displays on Birmingham’s manufacturing heritage. Additionally, Toch’s work will add to Birmingham’s significant collection of Contemporary Metalwork.

Adi Toch (b. Jerusalem, 1979) lives and works in London. Recent group shows include FOG Design and Art San Francisco (2022); The Gilbert Collection, Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Crafts Council, London; and Sarah Myerscough Gallery, London (all 2021). Toch has been awarded the European Prize for Applied Arts, Master Prize, and the Goldsmiths’ Craftsmanship & Design Award (2018). Her work is held in several collections, including those of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh; National Museum Wales, Cardiff; and the Jewish Museum, New York.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Omega Fund, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Omega Fund

Leicester Museum & Art Gallery

Anthony Amoako-Attah

Take me home II

2022

Screen-printed and kiln-formed glass

43.5 x 37.5 x 18.6 cm

Anthony Amoako-Attah first encountered glassmaking during his Ceramics BA degree at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Ghana in 2010 – glass had only just been introduced to the department. He moved to Sunderland University to complete an MA in Glass and is currently working on his PhD in Glass at the same institution.

Amoako-Attah superimposes the intricate patterns of Kente textiles from Southern Ghana onto sheet glass, which he kiln-forms to mimic the movement and texture of cloth. Kente cloth uses colour and pattern symbolically to celebrate rites of passage and historical events. He also incorporates black-and-white symbols called Adinkra, which represent concepts from Ghanaian proverbs. Amoako-Attah invents new Kente designs that express contemporary experiences of transition, migration, integration and life chances.

Take me home II is representative of a more sculptural direction for Amoako-Attah. This work is based on the woven plastic red, white and blue bags that derogatorily became known as ‘Ghana Must Go’ bags when Ghanaians

were forcefully expelled from Nigeria in 1983, following an executive order from President Shehu Shagari. Their ubiquity allowed Ghanaians to conceal important familial and cultural belongings as they fled. This is represented in the piece, which replicates the simple design of the bags and confirms their status as cultural symbols with Kente patterns and Adinkra symbols.

Leicester Museum & Art Gallery has a handful of textile samples from Ghana within its collection. Amoaka-Attah’s work resonates with the institution in terms of how it captures the spirit of African textiles but also how it explores themes related to the effects of migration, dislocation and personal identity – particularly relevant as the Museum & Art Gallery attained the Museum of Sanctuary Award last year.

Anthony Amoako-Attah (b. Obuasi, Ghana, 1989) lives and works in Sunderland. Recent exhibitions include Collect, London (2022); Sunderland Museum & Winter Gardens (2019); National Glass Center, Sunderland (2016); and Business Design Centre, London (2016). He was selected as ‘Artist of the Fair’ at Collect, London (2022) and won the first prize at Aspiring Glass Art, Warm Glass (2020).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Omega Fund with assistance from the City of Leicester Museums Trust, 2022/2023

Acquisitions Scheme: Omega Fund

National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh

Jonathan Boyd

Very Little Common Ground

2019

Pendant: silver Box: leather

25 x 15 x 5 cm

Jonathan Boyd explores how jewellery should be regarded as a sociopolitical art form. Because jewellery can go beyond the gallery wall or display case, it has a unique position, allowing both the maker and the wearer to interact in a public space. In this way, it becomes more of a performance than something purely aesthetic.

Very Little Common Ground is part of a series of works containing words and text used by politicians, the press and political commentators during the EU referendum in the UK. It was made to reflect the overload of information that typically results in conflicting and confusing ideas. The title refers to how little the thoughts and comments from two opposing journalists on the situation – one from the right and one from the left – merged. Therefore, the pendant reflects the conflict and divisions within the country and society by showing the journalists’ lack of crossover. Boyd felt that on both sides of the Brexit campaign, our cultural identities were being changed and

manipulated by the language used by individuals in positions of authority.

Very Little Common Ground is an example of jewellery used as a catalyst for a shared dialogue on current affairs between the maker, wearer and viewer. As jewellery is often a symbol of wealth, there is a unique form of satire when it becomes a political medium. National Museums Scotland already have a small collection of political jewellery, including the Holloway Prison Suffragette brooch from c.1909, David Poston’s Slave Manacle from 1975, Sera Park Choi’s Stay Home from 2020, and Jo Garner’s 2017 set of five brooches Crafting a Divide Very Little Common Ground will enhance this collection by representing a significant present-day political event.

Jonathan Boyd (b. Aberdeen, Scotland, 1984) lives and works in London. Selected solo exhibitions include Gallery SO, London (2019); Dovehill Studio Galleries (2015); and AU Gallery, Glasgow (2010). Selected group exhibitions include Collect, London (2021); China International Metal Art Exhibition, Beijing (2021); and the 6th International Biennale of Contemporary Jewellery and Metal Art, Vilnius (2020).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Omega Fund, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Omega Fund

Southampton City Art Gallery

Phoebe Collings-James

Jugular 2021

Glazed ceramic 48 x 48 cm

Phoebe Collings-James’s practice comes from a desire to work with clay as a live, sculptural material, and from previous paintings she produced on canvas. These two ways of making converged into her current process, which allows for the incorporation of resonant symbols and textures. She describes her work as ‘emotional detritus’, as it speaks of the feelings and experiences of living, surviving and desiring within hostile environments; the artist hopes that viewers will have a sensory reaction to her art.

Jugular is a significant work as it marks the moment the artist first incorporated colour into their clay paintings. Previously, their scroll-like tablets had always been grids of monochromatic white slip and glaze on black clay. This work stands alone as a single panel, marked with dynamic brush strokes, which describes the vulnerability of ‘going for the jugular’ with an onomatopoeic thrust. The work also contains sgraffito markings and slip painting – techniques that have become integral to Collings-James’s ceramic language.

Southampton City Art Gallery holds one of the finest collections of art in the south of England and holds ‘Designated’ status, awarded by Arts Council England. Currently comprising over 5,000 works and spanning eight centuries, the collection is an outstanding educational resource that can trace the history of European art from the Renaissance to the present. The core, however, is British twentieth-century and contemporary art. Jugular is an important addition to the small but significant collection of ceramic works held by the gallery, which is built on a bequest of British studio pottery by Eric Milner-White in 1939 that represents some of the best studio potters working in England between the two World Wars, including Bernard Leach and Shoji Hamada.

Phoebe Collings-James (b. 1987, London) works in London and Brooklyn, New York. Recent solo exhibitions include the Camden Arts Centre, London; Picture Room, New York (both 2021); Palais de Tokyo, Paris; Ginerva Gambino, Cologne; and Arcadia Missa, London (all 2018). Selected group exhibitions include Two Temple Place, London (2022); Kunsthalle Düsseldorf; Eastside Projects, Birmingham (both 2021); and FACT Liverpool (2019).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Omega Fund, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Omega Fund

Williamson Art Gallery & Museum, Birkenhead

Michael

Brennand-Wood

Return to Origin

2022

Interlaced stitchery, collage, photography and collage on wood panel

99 x 66 x 4 cm

Michael Brennand-Wood is a textile artist who combines his knowledge of ancient craft techniques, such as hand embroidery and lace making, with modern techniques like digital printing and computerised machine embroidery, to create textile multimedia pieces. Brennand-Wood is keen to extend the possibilities of textiles in terms of practical realisation and across time through the handover of traditional techniques.

Return to Origin was commissioned for the Williamson Art Gallery & Museum, Birkenhead, in relation to the Arthur H. Lee & Sons archive. Lee-Fabrics was a Birkenhead company that ceased trading in 1970, and its archive contains extensive design records, photographs, advertising material, pattern books, printing stamps and publications. When the factory closed, the contents were sold; for many workers, it was the first time they could afford the goods they were making. Items disappeared into the local community and

beyond. The prominent British weaver Peter Collingwood (1922–2008) bought a collection of threads, which, years later, he gifted to the Williamson Art Gallery & Museum, as he had not used them. These now form part of Michael Brennand-Wood’s commission.

Return to Origin is a reference to the dispersal of Lee-Fabrics. Images from the company archives, such as chairs upholstered with different Lee-Fabrics, form the base pattern of Brennand-Wood’s collage. Each chair has a personable figurative quality; even with the absence of any human form, they seem like ghosts of another era. As Lee-Fabrics enhanced their fabrics through the fusion of print, weave and stitch, Brennand-Wood has done the same, with threads woven through and pinned on.

Michael Brennand-Wood (b. Bury, UK, 1952) is an artist and art consultant. Recent solo exhibitions include Galerie Ra, Amsterdam (2019); The Harley Gallery, Nottinghamshire; and Wolverhampton Art Gallery (both 2017). Group exhibitions include Craft Council, London (2021); Two Temple Place, London (2020); Fonderie Kugler, Geneva; Galerie RA, Amsterdam (all 2019); and Galerie Handwerk, Munich (2018).

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Omega Fund, 2022/23

Acquisitions Scheme: Omega Fund

Williamson Art Gallery & Museum, Birkenhead

Philip Eglin

Madonna and Child

2022

Ceramic, lead-glazed

51 x 18 x 13 cm

Philip Eglin is a ceramicist whose work reflects and comments on contemporary culture. Eglin’s references span international folklore, cultural icons and symbols used on packaging and the underside and backs of objects. This interest in everyday objects also manifests itself in the moulds used in his pieces. He works on a range of scales in earthenware and stoneware, from small functional vessels to large figurative and sculptural works.

Madonna and Child depicts the Virgin Mary and her infant son Jesus in a common motif where Mary is holding Jesus in her arms. This ceramic figure is transfer-printed with images showing other poses the Madonna and Child have taken in art history, for example, with different proportions or with and without halos. The Williamson Art Gallery & Museum has been keen to expand its contemporary ceramics collection, with a particular focus on non-functional and sculptural pieces. This piece demonstrates how ceramic artists are exploring surface decoration, glazing and sgraffito techniques in the present day, which allows them to show the contemporary resonance of earlier art pottery collections. Eglin’s work fits the bill in this

regard: Madonna and Child, as well as being a striking large sculpture, is a demonstration of transfer printing, moulding, slab-building and slip decoration.

The Williamson Art Gallery & Museum has an important ceramics collection – it houses the largest public collection of Della Robert Pottery as well as Liverpool porcelain, nineteenthand twentieth-century art pottery, and more contemporary studio ceramics. They are currently working on a project to refresh and reinterpret their ceramics display, relating the ideology that drove the ‘arts and crafts’ movement to the subjects of contemporary ceramics.

Philip Eglin (b. Gibraltar, 1959) is a contemporary ceramicist. Solo exhibitions include Scottish Gallery, Edinburgh (2021); Marsden Woo Gallery, London (2020); and Taste Contemporary, Geneva (2019). Group exhibitions include artgenéve, Geneva (2022); Crafts Council, London (2021); and Oxford Ceramics Gallery (2020). His work is held in numerous public collections internationally, including Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Mint Museum, Charlotte, North Carolina; British Council, London; The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge; National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh; and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Presented by the Contemporary Art Society through the Griffin Fund, 2022/23

Gifts & Bequests

‘We felt a responsibility to make our father’s work available to the public. How? We had no idea. The help and connections the CAS have with public collections have been an invaluable help and we are happy to see the work well distributed across the country in good appropriate collections. Thank you.’

Imogen Batterham, daughter of Richard Batterham

Gifts and Bequests

Richard Batterham

The Box, Plymouth

Small ochre porcelain

1958

Stoneware

6.5 x 7 cm

Star Bowl

1967

Stoneware

8 x 23 cm

p.92, top

Gravy pot with handle

1970s

Stoneware

11.43 x 12.7 cm

Lime marmalade pot

1980s

Stoneware

Small soufflé dish

1980s

Stoneware with salt glaze

5.5 x 10 x 4 cm

Medium caddy

Late 1980s

Stoneware with iron and ash glaze

16 x 12 cm

Caddy

1990s

Stoneware with ash glaze and blue, brushed iron glaze

23 x 14.5 cm

Box No date

Stoneware

Diameter: 4.5 cm

Large flat box No date

Stoneware with ash chatter marks

8 x 12.5 cm

Mustard pot No date

Stoneware with runny manganese glaze

9 x 7.5 cm

Small beer jar No date

Fluted stoneware

32 x 27 cm

Small bottle No date

Stoneware with ash glaze, unglazed rim and ridges

35.5 x 18 cm

Small cut teapot, lidded No date

Stoneware

12.5 x 19 x 11cm

p.93, top

Crafts Studies

Centre

Lidded Jar

1958

Stoneware

10.7 x 10.5 cm

Bottle thrown in three parts

1982

Stoneware, iron on slip, wiped decoration

73 x 28 cm

p.92, bottom Avocado dish

Mid 1980s

Porcelain

4 x 13 cm

Bottle Mid 1980s

Porcelain

14 x 9 cm

Humada Box No date

stoneware

Ladi Kwali Pot No date

Stoneware

Large Jug No date

Stoneware with black iron and ash glaze

39.5 x 20 cm

Muriel Rose Dish No date

Stoneware

Squared mustard pot No date

Porcelain

7 x 7 cm

The Hepworth

Wakefield

Bottle

1966

Stoneware with hazel ash and feldspar on top

22.5 x 10 cm

Large Cut Jar

2003

Stoneware with light brown salt glaze

27.5 x 16 cm p.93, bottom

Large Cut Jar

2003

Stoneware with black iron glaze and ash glaze

35 x 19 cm

Large Cut Jar

No date

Stoneware with light green glaze

35 x 19.5 cm

Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (MIMA)

Large Melon Teapot

1980s

Stoneware with salt glaze

18 x 29.5 cm

Cut Bowl

1996

Stoneware with black iron glaze and ash glaze

22 x 40.5 cm

Large dish

2011

Stoneware with ash glaze and blue

Diameter: 41 cm

Small Bottle No date

Stoneware with ash glaze and cobalt and blue dribble

37.5 x 19 cm

Small cut-sided box No date

Stoneware with ash glaze

7.5 x 13.5 cm

The Shipley Art Gallery, Gateshead

Small teapot

1996

Stoneware with ash/clay glaze

11.5 x 19.5 cm

Coffee mug

No date

Stoneware with green glaze

3 x 4 cm

Coffee mug

No date

Stoneware with green glaze

3 x 4 cm

Five-pint jug

No date

Stoneware with salt glaze

27 x 16 cm

Five-pint jug

No date

Stoneware with green glaze

28.5 x 17.5 cm

Five-pint jug No date

Stoneware with ash glaze

28 x 17 cm

Mustard Pot

Mustard pot

caddy

Stoneware with light green with chattering

11 x 9 cm

Richard Batterham worked at his pottery in Durweston, Dorset, for over sixty years. Over the course of his career, he established himself as one of the most distinguished and admired potters of his time. After a two-year apprenticeship at the Leach Pottery in St Ives, Batterham set up his own studio. He was the inheritor of an interwar British tradition of stoneware pottery throwing that combined a reverence for Japanese and other east Asian traditions with a love of British medieval pottery forms. Through the 1960s, his practice was more associated with a counter-culture that sought to distance itself from what it perceived as a world too in thrall to new technologies.

Throughout his life, Batterham kept some of his best work – things he considered particularly successful or that captured the essence of his ambition. Before he died, he worked with the ceramics department at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, to put together a substantial display of his own collection of pots. The display showcased the spectrum of his output, from modest, everyday items such as egg bakers and mustard pots to monumental pieces like large lidded beer jars. It was Batterham’s wish that a substantial number of pieces from his personal collection should eventually find homes in UK museums; after his death, it fell to his son and daughter, Reuben and Imogen Batterham, to honour that wish. Through the course of 2022, the Contemporary Art Society worked with curators at the Crafts Study Centre, Farnham; MIMA, Middlesbrough; Shipley Art Gallery, Gateshead; The Box, Plymouth; and The Hepworth Wakefield. All have had an opportunity to make selections of groups of pots, benefiting too from the advice of Reuben Batterham, who is perhaps the single most knowledgeable person on his father’s work.

The Hepworth Wakefield has been collecting British studio pottery since 1938 and, in recent years, has added numerous contemporary pieces as a result of gifts as well as judicious purchases.

Batterham was not represented at all in the collection, and the curator at the Hepworth chose a group of cut-sided vases that emphasise the sculptural quality of his sensibility.

The Box, Plymouth, holds one of the most important ceramics collections in the south west, with strengths in British porcelain and studio pottery, due to the region’s importance in the history of ceramics. In 1768, William Cookworthy discovered a china clay vein in Cornwall and established Britain’s first hardpaste porcelain factory in Plymouth. Three centuries later, the region became home to post-war artists experimenting with colour, abstraction and craft. Alongside the circles of painters and poets who lived and worked in St Ives, Cornwall, Bernard Leach and Shoji Hamada established one of the twentieth century’s most influential pottery studios. In spite of the distinction of its collections, The Box did not hold work by Richard Batterham and has chosen a group of pots that includes some of his rarer work in porcelain, highlighting their relationship to the history of porcelain in the south west.

The Shipley Art Gallery’s craft collections are designated as of national importance, and the Shipley is home to one of the most significant collections of twentieth-century studio ceramics in the UK. Today, the Shipley is home to the Henry Rothschild Collection. Rothschild’s advocacy of studio potters, through his shop Primavera and his collecting activity, had a profound influence on the development of post-war studio ceramics in Britain. Rothschild featured Richard Batterham’s work in the exhibitions he organised at Kettle’s Yard, Cambridge, in the early 1970s, and had six pieces by Batterham in his own personal collection, all of which are now at the Shipley. The Shipley have chosen pots to show Batterham’s lifelong interest in the repetition of forms and experiments with glaze and scale to complement their existing holdings.

For MIMA and the Crafts Study Centre, both of which already had some holdings of Batterham’s work, the proposition was also to select pieces that would complement the collections and amplify the understanding of his output further.

Richard Batterham (b. Woking, UK, 1936; d. Durweston, UK, 2021) was educated at Bryanston School, Dorset. He completed National Service from 1954 to 1956. From 1957 until 1958, he apprenticed at the Leach Pottery, St Ives. He had his first exhibition at the Hambledon Gallery, Winchester, in 1964, and his first solo exhibition at Crafts Centre London in 1965. Recent solo exhibitions include The Lightbox, Woking (2022), and a display at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (2021/22).

Gifts and Bequests

Alvaro Barrington

Towner Eastbourne

Alvaro Barrington

1944–1977

2018

Oil and yarn on burlap paper in custom frame

35.5 x 28 x 4 cm

Lamb of God

2020

Screen print in artist’s frame

100.3 x 76.2 cm

Edition 19 of 60 plus 30 AP

Opposite

Alvaro Barrington’s multimedia approach to image-making employs burlap, textiles, postcards and clothing. Considering himself primarily a painter, he also often works with performance and fashion, incorporating everyday objects into his works. Barrington explores how materials can function as visual tools while referencing their personal, political and commercial histories. He is often inspired by other artists, borrowing or copying from them and from other references, including art history and music. He is also informed by memory and nostalgia, using experiences from his life that have shaped him.

Two works, 1944–1977 and Lamb of God, have been gifted to Towner Eastbourne. 1944–1977 is a screen print that references work by other artists made in the eponymous time period. Having this dialogue with existing artworks is an essential part of his process and something he incorporates into his shows. Barrington’s play on connections between diverse historical

and contemporary cultural references is visible in Lamb of God, whose title highlights a phrase from the Bible: ‘Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.’ Both works are held in the artist’s characteristic home-made frames, which have been partially painted in contrasting colours.

Born to Grenadian and Haitian parents and raised between the Caribbean and New York, Barrington’s work deals with travel and cultural exchange. The artist is interested in what he describes as ‘celebrating communities in the way that they celebrate themselves, and the diverse cultural language in which we celebrate ourselves’. This corresponds with the Towner’s collection, which focuses on themes around landscape, community and location. 1944–1977 and Lamb of God formed part of the Towner 100: Unseen exhibition in 2023, which celebrated recent, unseen or less well-known acquisitions to the collection.

Alvaro Barrington (b. Caracas, Venezuela, 1983) lives and works in London and New York. Solo exhibitions include Mendes Wood, São Paulo (upcoming, 2023); Massimo De Carlo, Milan; Corvi-Mora, London; Blum & Poe, Los Angeles; Thaddaeus Ropac, Salzburg (all 2022); South London Gallery; Sadie Coles HQ, London (all 2021); and MoMA PS1, New York (2017). Recent group exhibitions include Le Consortium, Dijon; Goldsmiths Centre for Contemporary Art, London (both 2022); and Hayward Gallery (2021, touring).

Gifted by Russell Tovey through the Contemporary Art Society, 2022/23

CAS *Consultancy

‘CAS *Consultancy was extremely supportive in helping us find an artist to work with. They clearly understood our sustainable aspirations, the planning context and constraints of the location for the artwork and developed a carefully considered narrative for the artist to respond to. CAS *Consultancy provided invaluable guidance and knowledge when shortlisting artists and we felt they were all excellent choices, who had been carefully chosen. We enjoyed the collaborative process and were impressed with how they listened to our feedback and provided insight on the artists to help us select an artist.’

Tom Salmons, Senior Associate, Fletcher Priest Architects

‘CAS

has been working with the Royal Docks Team for the last year to develop a public art strategy across the Royal Docks in London. We have greatly valued their extensive expertise and advice to develop a practical strategy and valuable resources, as well as their rigorous and collaborative approach to the work. The process has been really enjoyable: CAS have been a real pleasure to work with, working collaboratively and flexibly across a multidisciplinary team.’

Lucy Loveday, Creative Project Producer, Greater London Authority

Strategies

Our public art and cultural strategies are robust frameworks for the future, offering practical guidance and sustainable methodologies for delivery. Arts and culture are essential components in successful development – making places people want to be a part of and contributing to long-term economic and social return.

Our approach is people-centred and developed collaboratively with stakeholders and communities. Over the past year, CAS *Consultancy has worked on a diverse set of UK strategies, from new life sciences developments to world-class dining destinations.

*Consultancy

Granta Park Phase 2 Public Art and Culture Programme

BioMed Realty with Eric Parry Architects and

Terence O’Rourke Landscape Architecture

Having successfully delivered a public artwork with CAS *Consultancy at Babraham Research Campus in 2021, BioMed Realty is planning an ambitious cultural offer for its newest development at Granta Park. The ambition is to commission an artwork that is completely unique to the site, has resonance for the communities Granta Park serves and is a positive addition to the campus’s sustainability agenda.

Granta Park is an important estate in one of the world’s most dynamic life sciences zones. Home to leading companies including Gilead, AstraZeneca, Illumina, Pfizer and PPD, the

current estate offers 120 acres of inspirational surroundings in rural Cambridgeshire for a population of nearly 4,000 people working at the cutting edge of biomedical research. Granta Park is expanding, with its Phase 2 masterplan approved by South Cambridgeshire District Council.

The Public Art and Culture Programme will see the development of a signature artwork that could only exist at Granta Park, revealing an interest in the ecology of Cambridgeshire and its unique setting. Both the artwork and its linked programme of events and activities should engage communities, sharing ideas about the site, its relationship to the River Granta and the larger ecosystem of which it is a part. The Programme will create a sense of place within Granta Park for people to consider the complex relationships and interdependencies of the natural world.

Oxford North Public Art and Culture Scheme

Stanhope with Oxford North Ventures, Thomas White Oxford, Hill Group and Fletcher Priest Architects

Oxford North will be a new, mixed-use innovation district comprising residential, life science research facilities, public amenities and substantial landscaping. Oxford North will attract the world’s best talent to a unique and highly skilled knowledge worker community.

CAS *Consultancy has developed a framework to reach out to stakeholder communities as they come online, which will develop and deliver public art that is woven into the fabric of the landscape and architecture across the development, both now and in the future. Oxford North needs an exciting, innovative public art approach to establish it as a major innovation quarter, and the CAS*C scheme advocates for curation that embraces digital transformation and innovation, enabling new forms of visitor experience and offering a feeling of welcome and inclusion, with public art that is sustainable and that invites stakeholders and residents to be part of the creative process from the outset with a range of thematically linked art practices.

Our Public Art and Culture Scheme offers opportunities to add to the character of this major innovation district by highlighting its progressive research and innovation principles, reinforcing orientation and legibility across the site and promoting a distinctive identity as a place of possibilities. Through public art integrated into the build process, the scheme advocates ‘adding value’ over the several phases of the development with interventions that include performance, experimentation and lab work as well as sculpture, wayfinding and a significant digital presence.

London Wall West Culture Plan City of London Corporation with Diller Scofidio + Renfro Architects, Sheppard

Robson Architects and Gross Max Landscape Architects

The City of London Corporation is consulting on plans to regenerate the London Wall West site, which comprises the previous home of the Museum of London and Bastion House. Through its development, the site provides an opportunity to create a world-class destination that attracts major businesses. In doing so, the project would help contribute to the funding required for major projects like the Museum of London’s move to West Smithfield and delivery of wider cultural, community and economic investment, as well as significant public realm improvements.

CAS *Consultancy has developed a collaborative Culture Plan to accompany the planning application for the wider masterplanning of the area. The Plan is a high-level document that defines a cultural vision for London Wall West, a series of cultural development principles, an approach to delivering culture relevant to its context and potential delivery partnerships. It includes recommended next steps for establishing a cultural governance model and short, medium and long-term programme development considerations. It is the first stage in a journey of commitment to culture and community at London Wall West and sits alongside the Statement of Community Involvement and Learning & Skills Strategy to offer a cohesive package of public benefits.

Heddon Street Public Art and Culture Strategy

The Crown Estate with Barr Gazetas Architects

The Crown Estate – one of the UK’s largest landowners, with a portfolio noted for its heritage, scale and diversity – has commissioned CAS *Consultancy to develop opportunities for a series of landmark public artworks as part of planned public realm works transforming Heddon Street in Central London into a global destination for outdoor dining.

The reinvention of this iconic street centres on art and will be used as an exemplar for The Crown Estate’s developments across its London portfolio. Our Public Art and Culture Strategy views the street as a single canvas –

a Gesamtkunstwerk – with opportunity areas proposed for art interventions developed through collaboration with the project design and delivery teams and ratified by The Crown Estate project steering group.

The final artworks will form a ‘wow’ moment for all audiences – those who work and dine on Heddon Street and those who visit for a oneoff occasion or come to visit the site of David Bowie’s album photography for Ziggy Stardust.

Royal Docks Public Art Strategic Framework

Mayor of London and Mayor of Newham

CAS *Consultancy has been working to develop a public art delivery network to define the Royal Docks as a cultural engine, signposting the repurposing of existing spaces and developing new spaces in which creatives can physically make and develop extraordinary work.

The Public Art Strategic Framework focuses on building a community of creative visionaries and the extensive support teams necessary to the development of new work in the Royal Docks, which is a large and complex series of landscapes incorporating a huge body of water, industrial and residential neighbourhoods, and numerous communities all with their own unique qualities and identities.

The Framework proposes approaches and methodologies to bring together the cultural, education and commercial initiatives based around the Royal Docks towards forming partnerships to connect, advocate for, support and improve networking and organisational

collaboration for public art across the Royal Docks. Our Framework provides guidance to help develop the wider ambition of creativity and culture becoming key drivers to improving the local economy, community wellbeing, skills development and ultimately strengthening community resilience in London’s post-pandemic landscape.

Springstead Village Public Art Strategy

Bellway Latimer Cherry Hinton LLP

Springstead Village will be a major extension of the Cherry Hinton suburb of Cambridge, three miles from the city. The development will focus on ecology, greening and sustainability, with a vision integrating housing and public space within a rich, living landscape.

Building on the deep connections between the Garden Cities and Arts and Crafts movements, CAS *Consultancy’s Public Art Strategy follows the principles set out in the development’s masterplan, referencing its Youth & Play Strategy through the integration of unique creative concepts, local narratives and natural materials in its recommendations.

The Strategy proposes the integration of an artist – and the public art they develop – into the public realm and play design process, thereby embedding art into the planning process to add value to landscape, play provision, wayfinding and street furniture to create an exemplar of public art and transformative design collaboration.

Public Commissions

We’re proud advocates for the power of art in public spaces and we’ve delivered some of London’s most important commissions over the past decade. Our expertise is matched by our commitment to the social impact art brings to the public arena.

CAS *Consultancy works with world-recognised artists to imagine and deliver art for all. We’re recognised leaders in the field and understand that arts and culture are central to placemaking and community building. Our clients share this vision and want to make a difference – delivering social value is at the heart of what we do, whether it’s temporary or permanent, online or on-site. Public space is changing and we’re delivering great art for great places.

Bedwyr Williams, Do the Little Things, St Davids, Wales, 2022 and Ferns, Republic of Ireland, 2023

Ancient Connections with Pembrokeshire and Wexford County Councils

In 2020, CAS *Consultancy approached artist Bedwyr Williams to develop a proposal for an artwork in two locations. Williams’s response was two identical works that consider the story of the relationship of St David and St Aidan and the pilgrim trail that connects their intersecting lives. The works – each a set of three oversized skeps (traditional beekeeper’s hives) –contain bee colonies that are cared for by local beekeepers, with the honey harvested, jarred and sold by and in the communities.

Commissioned by Ancient Connections, an EU-funded cross-border arts, heritage and tourism project, the project connects the

two communities through the practice of beekeeping, reflecting the medieval story of St David and his friendship with St Aidan, who, legend has it, brought bees back to Ireland from Wales.

Do The Little Things marks the beginning and end of the new pilgrim route between St Davids Cathedral and St Edan’s in Ferns. Managed by The British Pilgrimage Trust, the WexfordPembrokeshire Pilgrim Way encourages lowimpact tourism in both regions and opened in 2023. Similarly, sustainability and a respect for the environment are at the heart of the artwork, which is endorsed and supported by the local authorities of Pembrokeshire and Wexford in partnership with local organisations and community groups.

Ryan Gander, Schools Programme and Sketchbook

Lendlease with local schools and South London Gallery

In 2021, CAS *Consultancy commissioned artist Ryan Gander OBE RA to create a landmark public artwork for LendLease’s development, Elephant Park. Gander’s work has involved collaboration with the South London Gallery in Peckham and Year 4 pupils from three local primary schools to develop this new work.

Gander has carried out a series of workshops with the schools, involving children’s ideas about the future on a personal, local and global level. The aim of the project is to generate positive stories for young people and encourage them to reflect the diversity and energy of their own place and future.

Alongside these workshops and the final artwork, Gander has published The Future Sketchbook, a free resource available to all schools across Southwark and as a digital download across the country. Teachers and children are encouraged to get involved in this unique, creative project, while the artwork is due to be open to the public in the autumn of 2023.

Rhys Coren, One Exchange Square Commission

M3 Consulting with Fletcher Priest Architects

CAS *Consultancy is developing a new public art commission for the City of London at One Exchange Square. Part of the original 1980s Broadgate development, One Exchange previously housed the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

Fletcher Priest Architects are working to set a benchmark for sustainable refurbishment in the City. Approximately 90% of the existing building structure will be retained, minimising the carbon impact of construction. Embodied

carbon will be reduced by 50% compared to a typical new build and the operation of the building will be carbon neutral. One Exchange Square will be 100% electric, using smart façade designs and mechanical services in conjunction with building management systems to limit energy consumption.

Artist Rhys Coren has recently been appointed to transform One Exchange’s public arcade into an immersive artwork with sustainability at its heart, working with existing site materials to create a welcoming, pedestrian-friendly space that invites and inspires use of a neglected walkway, creating a more conscious, safe and sustainable environment.

Workplace Culture

We work with our clients to make workplaces more relevant, dynamic and personal for staff and their guests. We know the value art brings to the workplace, and we’re able to respond to different needs to achieve a truly bespoke result. We work with contemporary collections acquisitions and management, curating and managing loaned exhibitions and programming events and performances that add real value to the working day.

We work with artists to create projects that reflect a company’s ethos and branding, while maintaining credibility as works of art. We’ve curated and managed art awards programmes, collections websites and school enrichment schemes, ensuring staff across departments are deeply involved in the process.

Aspen Collection

Global Office Rationalisation with Christie’s and ArtLogic

CAS *Consultancy has worked with Aspen Insurance’s contemporary art collections since 2008, overseeing the collection’s growth from a handful of key works into a dynamic programme of hundreds of artworks, across offices spanning the globe, that acts as a catalyst for staff involvement. Each office reflects the unique character of its site, addressing collaboration, diversity or providing a space for reflection. The collection includes works in the US, UK, Bermuda, Switzerland and Singapore, by artists who live and work in each region.

From 2013 to 2018, we delivered the Aspen Digital Art Award, a bursary supporting young graduates to develop new online artwork. The prize was the first of its kind to support graduates with an online brief and consisted of a generous grant to produce work for the collection.

From 2020, CAS *Consultancy has been working to streamline the collection with an assessment of the collection’s 400+ artworks. A database is being developed with ArtLogic and we have been advising on the de-acquisition of works that have increased in value. Profits generated will support Aspen’s mission to express its Ecological, Sustainability and Greening policies as well as its Corporate Social Responsibility principles through an art-based approach and by supporting emerging artistic talent across the globe.

Supporters & Patrons

The generosity and active involvement of the Contemporary Art Society’s Supporters and Patrons continually enables our vital work with public museums and galleries, our open dialogue with artists, and a wide-ranging, engaging programme around contemporary art. We would like to thank the following individuals, organisations, and foundations who have made our charitable work possible from April 2022 to March 2023.

CAS Supporters & Special Project Funders

Arts Council England

Creative Scotland

Emma & Fred Goltz

Helen Faccenda

Sarah Griffin

The Lord & Lady Lupton

Henry Moore Foundation

Valeria Napoleone

Sfumato Foundation

Cathy Wills

Anna Yang & Joseph Schull

Collections Fund 2022/23

Nicola Blake (Co-Chair)

Liesl Fichardt

Emma Goltz

Sascha Hackel

Stephanie Holmquist

Soo Hitchin

Béatrice Lupton (Co-Chair)

Suling Mead

Minka Nyberg

Pamela Stanger

Cathy Wills Council

Marco Compagnoni

Emma Goltz

Brian Johnson

Béatrice Lupton

Bianca Roden

Anita Zabludowicz OBE

Gold Patrons

Charlotte & Alan Artus

Michael Bradley

Liesl Fichardt

Whitney Gore

Soo & Jonathan Hitchin

Stephanie Holmquist & Mark Allison

Marelu Justus

Alexandra Lindsay

Suling Mead

Bertrand & Elisabeth Meunier

Keith Morris OBE & Catherine Mason

Tim & Andrew Pirrie-Franks

Bianca Roden

Will Rosen

Bruce Sansom

Ryan Taylor

Tina Taylor

Peter Wild & Minka Nyberg

Jonathan Wood

Edwin & Dina Wulfsohn

Anna Yang & Joseph Schull

Silver Patrons

Nicola Avery-Gee

Sarah Barker

Nicola Blake

Jenny Christensson

Bertrand Coste

Loraine Da Costa

Belinda de Gaudemar

Sarah Elson

Susan Furnell

Sascha Hackel & Marcus Bury

Mark Harris

Harinder Hundle

Helen Janecek

Chris Jermyn

Vanessa Kandiyoti

Gerald Kidd

Chris Kneale

Julie Lee

Béatrice Lupton

Simon & Midge Palley

Adam Prideaux

Katrina Reitman

Susan Rosenberg & John Lazar

Dasha Shenkman OBE

Florian Simm

Brian Smith

Paul Smith

Pamela Stanger

Emily Sun

Liese Van Der Watt

Marc & Brenda Vandamme

Audrey Wallrock

Clara Weatherall

Stella Weatherall

Cathy Wills

Mary Wolridge

Bronze Patrons

Debra Blair

John Heller

Young Patrons

Giorgia Ascolani

Sonia Barbey

Charlotte Diemer

Assia Jalloh

Claudio Köser

Yisi Li

Claudia Moross

Carali McCall

Benedetta Riva

Johanna Schwabl

Victor Kyaw (Phone Si Thu) Win

Indira Ziyabek

International Patrons

Marie Elena Angulo & Henry Zarb

Jill Hackel & Andrzej Zarzycki

Renate Kurowski-Cardello

Honorary Patrons

Glenn Brown CBE & Edgar Laguinia

Jean Cass

Sarah Griffin

Christopher Jonas CBE

Penny Mason

Elizabeth Meyer

Alison Myners

Valeria Napoleone

Mark Stephens CBE

Jackson Tang

Russell Tovey

Artist’s Table Committee for Jeremy Deller

Emma Goltz, Soo Hitchin, Harinder Hundle, Suling

Mead, Adam Prideaux and Sophie Crichton-Stuart (November 2022)

Development Board

Charlotte Artus

Nicola Blake

Marco Compagnoni

Bertrand Coste

Liesl Fichardt

Emma Goltz (Chair)

Soria Hamidi

Béatrice Lupton

Suling Mead

Benedetta Riva

We are also grateful to all our supporters who wish to remain anonymous.

Corporate Patrons

CAS *Consultancy Clients

Ancient Connections

Aspen

Bellway Latimer Cherry Hinton LLP

BioMed Realty

City of London

Eric Parry Architects

Fletcher Priest Architects

Greater London Authority

Lendlease

M3 Consulting

Mayor of London

Mayor of Newham

Stanhope

Steering Committee for Humanitarian Aid Workers

The Crown Estate

Thomas White Oxford

University of Bristol

Trustees

Trustees & Staff Staff

Marco Compagnoni (Chair)

Nicola Blake

Michael Bradley

Tommaso Corvi-Mora

Timothy Franks

Emma Goltz

Suling Mead

Ama Ofori-Darko

Béatrice Lupton

Keith Morris

Valeria Napoleone

Francis Outred

Bianca Roden

John Shield

Cathy Wills

Edwin Wulfsohn

Anna Yang

Caroline Douglas Director

Sophia Bardsley

Deputy Director

CURATORIAL

Christine Takengny

Senior Curator, Museum Acquisitions

Ilaria Puri Purini

Curator of Programmes

Efea Rutlin

Curatorial Trainee

Tania Adams

Collections Researcher

Ksenya Blokhina

Copyright Manager

DEVELOPMENT & EXTERNAL RELATIONS

Dida Tait

Head of Development & External Relations

Ally Bennett

Senior Manager, Development

Clemmie Langley

Assistant Manager, Development

Tosin Adegoke

Senior Communications and Campaigns Manager

CAS *CONSULTANCY

Colin Ledwith

Head of CAS *Consultancy

Megan O’Shea

Senior Art Producer, Consultancy

Jordan Kaplan

Senior Art Producer, Consultancy

Katharina Worf

Senior Art Producer, Consultancy

ADMINISTRATION

Myles Burgess Administrator

Hev Forknell

Office Manager (until October 2022)

Toju Iluyomade

Office Manager (from November 2022)

Index of Artists

Special Projects

Bani Abidi

Emii Alrai

Ali Cherri

Maryam Hoseini

Rita Keegan

Hew Locke

Ibrahim Mahama

Francisca Onumah

Ro Robertson

Veronica Ryan

Fine Art

Sena Başöz

Christiane Baumgartner

Phoebe Boswell

Halima Cassell

Dorothy Cross

Dee Ferris

Harminder Judge

Eva Koťátková

Ibrahim Mahama

Rene Matić

Anya Paintsil

Hetain Patel

Grayson Perry

Jimmy Robert

Yinka Shonibare

Sin Wai Kin

Omega Fund

Anthony Amoako-Attah

Michael Brennan-Wood

Jonathan Boyd

Phoebe Collings-James

Philip Eglin

Zoe Preece

Adi Toch

Gifts and Bequests

Alvaro Barrington

Richard Batterham

Image Credits

Special Projects

p.17 © Ibrahim Mahama. Courtesy of White Cube

p.19 © Hew Locke. All rights reserved, DACS 2023. Photo: Anna Arca

p.21, top © Ro Robertson. Courtesy of the artist and Maximillian William, London. Photo: Robert Glowacki

p.21, bottom © Ro Robertson. Courtesy of the artist

p.23 © Emii Alrai. Photo: Matt Denham

p.25 © Veronica Ryan. Courtesy Paula Cooper Gallery, New York.

p.27 © Rita Keegan. Courtesy of the artist

p.29 © Ali Cherri. Photo: National Gallery

p.31 © Francisca Onumah. Photo: Jerry Lampson

p.33 © Bani Abidi. Photo: Film and Video Umbrella

p.35 © Maryam Hoseini. Photo: Dario Lasagni

p.39 © Anya Paintsil. Photo: Rocio Chacon

Fine Art

p.41 © Ibrahim Mahama. Courtesy of White Cube

p.43 © Sin Wai Kin. Courtesy the artist and Soft Opening, London

p.45 © Harminder Judge. Courtesy of the artist and Sunday Painter

p.47 © Grayson Perry & Paragon | Contemporary Editions Ltd. Photo: Stephen White

p.49 © Eva Koťátková. Photo: Oliver Roura.

p.51 © Hetain Patel. Courtesy the artist.

p.53 © Dorothy Cross. Photo: Kerlin Gallery

p.55 © Sena Başöz. Photo: Erhan Arık

p.57 © Halima Cassell.

Photo: Reading Museum

p.59 © Rene Matić. Courtesy of the artist and Arcadia Missa, London.

Photo: Josef Konczak

p.61 © Dee Ferris. Photo: Swindon Museum & Art Gallery

p.63 © Jimmy Robert. Photo: Roberto Salomone

p.65 © Phoebe Boswell. Courtesy of the artist

p.67 © DACS 2023. Photo: CDS Gromke e.K. Leipzig

p.69 © Yinka Shonibare CBE. All rights reserved, DACS 2023. Courtesy Yinka Shonibare CBE and Cristea Roberts Gallery, London.

p.71 © Rene Matić. Courtesy of the artist and Arcadia Missa, London.

Photo: Josef Konczak

Omega Fund

p.75 © Zoe Preece. Photo: Dewi Tannatt Lloyd

p.77 © Adi Toch. Photo: Agata Pec

p.79 © Anthony AmoakoAttah. Courtesy of Bullseye Projects. Photo: the artist.

p.81 © Jonathan Boyd. Photo: National Museums Scotland

p.83 © Phoebe CollingsJames. Photo: Luke Williams

p.85 © Michael BrennandWood. Photo: Pam Seale

p.87 © Philip Eglin. Photo: Philip Sayer, courtesy of Marsden Woo.

Gifts and Bequests

p.92 and p.93 © Estate of Richard Batterham.

Photo: Victoria and Albert Museum, Jon Stokes

p.97 © Alvaro Barrington. Photo: Corvi Mora

CAS *Consultancy

p.101 Granta Park Phase 2. Image courtesy: Eric Parry Architects and DBOX

p.103 Heddon Street.

Photo: Guilherme Peev dos Santos

p.104 Royal Docks. Photo: Claudia Schilling

p.106 Bedwyr Williams, Do the Little Things, 2022, commissioned for Ancient Connections.

Photo: Karel Jesper

p.107 Ryan Gander Workshop at Charlotte Sharman Primary School, 2022, commissioned for Lendlease, Photography: South London Gallery

p.108 One Exchange Square, Image courtesy: Fletcher Priest Architects and Secchi Smith

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