ISSUE 1
22 ARTISTS DOING THEIR HOLLY DREWETT & NEMO NONNENMACHER DONGHWAN KO JAMES PADDOCK ALDOBRANTI HEATHER JUKES LEE GILBY JAMIE COOPER ALEXX HALEY BOHYEON KIM ELIZABETH WITHSTANDLEY MALCOLM LEYLAND ROB BIRCH LORAINE MORLEY ELLY PRESTEGARD STUART JONES VICTORIA CASILLAS PETE MOUNTFORD ANESKA KOSINSKA FRANCESKA MCCULLOUGH HERMINE DOUBLON ALEXANDRA WILLIAMS RONIS VARLAAM ISSUE 1
OWN THING TOGETHER The SOLO Magazine is an artist-led initiative to introduce and promote contemporary directions in the UK. We are pleased to showcase this first collection of twenty two who amply demonstrate the vibrancy of current skills and effort available to London audiences today. These individuals from all parts of the UK and seven or more countries of origin have arrived onto these pages and enrich the diversity of our initiative; each speaks with a unique voice and each identifies their vigorous direction of travel in their developing practice.
These artists work in a wide variety of media and styles: in two, three and four dimensions; with paint, mixed media, film and photography, installation and performance — it cannot be possible or fair to identify them further in this small space — we invite you to spend time with each artist in their pages, the vitality of the work on offer will surely find a landing place in any gallery or show space today.
We aim to publish bi-annually and we select recipients (galleries) as carefully as we select artists. This first edition will be London based, and only 150 galleries will receive the magazine. We constantly strive to widen our community and include artists from a wide range of backgrounds, working in a vast array of media whether traditional or contemporary. The SOLO magazine serves to provide a voice to our network and highlight individual art practices to galleries, institutions, and eventually, to the general public.
Drewett&Non Holly Drewett, Nemo Nonnenmacher This collaboration is informed by movement and rhythm in relation to the body and its senses, exploring links between drawing and sculpture. It considers the resolution of images and the implications of reappropriating and reiterating. The piece is made from reclaimed wood, remnants of a previous sculpture. The wood protrudes from the wall at different intervals, whilst the windows are covered with yellow vinyl, casting a coloured tint across the gallery and the structure itself. Following the sun, colours and shadows change through out the day, dictating the overall impression of the work at any given time.
Holly Drewett (b.1986, UK) works with drawing and installation, investigating sensory responses and the body’s automated systems and hierarchies. Drewett has been artist-in-residence at CWND, London, Art Print Residence, Barcelona and South Hill Park Art Centre. She won the East London Printmakers Prize in 2017 at Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair and has recently exhibited at Worlds End Studios, London, CICA Museum, Gimpo, Korea, Kingsgate Project Space, London and The Federation of Canadian Artists, Vancouver. Nemo Nonnenmacher (b. 1988, Germany) uses photography and sculpture to imagine the relationship between human hand and digital space. Nonnenmacher has been artist-in-residence at Outset Contemporary Art Fund as well as Unit 1 Gallery | Workshop in London. From 2012 to 2017 he was a fellow of the German Academic Scholarship Foundation, exhibiting in the UK and throughout Europe, including ‘Prototypen’ at the Schleuse Opelvillen in Rüsselsheim, Germany in 2017 and the Fondazione Fotografia in Modena, Italy in 2016. Both artists graduated from the Royal College of Art in 2017. They curated ‘Acts of the Plough’ for Artlicks Weekend, 2018, with Fran Gordon, Ben McDonnell and Joshua Phillips. In 2019 they took part in ‘The Same Tendency’, a residency program at Summerhall, Edinburgh, supported by Edinburgh Sculpture Workshop and Stills Photography Centre. During this time they developed and produced the work [ek - oh] which was exhibited at Summerhall.
www.hollydrewett.com www.nemononnenmacher.com Reclaimed Email: holly.drewett@network.rca.ac.uk Email: nemo.nonnenmacher@network.rca.ac.uk instagram: www.instagram.com/@hollydrewett @nemo.nonnenmacher +447588690986
(ek - oh) 2019 Wood, Acrylic Paint, Yellow Vinyl
nenmacher
Ko Donghwan Ko I am interested in exploring the spaces that I have occupied in my past and the space I occupy in the present. My works revolve heavily around strong affiliation towards understanding the dynamic nature of the spaces which we define as home. The space of the home is the most personal and private space; it is comfortable and it separates me from the outside world. Also I believe that the home may be the most basic space for everyone and the foundation for all actions and memories. From the vantage point of the home, we create family—our first experience of community. But for me, a home is not a fixed space, but an imperfect space that changes or moves along with time. It is a temporary space that requires settlement and adaptation. So, while a home gives me a sense of security, I realize that it is a temporary personal space which is unstable and bound by factors that are outside of my control. Also I think that a home is paradoxically comfortable, warm, complex, limited, temporary, divided, and empty. The spaces I have stayed in for a period of time have all become home to me, both psychologically or physically. I am thinking about finding the meaning of the space I inhabit and considered what home means to me. As an artist living in an era where one moves around and has to remain flexible while staying for varying lengths of time in different accommodations and cultures, adapting to the role of the migratory citizen of this contemporary world.
Donghwan Ko is currently based in Seoul and London. He received his MFA from the Wimbledon College of Arts, and his Professional Doctorate Fine Art from the University of East London in 2017. He participated in several shows including Moveable Feast (No.12 Gallery, Tokyo, 2019), Home Fragile Home (Gallery DOS, Seoul, 2018), The London Summer Intensive Show (Camden Art Centre, London, 2018), Something Lost (Tapir Gallery, Berlin, 2018), RA Summer Show (Royal Academy of Arts, London, 2018), Platform for Emerging Arts 16 (Leyden Gallery, London, 2017), Korean Eye: Perceptual Trace (Saatchi Gallery, London, 2017).
www.donghwanko.com Email: donghwanko@gmail.com Instagram:www.instagram.com /donghwanko Twitter: www.twitter.com/donghwanko Facebook: www.facebook.com/donghwan.ko +82 10 9973 2010
House of Red Lines Pen on Paper
(Front) Home Fragile Home Pen on Paper
(Back) House of Blue Lines Pen on Paper
Paddock James Paddock I use mixed media conceptual art to send messages, including found objects, man made objects, installation and video. I live in Southampton, but usually exhibit in London and recently been in group shows internationally. My work explores and critiques aspects of contemporary society, questioning the current narratives in today’s western society and discussing often frequently overlooked topics, such as mental health, social isolation, human conditioning and freedoms in the western world. I have been funded by the Arts Council England in 2019 for PYLON. A project that looks at experiences of psychosis, in an immersive mixed media installation that translates a psychotic episode to the art viewing public. The first exhibition will be at The A side B side Gallery, Hackney Central, London from the 4th -10th September 2019, which is my first London solo show.
I studied at The Cardiff School of Art and Design and The Winchester School of Art, graduating with a Fine arts Degree. I am a returning Artist to practice after ill health for a period. I shall be exhibiting my video artwork ‘Lost Person’ in two exhibitions in Lisbon, Portugal this summer 2019 as part of the Loss and Lucidity touring show, curated by Diana Ali.
www.jamespaddock.net Email: jamespaddock100@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/jamespaddock100/ 07519170998
Pylon Production Still Video
Aldobranti Aldobranti I am a conceptual photographic artist — I take photographs about things and not of things. The ideas around which I make images are of Light and Shadow with Self and Other. My work often involves performance and the photography of the performance and the Performance that is photography, particularly when working in large formats of film. My interest in the shadow began with the title of an exhibition at London’s V&A Museum, “Shadow Catchers”, 2010, and I began to think about Shadows, independent and separate that need to be caught to be studied. Like a naturalist, I stalk and jump upon these separate shadows or study the places where they might fall. For choice I would rather work in analogue, classical wet processes of film. My reasons for this choice are several. My work is considered and reflects a research process leading to the shot; the performance is more deliberate and continues through the studio session into the darkroom; there is an indexical strength to a negative — it is a definite record of light’s progress; the wet processes hark back to a time when I worked in clay and; lastly, the absence of a “delete” button on the camera reinforces all the above. The positive print conceals the fact that the negative photographic image on film is a mark made by Light. This becomes much more theoretical when I think about the way in which Painting and Drawing in the West must commonly depict Light as an absence of pigment bounded by Shadow. [So different for other cultures.] And so I begin to paint the Self and the Other into the lens with a laser pointer, the lack of tactile feedback leading to a pleasing randomness of line and another sense of the found in the image. If appearance is only enabled by Light, my large scale installations explore domains which are only known by their Shadows.
In previous lives I was a working mathematician, a Chartered Engineer, a collaborating partner on EU funded projects, IT consultant, a marketing director and a unicyclist. I graduated MA Fine Art from Winchester School of Art, University of Southampton. I was awarded an academic scholarship from the University of Southampton. Previous academic qualifications were graduate and postgraduate degrees in Mathematics. My work has been shown throughout the UK, in Portugal and the US. An increasing part of my practice is to engage with other artists through small collections of text and images as printed books.
https://aldobranti.org Email: aldobranti@gmail.com Exhibitions & Publications: https://aldobranti.org/#!info/bio.php.: +44(0)7910353133
I, Butades #1046 Performance to Camera
Jukes Heather Jukes I make sculptural forms based on the female body. I am interested in female lineage from an art historical, biological and anthropological standpoint. Art history and traditional cultures often celebrate paternal ancestry and prowess. My pieces explore female ancestral lineage and reference fertility figures from ancient art. Biological form and function are also key, the insect chrysalis and the human skeleton are therefore sources of inspiration for me. In terms of materials I choose to use paper, clay and plaster for their primitive feel. In addition, I use various methods of duplication as a way of creating identity, so I have made multiple copies of some of the sculptural elements of my pieces to reference reproduction and genetic replication. I am also interested in making interventions with my pieces (in the landscape) and photographing the results. LUNA, my piece pictured is an expression of female lineage based on the female transmission of mitochondrial DNA.
I am a Fine Art graduate (BA Hons, 2005, MA with distinction, 2011). At art college I realised that my science background (genetics) was a very rich source of ideas, so I developed my practice based on discoveries in genetics and biology. One of my main pieces, The Shape of Memory, is comprised of large sculptural fragments of a human paper chrysalis, referencing insect metamorphosis and the memory that is embossed and retained. My current interests in genetics are in DNA as a text and the uniquely maternal transmission of mitochondrial DNA. I like the contrast of sophisticated science and primitive materials. I held a solo exhibition, The Art of Mitochondria, in 2016 and had work selected in 2017 for exhibitions in London and Leeds celebrating International Women’s Day. I am interested in many artists - Antony Gormley, Juame Plensa,Helen Chadwick, Susan Aldworth, Susan Cutts and Neus Torres Tamarit to name a few!
www.heatherjukes.com Email: heatherjukes@icloud.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/heatherjukesartist 07788 673024
Luna Various types of clay, fired, generally unglazed or clear glazed. Also Paper and Plaster
Gilby Lee Gilby Lee Gilby is a self-taught photographic artist whose work has followed a long journey skirting many genres. It has only been in the last five years that he has been satisfied that he has been producing work that he feels is relevant and therefore suitable to exhibit. Photographs only represent a scene in a minute fraction of time and only within the limits of focal and dynamic range as well as the relative positioning of camera and subject. Lee’s practice aims to remove these restrictions to create a departure from reality by eschewing the ‘rules’ and constraints of old techniques and instead creating new visions exploring relativity, time, light, texture and tonal relationships whilst retaining compositional elements and form. The resulting work is a representation of the unseen, a recontextualised relative reality and a new truth in its own right. His work is mainly based around the concept of relativity but uses reductionist methods to create abstract images that hopefully engage the viewer and trigger their own thought process to contemplate not only the meaning of the image but also to enable contemplation of wider subjects or, indeed, their own ideas of nature, science and mental state. His work is usually in the form of large photographic prints but recently has been exploring the options of projected installations and alternative processes. He has exhibited in and around Lincolnshire, the USA and Russia as well as having work used for illustrative commercial purposes. He has also been fortunate to have been involved in two Arts Council funded projects resulting in a group show and also promoting various art projects. Lee is currently seeking representation and is also looking to collaborate in future projects, home or abroad.
www.leegilby.com Email: leegilby@mac.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/@leegilbyphotography Twitter: www.twitter.com/@LeeGilby 07957454873
Three Large Scale C-Type Prints
Jones Stuart Jones I am interested in the environment and the way we view and experience it. My work is informed by the urban and rural landscape and ideas of utopia, dystopia and the sublime. I create work exploring reality within environments and our relationship with them. I am intrigued by places and spaces that exist within our lives and ideas around natural disasters, climate change and current social and political issues. I use a wide range of media, I paint and draw with ioloaint, household paint and spray paint. Working the paint surface of the canvas flat on the floor or on the wall. My work explores our relationships and connections with the landscape and how this is consistently in flux. My process varies and evolves over time but generally starts with drawings, images and collages that I have manipulated and experimented with using photocopying. We are increasingly disconnected from our environment due to technological advancement and in a consistent conflict with the natural world due to the way we live. I approach my work with these ideas and thoughts with the hope that they gain traction in the spaces in the work. The human presence is missing from my paintings enabling the viewer to become the missing human presence within the work, the spaces becoming portals that the viewer has to negotiate into another world, space or time.
Stuart Jones has been working as an artist for over 20 years. His specialism is contemporary painting and drawing. He is inspired by the natural environment and the shapes and forms of modern architectural structures - these subject matters form the basis of his art practice. He has had solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally. Recent group Exhibitions 2019 Artrooms Art Fair London, 11-13 January, Melia White House Hotel, Albany St, Regent’s Park, London, NW1 3UP 2018 ‘The Salamander Devours its Tail Twice’, Gallery 46, Whitechapel, London, 46 Ashfield St, London E1 2AJ 17th November to 5th December 2018. ‘The Salamander Devours its Tail Twice’ brings together twenty-eight artists figuring out what it means to be human. Each artist oscillates between self-understanding and cultural expectation. Located somewhere in the middle, they create an extension of themselves, a mirror from which they may better understand their position in the present, relation to the past, and anxieties around the future. 2018 Thoughtful Planet 2, The Thought Foundation, Gateshead 2017,16,15 Creative Reactions, Pint of Science event, Cambridge Amongst other awards, Stuart has been awarded the Contemporary Arts Trust Prize, shortlisted for the Artzine Art Prize, the Lynn Painter- Stainers Prize and ‘Highly Commended’ for the annual awards for Red Line Art Works. He has had numerous commissions and is represented by Arc Prints in London, and Saatchi Art, and his work has been loaned by MGM Studios, Paramount British Pictures and the BBC. He is also a Fellow artist at Digswell Arts.
www.stuartjonesartist.co.uk Email: stuartwjones@hotmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/stuartjonesartist/ 07765901489
Erebus 2 Oil paint and mixed media on canvas.
Heterotopia Oil paint and mixed media on canvas.
Cooper Jamie Cooper Cooper’s studio practice involves using creative writing to draw from a blend of source material such as science fiction films, socio-political concerns and philosophical ideas to construct theoretical “other places” from which new artworks can be generated. He draws conceptual inspiration from writers Kodwo Eshun and Mark Fisher, who reference Afro Futurism’s Science fictional re-imagining and reclaiming of the future. Writers Timothy Morton and Eugene Thacker talk about the end of the Anthropocene, this is the primary concern driving Cooper’s theoretical practice. Jamie works across a variety of mediums to create immersive environments that mix sculptural objects with light using humour and language as mechanisms to provoke deeper critical engagement. Artificial lights are often used to create uncanny objects that resemble cultural artifacts from the real world, invoking an alternative “art” reality.
Cooper has completed a Masters in Fine Art and a BA (Hons) in Sculpture and environmental Art at Glasgow School of Art. He has shown public art works as part of the British Council interdisciplinary ‘Cityscapers’ project in 2008, this project was toured by the British Council to London, Sydney and Singapore. He has also contributed public artwork to Glasgow International in 2010 as well as working collaboratively with Natalie Lambert to co-organising Atypicalroot public art trail for G.I. Festival 2008. In 2013 he was commisioned by Leftcoast Arts to make a public artwork for Blackpool illuminations. Several of his video works have been shown in Glasgow and Berlin as part of the Solid State cinema, Youthitude DIY festival and at Mojito Kino. In 2013 Cooper was the recipient of both Creative Scotland and Arts Trust Scotland professional development funding. Cooper has had many self initiated DIY projects in Glasgow including Modern World, Zerode and Vomit Apocalypse group shows and is the editor of the art and theory publication Zerozine. Cooper is a studio holder at Wasps Southblock studio’s in Glasgow. His works have been exhibited in Sydney, Singapore, Berlin and the UK. Highlights; In 2019 Jamie Cooper exhibited works alongside Tom Sachs & Michal Lexier @ LATA gallery in Edinburgh.
www.jamie-cooper.org Email: atypicalcooper@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/jamiecooperstudio Twitter: www.twitter.com/naeplace Facebook: www.facebook.com/zerozine 07792921103
JC3 Sculpture & Film
Haley Alexx Haley Haley’s work explores harmonious space and how daily life is becoming increasingly idealized. Using the square as a universal language of understanding, her grids comment on consumerism and show rooms of ideal living spaces. Her paintings involve a series of important process-based instructions, developed from drawings originally designed through digital simulation games. Using familiar, domestic materials such as voile, her paintings leave the viewer confronted by a series of data formed from the collection of living experiences.
Alexx Haley (b. Brighton, 1995) is a multi-disciplinary artist, living and working in West Sussex. Recently graduating from her Masters Fine Art at the Arts University Bournemouth (AUB), Haley has since continued her relationship and networking with the university. Working in collaboration with BA Architecture, she and a select few Masters Fine Art students exhibited a workshop within the British Pavilion, Drawing Boundaries, Folding Islands, Free Space, BIENNALE ARCHITETTURA, 2018. She was also one of one hundred selected artists who featured in a limited 100 copy publication, A Recipe Book, collaborating with International Artists which was led by her Masters Fine Art Tutor at AUB. Haley has participated in the annual Parallax Art Fair, Chelsea 2017 and, along with her fellow students, raised money to exhibit their BA Fine Art degree show, V.Serious Art Show, to Brick Lane in the summer of 2017.
www.alexxhaley.weebly.com Email: alexandrahaleychattaway@gmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/@alexxhaleyart Facebook: www.facebook.com/@alexxhaleyart 07975948864
Miniature Represents Closure Velvet, Voile, Organza, Emulsion on Canvas Size: 100 x 175 cm Year: 2018
Kim Bohyeon Kim With the influence of the internet generation, I have been attracted to explore the relationship between phenomena of the digital age and ecosystems, combining both a futuristic and archival approach to synthesizing and presenting in formation. I seek out the elegance of anxiety, or of excitation through the tropes of experimentation and pataphysics, examining and speculating on the dialectical relation between object and subject. My works are across a wide range of literary proximity between the taste of visual haptics and specific, synesthetically connecting relationships between images and sensations.
Bohyeon Kim is a South Korean artist who recently graduated from Slade School of Fine Art in London with an MFA. She explores the framework of painting through sculptural intervention. Employing found objects and digital images woven into sprawling installations, anthropomorphic and surreal qualities emerge. Probing the relation between object and subject, Kim’s practice is centred on deconstructing layers of form, colour, shape and texture, agitating the materiality of surface.
www.woodbona.com Email: zczlbki@ucl.ac.uk Instagram: www.instagram.com/bona_bohyeonkim Facebook: www.facebook.com/K.BH.BONA +82 1066630118
Instalation Mixed Media
Withstandley Elizabeth Withstandley Artifacts, individuality, and music are all central themes in my work. The projects take on the form of artifact by their simplification and classification, often times like relics from the Natural History Museum. The work questions individuality while presenting a portrait of a person, a group of people or a specific culture. My work is rooted in conceptual art, taking the form of photographic series, film, video and installations that explore contemporary culture through some sort of narrative. What is it like to be an individual? How does the importance of individuality affect our daily life? Are there aspects within each person that makes them distinctly unique? Or are we all the same? I have been focusing on these thematic elements in recent projects like “You Can Not Be Replaced” , “The Real Brian Wilson”, “The Symphony of Names : No Man Is an Island” , “Searching for the Miraculous (Part 1: One Day in Death Valley)” and “A Brief History of Happiness”. In 2015 I completed the multi-channel video installation titled “You Can Not Be Replaced”. The project features images of all 82 current and former members of the Dallas choral symphonic rock band, The Polyphonic Spree.
Elizabeth Withstandley is originally from Cape Cod, Massachusetts. She currently lives and works in Los Angeles. She received a BFA in photography from Pratt Institute and an MFA in photography from the University of Alabama. She co-founded Locust Projects, a not-for-profit art space in Miami, Florida. She has exhibited her work at The Torrance Art Museum, Torrance, CA, the Arsenale, Venice, Italy, SIM gallery, Reykjavik, Iceland, Dimensions Variable, Miami, FL, Museum of Contemporary Art, North Miami, The Moore Space, Fredric Snitzer Gallery, Miami, FL., The Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, Florida, The Tel Aviv Artists’ Studios, Israel, The Bass Museum, Miami, FL.
www.withstandley.com Email: info@withstandley.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/E_Withstandley Twitter: www.twitter.com/E_Withstandley 01323 251 4132
You Cannot Be Replaced video instalation
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Leyland Malcolm Leyland My current work of ‘multiple composites’ is a lateral departure from material I produced as an advertising photographer; it is, however, a departure which is still very much connected to the aesthetic of its commercial origins. I have always been fascinated with, and influenced by, what possibilities the medium has to offer and part of my curiosity is to look beyond the conventional ‘single viewpoint / stolen moment’ framework as typically defined by the camera. For many, the ‘single viewpoint / stolen moment’ is the end of the road in creative terms. For me, it is just the beginning. The subject of an image is less important to me than the presentation of it. Re-presenting the common object, and how the viewer experiences it, is at the heart of my philosophy; a driving force in my very approach. The ‘multiple composites’ of imagery I use in my work, allow me to re-present the way we see the world around us. When observing the real world we rarely stand still and focus on a single composed view. How we understand our environment, and the objects that make it up, is by adjusting our eyes and shifting our viewpoints. We see many images all at the same time. Our cognitive energy is in constant overdrive. Yet, we ignore most of this. How we order what we see is also important; imagine multiple conversations between multiple sets of people all walking into the same room at the same time and seeing all the same things. What they see ‘as a whole’ may all be the same thing, but what they see individually is on multiple levels and with differing hierarchies of observation. For example, if two people walk into a restaurant at one time, one may see a green chair first and think or say, “look at that green chair”, the other may see a blue table first and think or say, “look at that blue table”. In essence, I am attempting to make all of these observations visible.
Born in Lancashire, now living and working in London and South east England. Malcolm started his professional career as a photographer in London specialising in still life advertising. He was commissioned by many well known advertising and design agencies, and publications. Malcolm built a reputation for an individual and stylised approach to representing visual messaging for many brands throughout the eighties and nineties. During this period he developed an aesthetic and visual signature which stood aside of any commercial constraints. He never veered away from a private statement and a commitment he made to myself when he was eighteen years of age at art school; Malcolm wanted to move the medium of photography toward something new. Fully committed to the medium he knew that photography had a vast unexplored, unseen, creativity and all he knew was that I wanted to be part of its history. Malcolm has now abandoned commercial work entirely and is able to commit solely to developing those ideas.
www.malcolmleyland.co.uk Email: mal@kmotion.co.uk Twitter: @malcolm_leyland Multiple composite, archival Facebook: www.facebook.com/leyland Instagram: www.instagram.com/malcolmleyland Trebuchet Magazine: www.trebuchet-magazine.com/malcolm-leyland-interview/ 07838195150
Pool at Effingham #1 pigment prints on paper
Garden at Bar 163 Multiple composite, archival pigment prints on paper
Sat In a Cafe In Prague Multiple composite, archival pigment prints on paper
Birch Rob Birch Things My Mother Use to Say We now live in a Post Truth world. For many these times seem fearful and full of uncertainty with little respite from the social and political assault from whom we would seek guidance and leadership. In the UK, our continuing Brexit (mis)adventure (and, in the USA the presidency of Donald Trump) has heightened a breakdown in our ability to construct the requisite social narratives required to be part of any cogent, functional and vibrant society. Our leaders now use democracy as an exercise in nostalgia with the political imagination paralyzed and its future cancelled indefinitely. The identity project is in need of constant updating, yet the effort required to make these changes precludes any change from actually taking place. A crisis in identity ensues. What lies beneath the veneer of representation is a crisis in identity. In rejecting the idea of identity being found solely through a physical likeness my work engages and articulates the nature of this crisis and tackles directly ways in which it can be addressed. The works propose that identity is a series of separate narratives that coexist alongside each other to express new experiences. It is predicated upon a knowledge that identity is reliant upon context, experience and courage. These images are from a series of works entitled “Things my Mother Used to Say” and are part of my wider research into creating a direct response to the continuing crisis. We can no longer relay on the traditional political, social and artistic tropes that have prevailed for generations. These images directly tackle the issue of how are artists going to react to this problem? In using collage techniques my work asks what will a visual representation of identity look like in the light of the confusion brought forward as a result of the collapsing social and political frameworks on which it is hung?
My work has been described as visual scepticism. I use the visual as a means of challenging received notions of truth and reality, and within the portrait genre notion of self, identity and beauty. My work is predicated upon a knowledge that truth is reliant upon context, experience and fearlessness. It also expresses the understanding that “Art” is not made but found. (A) truth is always inherent in the real and resistant world. It is my job, as an artist to act as the means of bringing it into being.
www.robbirch.com The revolution will not make you look five pounds thinner Email:robbirch68@googlemail.com (david cameron) Instagram: www.instagram.com/robbirch2001 Digital photo collage Twitter: www.twitter.com/robbirch Facebook: www.facebook.com/rob.birch.7549 07498613889
lets make america great again (donald trump) Digital photo collage
beedin’ spunk bandit (prince philip) Digital photo collage
Morley Loraine Morley I live and work on a remote, un-kempt ten acres in mid-Wales. It has proved an appropriate location for my artistic practice, which was initiated by the need for a creative means to explore and give form to an obscure and turbulent inner landscape. Central to this has been an ongoing reflection on the experience of my childhood and youth from which certain themes have emerged. I’ve come to view these as part of an existential terrain, a marginal place of the broken, the lost, the ephemeral, the unwanted, the nameless, the wordless. As a bricoleur/artist, yesterday’s newspapers, threadbare sheets and tattered copies of discarded novels abandoned to the dusty shelves of charity shops have provided me with apt material for the attempt to reclaim something from the detritus. Bricolage is the primitive practice of using whatever materials and tools come readily to hand. As a self-taught artist it has been the ideal model for me to adopt. In the early years of my practice I worked principally with scrap paper and cardboard. My largest piece of work during these years was a 6’ x 8’ ‘box room’, furnished entirely with newspaper furniture. A more recent work in paper is ‘The struggle with being born’, a female torso composed of brown paper bags. At present, I’m working largely with scrap textiles, some of which I hand-dye with plant dyes. ‘Happy Days’, a translucent patchwork set into black linen is an example. Handsewing and embroidery also feature prominently in my work, and hand-made felt is the basis of a long-term, ongoing project. Whilst a creative response to my own history continues to be the core source of and impetus to my practice, a long term interest in philosophical and theoretical ideas on culture has recently inspired some ‘outward’ looking projects. I’m particularly interested in the theory of the Anthropocene, and am currently working on a series of textile sketches around this theme. Exploration and experimentation in my studio practice remains the most important aspect of my work and life as an artist. RECENT EXHIBITIONS October 2016 – February 2017. Oriel Davies Gallery, Newtown, Powys. Commission for ‘The Drawing Room’ Interactive exhibition space. The Studio Coffee-Table (re-cycled cardboard, paper pulp, plant materials and vintage copies of The Studio). October 2017. Wells Art Contemporary, Wells, Somerset. My face for the world to see (paper sculpture); Borderline cases i/ii/iii (papier mache and textile sculpture). September 2018. Mid-Wales Arts, Caersws, Powys. R.S. Thomas Exhibition. Mildred, Elsi and R.S. (Textile portrait) RECENT WORKSHOPS August 2016. Mid-Wales Arts, Caersws, Powys. Sculpteen. Papier-Mache sculpture workshop for young teens. May 2018. Mid-Wales Arts, Caersws, Powys. Processions. Banner making workshop with local women for the processions taking place on the 9th of June commemorating the 100 year centenary of women securing the vote.
www.lorainemorley.co.uk Email: lpmorley@freeuk.com www.axisweb.org 01938 810246
The Struggle With Being Born Cardboard, paper bags and wheat glue.
Prestegard Elly Prestegard Art is my compass on the journey of life. I´m holding a seed in my hand, looking up at the star-spangled sky over me, - each looks the same size. It all depends on the viewpoint. Exploring my surroundings through art, I am constantly on the move. Sometimes forwards, very often in circles, crossing my own paths. I bring my experiences, and what I see in front of me will always be new and fresh. As with this picture, part of the series “The Process”. Using a mix of old prints, and new ones printed for the purpose, decomposing and composing, a new landscape appeared in front of me.
Growing up in a valley, under wild mountain peaks, leaves it’s marks. My inner mountains are not barriers but peaks I can climb to get a better view. I have been practicing art as long as I can remember, and I have no intention to change. Recently art has taken me to different countries, working in studios in Massachusetts, in Barcelona and in a Japanese factory, among others. The visual language connecting when words are insufficient. I studied art in Bergen, Norway, where I live, and at Slade School of Art in London. I have shared my knowledge through workshops, and as a professor at The School of Art and Design in Bergen (University of Bergen). Working with paper, from floating fibers, to paper for drawing, printing, photography. Tearing up artworks for collages, or even maculating them for recycling, just leaving traces from what was there originally. As my theme very often is connected to nature, paper is not only the vehicle, but the message, and the process reflecting the cycles of growth and withering.
www.ellyp.com Email: elly@ellyp.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/ellyprestegard Facebook:www.facebook.com/Elly-Prestegard-Visual-Artist +47 46693197
The Process
Casillas Victoria Casillas I am intrigued by the movement from traditional methods of presenting art, to a new perception in which the aesthetic of visual art is not just focused on the direct view but is enhanced by stimulating different senses in order to produce a change of mood, tapping into feelings which influence the ambience and dynamics of the exhibition and bringing sensory perception to the foreground. During the last year, I have been working on this piece which consists of a compilation of personal stories of citizens from the 28 European member states who currently reside in the UK. Once I have received the stories I embroider the words into an organza material in both English and their native language, each story is 1.50 x 1.00 m in dimension. ‘Voices’ highlights multilingualism within communities and the mixture of cultures sharing those spaces within cities, trying to accentuate the human factor. The organic feeling of the material floating appears ghostly and mingles with the viewer; however the experience is further accessorised by an audio montage which fills the space with a murmur. As an artist I like to observe people’s interactions in societies, studying a way to symbolise controversies of both a political and cultural nature. The reactions and interactions established between the art piece and the viewer’s perception when exploring the art work is captivating. In my opinion, this process creates critical feedback from which I can learn and implement in my own work in order to grow as an artist.
Born 28th September 1968 in Madrid (Spain) and lives and works in Kent (U.K) I am currently studying Fine Arts at university and approaching my final year, self-taught until 2016 when I entered the course after having an interview where I presented paintings and photos of my mural work. During the last few years, I have had the opportunity to investigate and discover my love for sculpture, video art, art installation and how to link different pieces of work in order to tell a story. These processes inspired me to implement ideas into my own art practice and use them when curating my work and that of other artists. Group exhibition; ‘El Seny’ Maidstone Museum 2018. ‘Unaccounted’ Trinity Gallery 2018 During the last few months I have curated with a fellow artist the nomadic exhibition called Terra Nostra in three different locations in which I also exhibited my own work ‘a journey’, consisting of a group of six paintings. Furthermore ‘voices’ was exhibited on 18th May as a one-day exhibition synchronised with two other European cities and as a Solo exhibition from 27th May to 2nd June in the Deptford area of London.
https://victoria9066.wixsite.com/website Email: victoria@casillas.co.uk instagram: www.instagram.com/artwithvictoria Twitter: www.twitter.com/CasillasMVic Facebook: www.facebook.com/Victoria Casillas Art 07990630922
Untitled 300 x 360 cm Organza Maze Art Installation 120 x 150 cm Organza Panels (thread and acrylic tube) Audio Montage
Doublon Hermine Doublon “Propagule” is a collection of handmade porcelain ‘serve wares’, that focuses on the relationship between decorative and functional aspects of containers within our domestic lives. Accentuating the tactile aspect of the objects allows each object of the collection unique characteristics emphasized by hand making. Celebrating l’Art de vivre, the art of living, this set of wares is designed to punctuate the table landscape, to create new aspects and enjoyment of entertaining. As a series of containers in different scales, these curious vessels aim to pleasurably surprise users, addressing materiality through a delicate physical aesthetic. The texture evokes ‘propagules’, ornamental elements punctuating the surface of the object, reminiscent of a living organism evolving and growing onto it. From low key texture to high key interventions, the pieces show a palette of textures throughout the objects offering differing clients a way to engage with the collection. The surface’s transformations by the texture elements on the containers give both sensitive engagement and ambiguity to the pieces that are quietly challenging the delicate, the smooth, the disturbing and the appealing. Propagule (from French); “A part or element of plant, such as a bud, That grows and stand out from it To become the main aspect of it.”
Hermine Doublon is a ceramic designer and maker, born and raised in Limoges, France, where she developed a strong relation towards ceramics craftsmanship. Highly trained in modelling and mould making, her body of work is centred on porcelain qualities. She acquired a 3D experimental based design process during her education at Ensaama Olivier de Serres, in Paris. Her masters work during her MA Design Ceramics at UAL Central Saint Martins, London, has lead to an intense exploration of surfaces and textures in regard of tactile properties objects can procure to users which she is feeding her practice with. Hermine’s practice is challenging the boundary between functional and decorative ceramics. Hence, her work revolves around the ambiguity of our domestic ceramics wares that she revisits with her inspired textures. Her pieces aim to stimulate the curiosity of the audience as well as a revival of their tactile sense, that would lead them to experience a different prehension of containers. Taking inspiration from living organisms growing processes such as plants and plants parasites, she translates this life evolvement onto her pieces. From small interventions to all over covering, her objects are a result of the texture elements development onto the surface. The surface’s transformations by the texture elements on the containers give both sensitive engagement and ambiguity to the pieces that are quietly challenging the delicate, the smooth, the disturbing and the appealing. This collection has been made by hand carving plaster models, the mould making process is being challenged where Hermine is integrating as many complex and meticulous details of the pieces as possible within the mould, resulting in the crispiest porcelain quality piece that is then hand finished.
www.herminedoublon.com Email: info@herminedoublon.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/@hermine_doublon 07513637130
Beakers, Asclépiade and Lychnis White porcelain, black stained porcelain, transparent glossy glaze.1280°C electrical firing, pieces signed with decals on foot.
Williams Alex Williams A deep-rooted interest in still life painting, a love for everyday objects and human domesticity and an obsession with the artist Giorgio Morandi are all at the heart of my creative practice. The work of mid-century Italian painter Morandi, considered colour, form and composition of household vessels; uncovered an important use of negative space and represented the way changing light constantly transforms what we see as being the truth. Coming from a Fine Art background, my studies in clay are all made in response to these themes, combining structural pieces which allude to spaces, rooms and furniture, with groups of small, hand- thrown vessels. My work hopes to bridge a gap between reality and representation – a place where objects are frozen to the spot, forever poised and ready for the artist to make their first mark on the canvas, the only variable factors being light and sight. I extend the use of these art objects to further produce bodies of work in painting, printmaking and photography. The clay works are to be interpreted as instruments for the artist and for my entire collection of work to be seen as “Studies in Still Life”.
I graduated from Norwich University College of the Arts in 2012 and continued a personal practice in Fine Art and crafts until I began a Master’s degree in Glass and Ceramics at the University of Sunderland’s world-renowned National Glass Centre. Since then, I have gone on to produce a large body of work, mainly in ceramics, dabbling somewhat in architectural glass and still maintaining a relationship with drawing, painting and print. I have recently had some of my work on show at the National Glass Centre as part of an MA collection. I currently have some collaborative work in an exhibition at the University of Sunderland as part of the Glass and Ceramics Society. My partner and I have also recently set up our own Ceramic studio under the name of Vera Street Pottery, a business dedicated to teaching adults and children the basics of clay whilst also producing work for an online store to come in the future.
www.verastreetpottery.co.uk II Monaco Email:alex_ke_williams@hotmail.co.uk/ I mainly work in the field of ceramics, Email: alexwilliams@verastreetpottery.co.uk although I do often incorporate painting and Instagram: www.instagram.com/verastreetpottery print-making into my practice. Facebook: www.facebook.com/Vera Street Pottery (Alex Williams) 079518927751
Mountford Pete Mountford Since moving to Brighton in 2014, much of my work focuses on the city and coastline themselves. primarily as an antidote to a lot of the ‘tourist art’ one sees around, by representing elements such as the amazing street patterns, fleeting glimpses of the sea whilst traveling and the emergence of the pylons of the Rampian Wind Farm on the horizon line. This intends to draw attention to what is a familiar view at first sight but, on closer inspection, doesn’t quite fit and disrupts the perception of the viewer. Another recent addition of mine is the circular format of the ‘Porthole series‘ complete with industrial fixings on the circumference of the border, which provide the notion of a nautical presence allied to a rapidly changing environment both natural and man made.
Pete has been practising for over 20 years. Educated at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art, Dundee and Montclair State University, NJ, USA. He has exhibited in the UK and USA, through galleries and Art Consultants such as Stables Gallery, A&D Gallery, Thomas Corman Arts, Unit 3 Projects (all London), Westbeth Gallery (New York) and City Without Walls Gallery (Newark, NJ). His work has gone through many phases underpinned by an approach of system, chance and sequence which meant having a defined structure to work within, whilst also being able to apply endless concepts and approaches within such a framework. Examples of this include abstract work (that applies colours to specific numbers), landscape/urban culture and mapping. He frequently utilises the grid, either within works themselves or as part of multi panel pieces where the narrative and dialogue between each module is engaging. Likewise, by using mixed media through applying contact with a range of implements and on different surfaces , he finds the ongoing “interplay and dialogue exciting as one decision invokes another problem or direction”. As well as being a practitioner Pete has worked as an Art/Design & Digital Media Lecturer for over 20 years in FE/ Adult and Higher Education and ran Art 3 Art consultancy between 2001/07.
www.colourmount02.com www.saatchiart.com/PeteinN5 Email: pete@colourmount02.com Email: pete_mountford14@yahoo.co.uk Instagram: www.instagram.com/pete_mountford14 Twitter: www.twitter.com/petemartist1 Facebook:www.facebook.com/petemcolourmount 07813 288791
Horizon through a Porthole 8 Mixed Media
Kosinska Aneska Kosinska London based artist. Her practice involves working on varied media such as painting, animation and sound, more recently developing oil painting techniques. Her work is related to affinity for natural world with awareness towards other living organisms and encourages the long term respect for natural systems we coexist with. She has displayed works in exhibitions over the last few years including Bermondsey, Hackney and Chelsea. Her studio space is based in South London. The work is expressing human connection with nature through movement of water waves and continuous interaction with the Ecosystem in our daily lives.
Email: aneskakos@gmail.com Blog: www.aneskakosinska.tumblr.com
Untitled Oil paint on canvas.
McCullough Franceska McCullough Each year of my life I give myself a year long challenge to help expand my knowledge of a material or style. These drawings are a series called, “42 Reflections” and are from the year I was 42 and wanted to give myself the challenge of using only pencil on paper to capture exactly 42 reflections but the rules were that I had to be in each composition but only in distortion and in a self reflected way. In total I produced just ten finished drawings but they have collectively 42 reflections so I feel good about that challenge and the fact I pushed myself to my limits and beyond. Each drawing has a story too which taps into the self reflections I had at different times during the year. For instance, the teapot reflection drawing is of myself on a really awful date with a man who wasn’t interested in me at all....you can see him reflected just over the handle of the teapot. I love that drawing though as it was a great pot of tea!
I’m an international artist with a focus in sculpture, illustration and model making. My first degree in figurative oil painting was earned in 1999 from the Kansas City Art Institute and my second degree was earned in 2018 from Central Saint Martins in sculpture in art and science. I’ve also retrained as a model maker with Creative Media Skills at Pinewood Studios and with the incredible David Neat here in London. Unfortunately I’m struggling with long term unemployment and so I job search daily but sadly cannot secure employment though I do keep trying. I keep myself busy with an art blog where I write about local exhibitions and artists as well as materials I’ve enjoyed using. I also run an art museum meetup group to help get people involved in the arts and I also run an art activist project called, “11 Million Hands for 11 Million Lives” which is set in place to remember all the 11 million individuals who were killed in the concentration camps during WW2 as well as a way to help me actively support equality and peace in our world with community involvement and projects. My favourite achievements thus far have been with this project and being interviewed by BBC World, BBC 3 Radio and by EBS News in South Korea about my peace project.
www.toothpickmoon.com Email: toothpickmoon@gmail.com Twitter: www.twitter.com/toothpickmoon Instagram: www.instagram.com/mirmarnia Faceboook: www.facebook.com/MirMarnia +44(0)7548310132
Teapot Reflection Pencil on paper
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Hot Tap Pencil on paper
Tea Light Pencil on paper
Varlaam Ronis Varlaam I am going to state something very obvious, probably the most obvious part of our existence, but I think quite surprising: We never see our faces. The part of our body that gives us our sense of self, of who we are, we never see. We can only see it in a mirror. And what is more ‘other’ than a mirror. Or in a way we can see it in the faces of others, of how they react to us. Our sense of self, our identity depends entirely on others. I have been trying to find a way of painting this fact. What is there? Images and thoughts, memories and desires. Ultimately we are a mystery to ourselves because we can only know ourselves through the other.
Ronis has studied filmmaking at the London Film School and has produced and directed several documentaries for television, mainly Channel 4. Gradually his interests moved to art in general and now his practice includes painting, photography and videos. He often works at the interface of opposites e.g. Abstract/Figurative, Subjective/Objective, and Positive/Negative. He is both an abstract and figurative painter and he believes in the primacy of painting. He has taken part in more than 30 exhibitions. He has been shortlisted for the Jerwood Drawing Prize 2015 and selected for the Creekside Open in 2011 and 2017, the Discerning Eye 2016 and National Open Art 2016. He has also taken part in events at the Venice Biennale and the Louvre.
www.ronisvarlaam.com www.saatchiart.com/Ronis Email: ronisvarlaam@hotmail.com Instagram: www.instagram.com/ronisvarlaam Twitter: www.twitter.com/ronisvarlaam Facebook: www.facebook.com/ronisvarlaam 07830253234
Painting 10 Oil paint on canvas
Painting 22 Oil paint on canvas
Painting 27 Oil paint on canvas
WHO WE ARE SOLO ARTISTS DOING THEIR OWN THING TOGETHER. Individual, but not alone in our efforts to bring our work to an audience Together, but not collectively working together. We formed SOLO, so as individual artists, we can help each other promote, support, inspire, network, and make our careers more meaningful, purposeful and progressive – to succeed in our efforts in everything other than the effort of creativity. Everything SOLO does promotes the individual. Our activities are focused on how to reach an audience for artists. Our aim is to organise, invent, and build various platforms to showcase as many artists as we can. Up to now, we have organised 3 exhibitions and our 4th is underway. We are selective in our processes, but at our core, we are democratic. The direction we take will be for the benefit of each participating artist. We are a not-for-profit group..
This is our first showcase magazine, we hope you take time to look and consider us.
This edition has been produced by: Mal Leyland, Ronis Varlaam, Qanitah Malik, Katie Mundy, Aldobranti, Aneska Kosinska.
Copyright & Artist’s independence:
Each artist owns the copyright of their works and images must not be reproduced without prior written permission. SOLO does not represent any of the artists, and each gallery is free to contact each artist at their discretion. SOLO does not claim any commission or contractual intent.
Email: info@soloprojects.org Instagram: www.instagram.com/soloprojectslondon7/ Facebook: www.facebook.com/SOLOprojectsLondon/
22 ARTISTS DOING THEIR OWN THING TOGETHER