West Midlands Open

Floor 3 | 20 May — 25 September 2022

The New Art Gallery Walsall is delighted to present, for the first time, the West Midlands Open, an exhibition of recent artworks in various media by artists from, or connected, to the region. The exhibition follows an open-call to West Midlands artists, including those currently attending an art school in the region or educated here in the past 10 years.

The Gallery received over 500 entries from across the region, spanning Greater Birmingham, The Black Country, Shropshire, Staffordshire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Warwickshire. From these, a panel of independent judges and Gallery staff selected 250 works for exhibition.

The West Midlands Open celebrates the quality, diversity and vibrancy of the local visual arts ecology and provides a platform and selling opportunity for artists in the region.

All works in the exhibition can be viewed below, ordered alphabetically by first name, and sorted via category;

…kruse — untitled

Print

…kruse — untitled

Print

…kruse — untitled

Print ×
  • Artwork description:
    This work is a text sent from the future via Inter_time. The Inter_Time app, also known as the Hindsight machine is/will be created by Cyb_Corp in the mid 2100s and is/will be how data can be sent back in time. This text was tagged Sender:Cassandra. Interestingly, all of Cassandra's messages are tagged Location: Unknown or Location: Off Earth. We do not know who Cassandra is but data indicates that she/they is an A.I. Information received from Inter_time indicates that the world two hundred plus years from now is almost unliveable. The number of human and non-human lives lost to floods, fires and other climate disasters is on a scale not seen on Earth since the extinction of the Dinosaurs.
  • Date:
    February 2022 and 13/05/2321
  • Medium:
    Digtal print
  • Category:
    Print
  • Website/s:
    https://www.krusework.info/

Addy A Adam — Still Not Safe To Tell A Truth Today

Painting

Addy A Adam — Still Not Safe To Tell A Truth Today

Painting

Addy A Adam — Still Not Safe To Tell A Truth Today

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    Martin Luther King Jnr., integrated within the back drop of a brick wall juxtaposing Elvis Presley song lyrics, personifying King's famous words: "I Have a Dream". White-washed bricks concealing a graffitied truth, (revealed by illuminating the rear of the canvas), represent the nature of historical and contemporary cover ups, and the proverbial coming up against a brick wall for the truth to out.
  • Date:
    2021
  • Medium:
    Acrylic and Acrylic Gel on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting

Alex Billingham — Bikini Killed The Atom

Audio/visual

Alex Billingham — Bikini Killed The Atom

Audio/visual

Alex Billingham — Bikini Killed The Atom

Audio/visual ×
  • Artwork description:
    Bikini Killed the Atom is a short film shot entirely on location at STRYX gallery and the surrounding area. Considering how our relationship with Nuclear technology has changed and continues to evolve with particular emphasis on viewing it through a queer perspective. This is a natural extension of my previous work in this field and will be part of a solo show in Dispensary Gallery – University of Wrexham in 2022. Following the effective obliteration of the Bikini atolls by the US military when testing Atomic weapons the US reaction was the Bikini a word we are now so used to it’s almost lost all connection to the events which lead to it’s existence.
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    Film
  • Category:
    Audio/visual
  • Website/s:
    https://alexbillingham.co.uk/
  • https://vimeo.com/alexbillingham
  • https://www.facebook.com/alex.billingham.7
  • https://www.instagram.com/billingham_alex/?hl=en

Alice Walter — End of The Rainbow

Painting

Alice Walter — End of The Rainbow

Painting

Alice Walter — End of The Rainbow

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    ‘End of the Rainbow’ is a collage on canvas. A clock-shaped, chaotic cycle of cute cartoons ask the viewer to read shifting symbols that hang uneasy in the indigo. Pastel tones and soft edges mask trauma, missing moments and invisible acts only seen on the faces on of the little ponies - cut and stuck in a state of fight or flight. Within the circle is a cluttered collage interior, creating a labyrinth littered with domestic obstacles. Just above centre sits a baby’s bassinet, a paper pocket, that holds a miniature sealed envelop enclosing a hand printed letter, written to ‘Baby Unborn’. Through this gesture, the canvas itself becomes a message to absence, illusion and the endless hope that limitless love lies at the end of the rainbow.
  • Date:
    2021
  • Medium:
    Paper, acrylic paint and hand-printed letter in envelop on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.alicewalter.co.uk

Aliya Perager — When I close my eyes

Mixed Media

Aliya Perager — When I close my eyes

Mixed Media

Aliya Perager — When I close my eyes

Mixed Media ×
  • Artwork description:
    'When I close my eyes' is a mixed media piece which uses acrylics, watercolours, oil pastels, modelling paste, acrylic pens, soft pastels and gold leaf. When I created the piece, I wanted to show the different things I see when I close my eyes and how my mind wonders from one thing to the next. It explores how the mind can sometimes be comforting with bright colours and on the other side, the thoughts we may feel when we are down. I want to show how the mind is a marvellous thing. The central part of the piece is a face with flowers coming out of the head. For this, I hope to show it as a reminder that we must continue to 'water' our minds with friends, family, art, doing something that makes us feel great - for us to keep blossoming. And that's why I have the watercolour drips and the flowers so bright and vibrant. I used patterns that related to my culture and experimented with techniques that my mind wanted to see come alive.
  • Category:
    Mixed Media

Amelia Hawk — It’s ok

Audio/visual

Amelia Hawk — It’s ok

Audio/visual

Amelia Hawk — It’s ok

Audio/visual ×
  • Artwork description:
    This work is a collaboration video with dancer Vidya Patel. We framed our response as a proposition that would say; What can movement/choreography do to act as a remedy for feelings of anxiety, sadness or uncertainty. What would movement look like that was supportive and acted as a way of saying ‘it okay’, or ‘lets get through this together’. Vidya specialises in Kathak dance and works with contemporary choreography.
  • Date:
    2021
  • Medium:
    Video
  • Category:
    Audio/visual
  • Website/s:
    http://www.amelia-hawk.com

Andreea Pislaru — Self-portrait

Painting

Andreea Pislaru — Self-portrait

Painting

Andreea Pislaru — Self-portrait

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    This painting is part of an ongoing series that presents the artist as a cat. The character represents the experience of being an immigrant in the UK and the feeling of not belonging to a specific place. This is accentuated by the background which makes the subject float without any spatial references. Each work contains symbols specific to the East European cultures, presented in a humorous manner. For example, the headscarf, branded clothes (Adidas in slav cultures), and the half-naked figure that usually is observed at male-only, not females. In this way, the work brings into conversation East European gender stereotypes. The cat is also a street animal in the UK, which in relation to immigration, serves as the outsider. In art history, the cat has been used as a describer of the female character, usually in a negative manner. Here, the cat is characterised using other symbols which brings mystery to the piece.
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    Acrylics on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • https://www.instagram.com/andreeapislaru90/?hl

Andrew Howe — Refuge II

Other

Andrew Howe — Refuge II

Other

Andrew Howe — Refuge II

Other ×
  • Artwork description:
    From a series of drawings and paintings inspired by walks in Shropshire and surrounding areas, in which I made observations of cabins, caravans, sheds and make-shift shelters of various kinds. Each place revealed evidence of previous or ongoing habitation, usually by persons unknown. The circumstances of their abandonment are also unknown or ambiguous, which provokes curiosity in the human stories behind these secretive dens. In their isolated woodland surroundings, these places could be viewed as idyllic retreat or desperate refuge. In the works, I invite contemplation of primitive living from multiple perspectives including the dual viewpoints of ancient human history and a dystopian future. Gaston Bachelard’s “Poetics of Space” was a reference in my reflections on precarious living conditions.
  • Date:
    May 2020
  • Medium:
    digital drawing, giclée print on paper
  • Category:
    Other
  • Website/s:
    http://www.andrew-howe.com
  • https://www.facebook.com/andrew.howe.503645/

Andrew Howe — That First Home Feeling

Painting

Andrew Howe — That First Home Feeling

Painting

Andrew Howe — That First Home Feeling

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    From a series of drawings and paintings inspired by walks in Shropshire and surrounding areas, in which I made observations of cabins, caravans, sheds and make-shift shelters of various kinds. Each place revealed evidence of previous or ongoing habitation, usually by persons unknown. The circumstances of their abandonment are also unknown or ambiguous, which provokes curiosity in the human stories behind these secretive dens. In their isolated woodland surroundings, these places could be viewed as idyllic retreat or desperate refuge. In the works, I invite contemplation of primitive living from multiple perspectives including the dual viewpoints of ancient human history and a dystopian future. Gaston Bachelard’s “Poetics of Space” was a reference in my reflections on precarious living conditions.
  • Date:
    July 2020
  • Medium:
    Oil on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    http://www.andrew-howe.com
  • https://www.facebook.com/andrew.howe.503645/

Andrew John Smith — Eine Kleine Nicht Musik (Homes Under The Hammer)

Mixed Media

Andrew John Smith — Eine Kleine Nicht Musik (Homes Under The Hammer)

Mixed Media

Andrew John Smith — Eine Kleine Nicht Musik (Homes Under The Hammer)

Mixed Media ×
  • Artwork description:
    Eine Kleine Nicht Musik, is part of a series of works begun during the period of lockdown. I spent a lot of time stuck inside reading Derrida and watching Homes Under The Hammer (amongst other things). I became interested in the rooms shown in the tv programme, particularly the more abject ones pre-transformation. Thinking about the reading, and processes of citationality and iterability, I took photos of some of those rooms, from the tv screen, and began painting on them. Perhaps in relation to the period when these works began, the painterly modifications often present an expansion/extension of the space of the room. Also, I’d like to think that the works offer an implied comparison between the forms of value accrued by the various property developers in Homes Under The Hammer and the value of the artistic work.
  • Date:
    October 2020
  • Medium:
    Acrylic on digital print
  • Category:
    Mixed Media
  • Website/s:
    https://www.andrew-smith-h-r-smoke.com

Andrew John Smith — New Smoke 10

Photography

Andrew John Smith — New Smoke 10

Photography

Andrew John Smith — New Smoke 10

Photography ×
  • Artwork description:
    New Smoke 10 is from a series of photos derived from translations of writing about the paintings of Neo Rauch. I translated these writings using Oulipian methods, made various models based on these translations, and I then photographed the models – so a kind of conversation between painting, writing and photography.
  • Date:
    November 2021
  • Medium:
    Digital print
  • Category:
    Photography
  • Website/s:
    https://www.andrew-smith-h-r-smoke.com

Andrew Kirkland-Perks — Artisan

Sculpture

Andrew Kirkland-Perks — Artisan

Sculpture

Andrew Kirkland-Perks — Artisan

Sculpture ×
  • Artwork description:
    This is a portrait of a mature women who I imagine has worked creatively all her life. Her hands are a portrait in themselves, conveying as they do the years of hard use that they've been put to.
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    Plaster
  • Category:
    Sculpture

Andrew Woodhead — Mission To Mars (Diptych): i. Gentleman Astronauts Club; ii. In-Flight Meal

Drawing

Andrew Woodhead — Mission To Mars (Diptych): i. Gentleman Astronauts Club; ii. In-Flight Meal

Drawing

Andrew Woodhead — Mission To Mars (Diptych): i. Gentleman Astronauts Club; ii. In-Flight Meal

Drawing ×
  • Artwork description:
    Jeff Bezos saves humanity by burning large quantities of fuel in his private rocket. As Mars approaches, he is served spaghetti with a gold bar instead of meatballs while listening to his favourite song - "Don't Stop Believin'" by Journey - on his portable retro personal cassette player (£19.99 on Amazon Prime).
  • Date:
    2021
  • Medium:
    Gel Pen and Watercolour on Paper
  • Category:
    Drawing
  • https://www.instagram.com/andrew_dronfield/

Angela Dooley — Aspects of the Rotunda reflected in Grand Central

Painting

Angela Dooley — Aspects of the Rotunda reflected in Grand Central

Painting

Angela Dooley — Aspects of the Rotunda reflected in Grand Central

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    Recently I have been using landscapes to explore the notion of trying to create images that produce an almost common emotion irrespective of the observer. My current work is centred on Birmingham City centre landscapes that result from the reflective surfaces that adorn many of its recent buildings; in particular Grand Central Station. Here are images that are ambiguous and bizarre , real structures presenting unreal reflections in a kaleidoscope of changing colour and pattern but which hopefully instil in the observers an underlying feeling of spontaneity and transience, as they are drawn into these scenes of distortion.
  • Date:
    2020
  • Medium:
    Watercolour
  • Category:
    Painting

Angela Dooley — Hill Street reflected in Grand Central

Painting

Angela Dooley — Hill Street reflected in Grand Central

Painting

Angela Dooley — Hill Street reflected in Grand Central

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    Recently I have been using landscapes to explore the notion of trying to create images that produce an almost common emotion irrespective of the observer. My current work is centred on Birmingham City centre landscapes that result from the reflective surfaces that adorn many of its recent buildings; in particular Grand Central Station. Here are images that are ambiguous and bizarre , real structures presenting unreal reflections in a kaleidoscope of changing colour and pattern but which hopefully instil in the observers an underlying feeling of spontaneity and transience, as they are drawn into these scenes of distortion.
  • Date:
    2021
  • Medium:
    Watercolour
  • Category:
    Painting

Angela Maloney — Nocturn 2

Painting

Angela Maloney — Nocturn 2

Painting

Angela Maloney — Nocturn 2

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    This painting is from a body of work originally started at the beginning of the global pandemic, when our love of bird song was briefly renewed and our reliance on the natural world for our own sense of well-being intensified. A comment on our human intervention with the fragile natural world and loosely based on Victorian dome jars, it aims to reflect on the inescapable evidence of humankinds’ need to take what we can at any cost. The purposely inverted colours in the painting aim to give it a nocturnal feel, suggesting time suspended, dreamlike, on hold, pending the dawn of an uncertain future.
  • Date:
    2021
  • Medium:
    acrylic on linen
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.angelamaloney.co.uk/index.html

Anisa Nazz — Grief

Painting

Anisa Nazz — Grief

Painting

Anisa Nazz — Grief

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    A golden female silhouette turning her back on sorrow and grief. The harsh etchings coming out from the sides depict the pain of this woman. The geometric style patterns represent the complexities she is going through. This painting was created at a time of loss for me. I struggled to grieve and so I threw myself into painting this day and many hours of the night. Ironically, it helped me come to terms with losing a loved one and address my sorrows. Even though it was created during a very difficult time, this piece was so healing for me that I am actually left with positive emotions whenever I see it.
  • Date:
    September 2021
  • Medium:
    Acrylic on cotton Canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.anisanazz.com/
  • https://www.instagram.com/anisa.nazz/

Anne Guest — Borderland

Mixed Media

Anne Guest — Borderland

Mixed Media

Anne Guest — Borderland

Mixed Media ×
  • Artwork description:
    The UK is one of the most nature depleted countries in the world (Natural History Museum 2021). The intensification of agriculture has resulted in loss of habitats and there is an increase in pollution due to our throw away culture. 'Borderland' explores these issues. I am interested in with how we simultaneously celebrate nature whilst trashing it with our detritus. As natural habitats decline will nature be able to adapt to these new constructed habitats? The gold metal leaf detail represents a ‘ray or glimmer of hope’.
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    Cyanotype with gold metal leaf detail
  • Category:
    Mixed Media
  • Website/s:
    https://anneguest.co.uk

Anne Guest — Home from Home

Mixed Media

Anne Guest — Home from Home

Mixed Media

Anne Guest — Home from Home

Mixed Media ×
  • Artwork description:
    The UK is one of the most nature depleted countries in the world (Natural History Museum 2021). The intensification of agriculture has resulted in loss of habitats and there is an increase in pollution due to our throw away culture. Home from Home explores these issues. I am interested in with how we simultaneously celebrate nature whilst trashing it with our detritus. As natural habitats decline will nature be able to adapt to these new constructed habitats? The gold metal leaf detail represents a ‘ray or glimmer of hope’.
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    Cyanotype with gold metal leaf detail
  • Category:
    Mixed Media
  • Website/s:
    https://anneguest.co.uk

Annette Pugh — Cafe Scene

Painting

Annette Pugh — Cafe Scene

Painting

Annette Pugh — Cafe Scene

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    This painting is informed by a black and white photograph found in a discarded tourist guide. The image has been adapted with many figures removed leaving the focus placed on the relationships between the remaining subjects.
  • Date:
    2020
  • Medium:
    acrylic and oil on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.axisweb.org/p/annettejanepugh/

Anthony Hall — Blue

Painting

Anthony Hall — Blue

Painting

Anthony Hall — Blue

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    I love working in oil on gesso because you can move backwards and forwards with sanding , painting and drawing. I was introduced to the work of Roger Cecil through a series of posthumous exhibitions at Machynlleth, Cardiff and Brecon and have been influenced by his edited back abstracted way of working . This painting 'Blue' is a series of shapes and the spaces in between with two elements of colour, the Blue is the title of my most played album by Joni Mitchell.
  • Date:
    Februry 2020
  • Medium:
    Oil on gesso on panel
  • Category:
    Painting

Atlanta Ellis — Mixed Tangiable

Photography

Atlanta Ellis — Mixed Tangiable

Photography

Atlanta Ellis — Mixed Tangiable

Photography ×
  • Artwork description:
    Before lockdown, I was always that individual that kept herself quiet and didn't want to express my feelings because I was afraid of any type of judgement if I expressed my own opinion or feelings. But during the lockdown, to even now, I have changed. I started to know about myself more as a person regarding my own identity and the environment that I live in (which many times I have overlooked). When being in my personal space has led me to create such a personal powerful project around my self-representation exploring my own identity. Many times, I have faced a wide range of negative comments regarding myself, whether it's the colour of my skin, how I portray myself as a 'biracial individual' but mostly the issues do circle around my hair. I started to unlock that side of the past and I was determined to create a positive out of the negative, which has led to the images that I have created today.
  • Date:
    March, 2021
  • Medium:
    Digital
  • Category:
    Photography
  • https://www.instagram.com/alive.visuals/

Azeem Akhtar — Crooked Cops

Painting

Azeem Akhtar — Crooked Cops

Painting

Azeem Akhtar — Crooked Cops

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    ''Crooked cops'' - Oil on gsm paper Following the grotesque murder of Sarah Everard the public felt vulnerable and incensed with those designated to protect and serve. However anger, resentment, and hatred, after all, tend to disappear when one makes a serious attempt to understand the unfathomable. Much in the same way Creams conveys his understanding of the ways of the world, Creams has a way of portraying dark elements within jigsaw pieces wrapped with a veil of optimism...of hope - a light that stirs even the darkest of souls.
  • Date:
    01/04/21
  • Medium:
    Oil
  • Category:
    Painting

Beer Baby — Big Squeeze

Painting

Beer Baby — Big Squeeze

Painting

Beer Baby — Big Squeeze

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    'big squeeze' exudes embrace. It is a depiction of a hug, however I try not to put too much emphasis on what I see in my pieces and welcome interpretations from others. This is why I champion abstraction in each painting and allows me the freedom to have multiple possibilities in each piece; before and after creation. If I don’t feel connected to the moment whilst creating, my feelings and to the colours, I struggle to create. It’s this connection that fuels my process. For this piece in particular I wanted to paint that connection.
  • Date:
    06.02.22
  • Medium:
    spray paint on MDF board
  • Category:
    Painting

Benjamin Crawford — From the End of the Road

Audio/visual

Benjamin Crawford — From the End of the Road

Audio/visual

Benjamin Crawford — From the End of the Road

Audio/visual ×
  • Artwork description:
    From the End of the Road is a 24 minute documentary that poetically reflects on the nature of cities. Through the responses and experiences of 4 acclaimed children of the region, the film uncovers varying strands of Birmingham’s history, the UK’s second city. Like a sea creature with tentacles continually sucking things into it, and spitting things away, Birmingham has long been a metropolis born of other places. From the End of the Road ruminates meditatively on the effects of redevelopment across the urban sprawl. With contributions from Carl Chinn, Kate Green and Karamat Iqbal, alongside poetry performances by Casey Bailey, the film also includes a hypnotic, industrial soundscape from Fernando Gimeno and an animated Castle Vale estate by Tom Evans. From the End of the Road seeks a closer look at our urban and rural environments, unravelling the stories hidden under the surface - those that tell us where we have come from, where we are and where we might go.
  • Date:
    August 2021
  • Medium:
    HD Video
  • Category:
    Audio/visual
  • Website/s:
    https://benjamin-crawford.com
  • https://www.instagram.com/bencrawfordfilm/
  • https://twitter.com/benncrawford

Bethan Jayne — The time I went to the 76th Annual West Midland’s Icons Party

Painting

Bethan Jayne — The time I went to the 76th Annual West Midland’s Icons Party

Painting

Bethan Jayne — The time I went to the 76th Annual West Midland’s Icons Party

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    As we are a couple of West Midlands superstars, my dog and I were invited to the annual disco/jelly buffet to celebrate. Upon entering the premises, we were immediately brought in to a conga line with Jasper Carrott, Dipsy from The Teletubbies and who I thought was Alison Hammond, but may have just been a lookalike. Dr Samuel Johnson, the most distinguished man of letters in English history, was too late to join the conga and so sulked upon a space hopper. John Cadbury was not actually invited, but somehow bribed Brum to sneak him in. He was later removed by the security team, who was made up of English new wave band Duran Duran.
  • Date:
    December 2021
  • Medium:
    Acrylic Paint on Paper
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.bethanjayne.co.uk/

Bethan Jayne — The time I threw cauliflower at Gino D’Acampo

Painting

Bethan Jayne — The time I threw cauliflower at Gino D’Acampo

Painting

Bethan Jayne — The time I threw cauliflower at Gino D’Acampo

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    I was testing out some recipes from my new Gino D’Acampo cookbook ‘Italian Family Adventure’ and decided to try a supposedly delicious cauliflower-based pasta. However, as I got in to the cooking, I realised that I had to cook the cauliflower for an entire hour and forty minutes, which left me so hungry. In a fit of rage, I hunted down Gino, which was very easy due to the large neon sign which said ‘Gino this way’. I entered him evil lair, which had a floor made a spaghetti hoops (the most evil of foods). Gino was stood creating plans on his chalkboard while his assistant Jason Panini Press stood on his shoulder. I threw the cauliflower at him, which disintegrated on impact due to the long cooking time. This created a cauliflower mask on his face. As I left, I managed to take a look at the plans on the chalkboard. Gino was created a Grandma Bike (a bike with the head of a grandma). She takes you all the way to Grimsby and Werther’s Originals come out of her mouth.
  • Date:
    January 2022
  • Medium:
    Acrylic Paint on Paper
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.bethanjayne.co.uk/

Bethany Dartnell — PERSHORE STREET

Painting

Bethany Dartnell — PERSHORE STREET

Painting

Bethany Dartnell — PERSHORE STREET

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    Original artwork of Birmingham's now lost Pershore Street. Once again, rich in nostalgia for me as a frequent visitor to the markets, ice rink and city centre as a whole as a kid we would often park here. It's been a heavy feature in my artwork for years but mainly in Photography. When they started knocking it down I wanted to immortalise it for life. Contrasting the dull grey tones with bright backgrounds has become a common factor for me in trying to portay a lighter side to brutalism.
  • Date:
    June 2021
  • Medium:
    Acrylic paint and pens on canvas board
  • Category:
    Painting

Bethany Dartnell — SMALLBROOK QUEENSWAY

Painting

Bethany Dartnell — SMALLBROOK QUEENSWAY

Painting

Bethany Dartnell — SMALLBROOK QUEENSWAY

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    Painting of Birminghams Iconic Smallbrook Queensway. An area I have walked often, and became a favourite view when sitting from coffee shops above. It's not only full of nostalgic memories of walking to meet my dad after a day roaming around town but also an incredible example of what Birmingham has left of its Brutalist scene.
  • Date:
    February 2022
  • Medium:
    Acrylic paint and pens on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting

Black Hole Club — D:Ream – Things Can Only Get Better (2005): A Polyptych of Stephen Snoddy

Mixed Media

Black Hole Club — D:Ream – Things Can Only Get Better (2005): A Polyptych of Stephen Snoddy

Mixed Media

Black Hole Club — D:Ream – Things Can Only Get Better (2005): A Polyptych of Stephen Snoddy

Mixed Media ×

Bobbie Whittaker — Purple Rain

Painting

Bobbie Whittaker — Purple Rain

Painting

Bobbie Whittaker — Purple Rain

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    Purple Rain was a response to: 1. That horrible kind of rain that just takes up a whole day and is constantly just dripping down your window. My work is increasingly becoming inspired by nature and how I respond to nature and my surroundings. I was so sick of rain and those days where you don’t want to leave the house. I wanted to try and make something beautiful out of one of those blue days and convince myself that you don’t always need blue sky to have a good day. 2. Exploration of the limits to which I can push oil paint. I enjoy experimenting with oils to see how far I can push them. In this piece I tried to add as much spirit as possible without removing colour. I love how this brings the extra texture and pattern to the piece. I hope that people viewing this work will relate to the constant that is the British weather, get a little cultural nod to Prince and be able to look deeper into the work to see the textures and patterns to show that even rainy days can be beautiful.
  • Date:
    2021
  • Medium:
    Oil and Spray Paint on Canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.bobbiewhittakerart.co.uk/

Boyana Aleksova and Tony McClure — Aperture (Struma) l

Audio/visual

Boyana Aleksova and Tony McClure — Aperture (Struma) l

Audio/visual

Boyana Aleksova and Tony McClure — Aperture (Struma) l

Audio/visual ×
  • Artwork description:
    Aperture (Struma) l is an installation, using documented video captured during an artist-led socially-engaging eco-activist event, highlighting the environmental impact caused by the build-up of rubbish in rivers, this time focused on the river Struma in Novi Chiflik, Bulgaria. Using apertures as unconventional windows to reveal the often obstructed viewpoint, where these obstructions are often used as barriers to avoid environmental issues. We ask viewers to reengage with a subject that is becoming an increasingly important and urgent discourse. We need to be the voice of many rivers. “The greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something, and tell what it saw in a plain way.” – John Ruskin
  • Date:
    04 February 2022
  • Medium:
    installation, TV, MDF wood, video
  • Category:
    Audio/visual
  • Website/s:
    https://www.boyanaaleksova.com/

Branko Marinkovic — Cutting Myself to Pieces

Painting

Branko Marinkovic — Cutting Myself to Pieces

Painting

Branko Marinkovic — Cutting Myself to Pieces

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    Currently I am working in mixed media and exploring a more illustrative way of working, my recent works have centred on current events and emotional and mental health. “Cutting myself to pieces”; is an illustrative mixed media piece I created during a creative frenzy in lockdown. I am interested in contemporary visual language and figurative work that mixes text and image as is often the case in the majority of shared media we currently consume.
  • Date:
    Aug 2021
  • Medium:
    Mixed Media
  • Category:
    Painting

Brian Shillitoe — New Place I

Painting

Brian Shillitoe — New Place I

Painting

Brian Shillitoe — New Place I

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    New Place I uses acrylic based paints and inks on wooden panel, to create an abstract sense of light and movement through a landscape space. The surface of the panel introduces the sense of a natural materials within the work.
  • Date:
    2021
  • Medium:
    Acrylic based paint and ink on wooden panel
  • Category:
    Painting

Caitriona Dunnett — Untitled 10

Photography

Caitriona Dunnett — Untitled 10

Photography

Caitriona Dunnett — Untitled 10

Photography ×
  • Artwork description:
    I work with alternative photographic processes and build on my prints. I have been experimenting with incorporating the landscape into my process by working with materials foraged from the land. These prints are phytograms, an organic camera-less photographic process created by Karel Doing. The technique employs the chemistry of plants to produce prints on analogue photographic surfaces. They were made with leaves, petals and berries sourced close to my home in Warwick. I enjoy the materiality of this process, layering the flora directly onto the paper and exploring colour, marks and impressions.
  • Date:
    December 2021
  • Medium:
    Phytogram
  • Category:
    Photography
  • Website/s:
    http://www.caitrionadunnett.com/

Carolyn Blake — 15:43 Passing Stockton-on-Tees

Painting

Carolyn Blake — 15:43 Passing Stockton-on-Tees

Painting

Carolyn Blake — 15:43 Passing Stockton-on-Tees

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    The painting is an exploration of my journey as a passive and regular traveller preferring to stare out of the window. This was on a journey from Birmingham to Newcastle-upon-Tyne in September 2021.Here the poetic in the everyday is symbolised in the old shed, whose use we can only guess at, contained within the confines of National Rail land. This shed standing proudly nestled below the trees has also become the canvas for the graffiti artist.
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    oil on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.carolynblake.com

Carolyn Blake — 15:37 Passing Stockton-on-Tees

Painting

Carolyn Blake — 15:37 Passing Stockton-on-Tees

Painting

Carolyn Blake — 15:37 Passing Stockton-on-Tees

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    The painting is an exploration of my journey as a passive and regular traveller preferring to stare out of the window. My intention is to give the unremarkable a presence. The unremarkable in this instance is the content of the composition, a clump of trees, shown slightly off centre, growing on land occupied by housing. In the middle ground, an extended fence decorated with graffiti butts onto railings which semi exclude a parkland area. In the foreground is the unattended area of railway land between the tracks and boundary fencing. Nothing special, just a passing moment.
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    oil on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.carolynblake.com

Catherine Wynne-Paton — time

Painting

Catherine Wynne-Paton — time

Painting

Catherine Wynne-Paton — time

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    A cluster of the oldest stars in the universe, based on the Hercules Globular cluster in M13 contains stars of 12 or so billion years old, their light takes 22 thousand years to reach us and though the spent stars in their final stage of life are gathering together, they make a wondrous, delightful form which I relate to the smaller scale, yet no less incredible feat of the human brain, of neurons and the excitement of idea formation, of the similar unknowns between the landscape of the brain and the landscape of the universe. The known, the unknown and the vast spaces in between. A childhood habit of mine was to mentally put the unfathomable universe in a cardboard box in a giants home and now I am thinking about what happens when you remove the box?
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    Acrylic on canvas
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    https://www.wynnepaton.co.uk/

Celia Johnson — Stack 2 (Park Lane Industrial Estate)

Painting

Celia Johnson — Stack 2 (Park Lane Industrial Estate)

Painting

Celia Johnson — Stack 2 (Park Lane Industrial Estate)

Painting ×
  • Artwork description:
    Stack 2 (Park Lane Industrial Estate) is part of a series based 0n site visits to the Park Lane Industrial Estate in Wolverhampton. Painted loosely and quickly, it depicts a stack of skips - its provisional quality reflecting the precarity and contingency of the industrial estate and its communities. This work (and Stack1) explore the contemporary experience of the industrial estate to make visible underrepresented communities of labour and to explore the legacy of Midlands Industrial giants that closed at the end of the seventies.
  • Date:
    February 2022
  • Medium:
    Acrylic on board (birch plywood)
  • Category:
    Painting
  • Website/s:
    http://www.celiajohnson.co.uk

Celine Llewellyn-Jones — Flowers in winter light

Drawing

Celine Llewellyn-Jones — Flowers in winter light

Drawing

Celine Llewellyn-Jones — Flowers in winter light

Drawing ×
  • Artwork description:
    In this artwork I was intent on capturing the cool dappled winter light shimming behind a vase of flowers. I used a lot of water, and bled the ink to suggest the wavering light and quivering translucency of the flowers.
  • Date:
    17th January, 2022
  • Medium:
    Ink on Awagami Masa paper
  • Category:
    Drawing
  • Website/s:
    http://www.celinellewellynjones.com

Ceridwen Raynor — Light of the World

Photography

Ceridwen Raynor — Light of the World

Photography

Ceridwen Raynor — Light of the World

Photography ×

Charlie Hurcombe — Newport Conversation

Mixed Media

Charlie Hurcombe — Newport Conversation

Mixed Media

Charlie Hurcombe — Newport Conversation

Mixed Media ×
  • Artwork description:
    'Newport Conversation' is a wall mounted relief and is one of an ongoing series of works exploring the utilisation of reclaimed and found materials, repetition of form, colour, aspects of manufacture, fabrication, assembly and construction, unity and fragments, and exists as an heterogenous object referencing diverse aspects of the Baroque and Minimalism. ‘Baroque, Barraco, A jeweller’s term: an irregular shaped or flawed pearl.’ (The Return of the Baroque in Modern Culture, Greg Lambert, Continuum 2004). 'Newport Conversation' and related works are a development of concerns made evident following the commission awarded by artsNK Sleaford in 2012 where found materials from the Lincolnshire coast were utilised in the production of a sculpture.
  • Date:
    June 2020
  • Medium:
    Birch plywood, Perspex, Formica, sheet acrylic, vinyl, found plastic and screws.
  • Category:
    Sculpture

Chloe Pitt — Home

Sculpture

Chloe Pitt — Home

Sculpture

Chloe Pitt — Home

Sculpture ×
  • Artwork description:
    A piece to remind someone of their safest place, a place in which we can call home, no matter the creature, human or animal or mythical being, we all have somewhere to call a home.
  • Date:
    2022
  • Medium:
    Resin, concrete, clay and natural stones and flocking
  • Category:
    Sculpture

Chloe Pitt — Emerald Isle

Sculpture

Chloe Pitt — Emerald Isle

Sculpture

Chloe Pitt — Emerald Isle

Sculpture ×
  • Artwork description:
    The base of the model along with the stalactite crystals are made from epoxy resin, the base is mixed along with small stones and multicoloured epoxy resin mixes. The skeletal model is made from a wire mesh frame with clay over the top, that is then painted with acrylic and watercolour paints, and the whole model is covered in artificial moss foliage. The multicoloured stones are natural stones painted with metallic acrylic.
  • Date:
    24/09/2021
  • Medium:
    Resin and clay with artificial foliage
  • Category:
    Sculpture
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