Curating Flat-Earth has been an amazing opportunity for me to bring together the work of a strong group of artists making powerful and relevant work which tackles the traditions of representing landscape and our place within it. The variety of approaches allows for a wide range of experiences and interpretations whilst creating a strong and cohesive exhibition which exemplifies the richness of this genre today. I am also pleased to be including new work for the exhibition.
Corridor8 Review:
Exhibition Details:
Flat + Earth
*(Flat = artist surface
+ Earth = reference landscape, physical materials used to create)
Curation: Joanna Whittle
Direction: Al Daw
Edwin Aitken, Hannah Brown, Gary Colclough, Graham Crowley, Tom Down, Paul Evans, Charlie Franklin, Mik Godley, Arantza Pardo, Mandy Payne, Julian Perry, Matt Raw, Joanna Whittle, Sean Williams.
22nd February - 15th March 2019
PRESS RELEASE:
Sidney + Matilda Gallery are pleased to present an ambitious exhibition of new landscape paintings and drawings by an eclectic group of regional and international Artists. Nestled amongst a cluster of conceptual galleries, institutions and project spaces, the show is a definite departure; focusing on contemporary paintings, drawings and sculpture.
Flat + Earth approaches landscape painting with a sideways glance, taking conventions unaware, at once celebrating and undermining them. Topographies are explored and exposed, each work represents the landscape from a different vantage point, be that internal or external, through long gazes or furtive glances - inviting the viewer to do the same.
In a culture clash of urban and rural vistas new developments replace the landscape of traditional industry, buildings crumble under the weight of aggressive development whilst artists reflect on our place within contemporary landscape. Flat + Earth attempts to tackle the eclectic nature of the changing climate; its vulnerability and physicality- a tension powerfully apparent in Sheffield.
This exhibition embraces the contemporary zeitgeist, addressing the tension and anxieties that arise from it. Despite the apparent unravelling of the world around us, artists stubbornly continue to create work confined within the parameters of the flat surface. Glorifying traditional mediums, celebrating painting and the scratching of marks on canvas, the work speaks of physical things, of earth and wood, stone and paper- landscape as environment, object and as something created from paint, clay or concrete.
Curator: Joanna Whittle
Gallery director Al Daw said:
“Sheffield has a wealth of Artistic talent, Flat + Earth give us an opportunity to expose that alongside a group of relevant, outstanding and newly produced international work. The ongoing strength of Sheffield’s creative output is explored against a backdrop of massive redevelopment and the shifting of the creative thinking in this city. I’m immensely excited by the potential of the gallery, this show highlights the ambitions of Sidney + Matilda in housing ambitious, completely independent contemporary Art exhibitions.
