2023: Tidal Surge
Dovecote Space, Snape Maltings, Suffolk     

The interior of the Dovecote space is like a chapel with a soaring ceiling and a tiny gallery and is clad in rough timber from the floor up. From a window high up in the gallery there is a view over the reedbeds of the River Alde. It is not really a space for a conventional exhibition, rather a space for an installation. The work I have produced for this enticing space, I like to think falls somewhere between the two.

Being on the East Anglian coast and alongside the river Alde,  the space and environment naturally led me to focus on the iconic ascpects of where I live, namely the sea, the river, the maritime and fishing history, as well as the ever present threat from the encroaching sea.

 

    A group of three large drawings on vintage nautical charts memorializing the last 12  fishing boats that are gradually disintegrating on Aldeburgh beach represent the core of this exhibition. My decades long obssession with listening to the BBC's Shipping Forecast  is represented by a group of six small oil paintings; another group of paintings inspired by the ex-voto model boats that hang in coastal churches and chapels across Europe have provided further imagery for me to play with.

 

Britten-Pears Arts

Snape Maltings Concert Hall and Galleries.