AA2A Residency - Bucks New University

Bucks New University © Bucks New University

November 2018 starts... Alex has been selected as part of the @aa2aproject placement at Bucks New University. A supportive platform enabling Alex to use university facilities to stretch her painting practice. She will be working amongst the hub of the university's textile dept, The Red Shed Workshops & Studios @bucksnewuni

Alex aims to test dye-methods, mark marking, staining and dying, plus applying, embedding colour with transparent fabrics for painting.

Resulting outcomes will be shared with fellow aa2a artists, Bucks students and the community. To follow Alex's progress please keep an eye on her aa2a profile/blog https://aa2a.biz/network/user/alex18

Arts Council of England assisted, the AA2A project (Artists Access to Art Colleges) provides placements for visual artists and designer makers in Higher and Further Education institutions across England.  https://aa2a.biz/

Offene Ateliers - studio in progress

Alex Roberts studio, in progress.

Danke an alte und neue Freunde, die gestern unseren offenen Ateliers-Tag unterstützt haben. "KUNST: OFFEN" Offene Ateliers In Berlin Marzahn-Hellersdorf hat Spaß zwischen den sporadischen Duschen gemacht! 'Come again - willkommen'!

Thank you old and new friends for supporting our open studios yesterday. "KUNST: OFFEN" Offene Ateliers In Berlin Marzahn-Hellersdorf had fun amongst the sporadic rain showers! 'Come again - welcome'!

To quote an upbeat, new visitor:

“Inside the Kesselhaus - noch ein Hotspot in der Beilsteiner Straße. 
Was Altes, was Blaues, was Neues: Das Atelierhaus KATAPULT/KESSELHAUS bietet den besten Rückzugsort, während gerade der Platzregen Pfützen produziert. 
Künstler aus verschiedenen europäischen Ländern haben hier ihre Werkstatt bezogen. Eine Mischung aus stylish, trash und mit super netten Typen! Wir freuen uns sehr über die Entdeckung! 
Jessie Keane... mit ihren keramischen Arbeiten. 
Alex Roberts mit sehr mystischen Suchbildern nach dem Verborgenen... Sicher nicht das letzte Mal hier gewesen ! Tradtion der Beilsteiner Strasse wird hier weiter geführt...”

“Inside the Kesselhaus - another hotspot … Beilsteiner Street.
Something old, something blue, something new: the Atelier Katapult/Kesselhaus offers the best retreat while the downpour is producing puddles.
Artists from different European countries have sourced their workshop here. A mix of stylish, trash and with super nice guys! We are very happy about the discovery!
Jessie Keane... with her ceramic work.
Alex Roberts with very mystical paintings searching for the hidden... certainly we will come back again! Tradition of Beilsteiner Street is continuing here…”

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10160397152635468&id=774370467

"KUNST: OFFEN" Offene Ateliers in Berlin Marzahn-Hellersdorf, 10 Juni, 2018

Alex nimmt teil am Tag der offenen Ateliers, Werkstätten und Galerien in Marzahn-Hellersdorf am Sonntag, den 10. Juni 2018 – der Eintritt ist frei.
Alex will be taking part in day of open Studios, Workshops and Galleries in Marzahn-Hellersdorf on Sunday 10. June 2018, free entry.

Kesselhaus MAP
Beilsteiner Str. 109, 12681 Berlin  Tram M8 Beilsteiner Str.  S-Bahn S7, S75 Springpfuhl
Von der Beilsteiner Str. biegen Sie rechts ab in den Merler Weg und überqueren den Bim & Boom Kinderspielland Parkplatz. Nehmen Sie dann die kleine Straße neben dem Rollmops-Gebäude.  Die Auto Mobil Werkstatt erscheint zu Ihrer Rechten, das Kesselhaus befindet sich am Ende dieser kleinen Straße. Kontakt
From Beilsteiner Str. turn right (Merler Weg) entering Bim & Boom Kinderspielland car park. Walk across the car park, taking the road next to the Rollmops building, Auto Mobil Werkstatt will appear on your right.  The Kesselhaus is at the end of this small road. Contact

Offen 13 - 18 Uhr/ Open 1 - 6pm
Kunstaustellung in der Gemeinschaftshalle, im Atelier Sándor Barics und im Atelier Alex Roberts

Painting Live Demo (Sándor Barics) 14 bis 15 Uhr / 17 bis 18 Uhr. Artist talk: 16 bis 17 Uhr.
Musik und Performances dazwischen

Midpoint I, 2017-18 (detail, in progress, studio view) Image credit: Laurin Gutwin

SFSA Drawing Open Launches

Midpoint drawing study III, 2018 Image credit: Noah da Costa

#sfsadrawingopen is open!  This work, Midpoint drawing study III has happily joined the line up @noformatgallery @2ndfloorstudios 

Exhibition dates: 25 May - 3 June, Thurs - Sun 13.00-18.00 #contemporarydrawing #zeichnung #deptford  In great company - 111 works, 51 artists, further documentation is accessible here

SFSA Drawing Open 2018

Alex has work included in this exciting drawing open.  Date for your diary: Preview Thursday 24th May 2018 18:00-21:00  For further information please visit the SFSA website

The Performativity of Painting Review

Artists' Talk, 10th February 2018. Image credit: Matthew Healey

The Department of Creative Professions and Digital Arts, CPDA at the University of Greenwich provides a brief insight from the Artists' Talk.  To read more please click here

Documentation of the recent exhibition is available to view via this email accessible PDF.  

FAD Magazine's Top 7 Art Exhibitions to see in London this week...

11/02/18 by London art critic Tabish Khan - click here

Photographs by Hana Vojackova and courtesy of Stephen Lawrence Gallery

The Performativity of Painting - Artists' Talk, Saturday 10 February

Documentation of the exhibition is available to view via an email accessible PDF.  Please share your interest via the CONTACT page

The Performativity of Painting, The Stephen Lawrence Gallery, University of Greenwich Galleries.  Opening hours: Tuesday - Friday 11am - 5pm, Saturday 11am - 4pm, until 16 February 2018

The Performativity of Painting, Artists' Talk, University of Greenwich Galleries and Creative Conversations

‘An experience of an artwork is an embodiment of space, within the work and around the work – the experience of the temporal’[1]

The Creative Conversations initiative and University of Greenwich Galleries invite you to join the artists of the current Stephen Lawrence Gallery exhibition, on the afternoon of Saturday 10th February, to view and experience the work and to discuss the performative nature of painting.

‘What is the relationship between the artists and their artwork? What role does the gallery space serve in the staging and meaning of the work? How does the ‘framing’ of the gallery space alter the experience of the viewer? How can an artwork behold a viewer? How can a curation of works create thoughtful dialogue individually and as a collaboration?’

These are some of the topics that will be considered in an open forum with the artists Tobias Buckel, Liz Elton, David Lock, J.A. Nicholls, Selma Parlour, James Pimperton, Rebecca Molloy guided by participating artist and curator Alex Roberts.

For further details, and to register the event, follow the link on the Eventbrite page here

Schedule of the event: Saturday 10 February 2018, The Stephen Lawrence Gallery, University of Greenwich Galleries

1.30-2pm arrivals – Coffee, tea and cake provided

2pm Rebecca Molloy performance

2.30-4pm Public panel, open discussion, Q&A’s. Introduced and guided by Alex Roberts.

[1] Linday Seer’s commentary, elevated from the final panel discussion of the conference, ‘Folds in Time: Artists’ Responses to the Temporal and the Uncanny’, hosted by The Freud Museum, 4th July 2015. Part of The Freud Museum Festival of the Unconscious.

The Perfomativity of Painting: 16 January - 16 February 2018

A choreographed meeting.

16 January – 16 February 2018, The Stephen Lawrence Gallery, University of Greenwich Galleries. 

Artists: Tobias Buckel, Liz Elton, David Lock, J.A. Nicholls, Selma Parlour, James Pimperton, Rebecca Molloy, Alex Roberts

Painting – the performance of structures, fragments and use of space within the perceived painted frame, and the relating inherent surround.

In bringing together these artists, through their distinct individual accounts and methodologies, the exhibition, The Performativity of Painting offers the opportunity to consider site-specificity, theatrical tropes, depicted surfaces, staging and the interconnectedness of the artwork’s context (in the works’ content and proximity). In this sense, the exhibition will seek to address painting's embodiment of the performative space.  Curator: Alex Roberts

To access the full press release please download here

Opening hours: Tuesday-Friday: 11am-5pm, Saturday: 11am-4pm

Private view: Friday 19 January 2018, 6-8pm  

Artists’ Talk: Saturday 10 February 2018, 1.30-4pm.  To reserve a place please register here

Contact: Gallery Curator, David Waterworth ugg@gre.ac.uk  www.greenwichunigalleries.co.uk

STEPHEN LAWRENCE GALLERY, University of Greenwich, 10 Stockwell Street, London, SE10 9BD, Tel: 020 8331 9954

We would like to thank Dr. Ken Wilder for his insightful text, written specifically to accompany the exhibition.  To download a copy of the E-Catalogue please click here

Dr. Ken Wilder is an artist and writer. Having practiced and taught architecture, he now makes site responsive installations and films. Based at Chelsea College of Arts, he is the University of the Arts Reader in Spatial Design. He has published widely on issues of reception aesthetics, including Bloomsbury’s 2016 anthology Painting: Critical and Primary Sources.

Social media live updates here

FAD Magazine recommends & reviews... Control to Collapse

"The Top 7 Art Exhibitions to see in London over Christmas & New Year’s. Read more..." 

“I have visited 5,000 painting-based shows this century. Yet there are approaches in the gesturally-themed group show ‘Control to Collapse’ which I can’t recall seeing in any of them.. “ Paul Carey-Kent.  Read more...

Control to Collapse, Blyth Gallery, Imperial College London 2017.  Image credit: Liz Elton

Control to Collapse, Blyth Gallery: 22 November 2017 - 3 January 2018

Contacts: Rebecca Byrne: rbyrneblack@gmail.com, Liz Elton: lizlelton@gmail.com

“Paint records the most delicate gesture and the most tense… Paint is a cast made of the painter‟s movements, a portrait of the painter‟s body and thoughts.” James Elkin, What Painting Is, 1955 

The 'gesture' is defined as a movement, usually conveyed by the hand or head, that expresses an idea or meaning. When accompanied with speech, it can articulate, emphasise, create humour or angst. In painting, the gesture has a loaded history. Most commonly associated with the abstract expressionists like Willem De Kooning, Lee Krasner or Joan Mitchell, it held alchemical accord, with the ability to imbue painting with the emotional charges of joy, anger or melancholy directly from the artist’s hand. Now emptied of those grand accreditations, the gesture takes on a more functional role. In an age of image proliferation, the gesture is a unique device or mode of language that is crucial in relaying a painter’s conceptual concerns. 

The artists in Control to Collapse feel, interpret and respond to the viscosity of pigment and the absorbency of surface to find painterly gestures that take an active role in conveying meaning. Through this tactile connection with their materials, these artists draw on bodily intellect and let muscular memory guide the application of paint. They are acutely conscious of the gestural act as a device for communication and find movements and motions that allow ideas to be soaked into the surface of their work. 

This exhibition navigates a variety of gestural acts, from an intricate slicing that causes oils to take on the healing qualities of flesh; to broad swathes of paint that engulf the gallery and interrogate the psychological qualities of the spaces we in-habit; or rapid washes of thinned oils that create aqueous scenes of transparent and luscious landscapes of vegetation to address politically charged themes of excessive water consumption. It explores the gesture’s role in communicating the wider concepts explored in the featured artists’ respective practices. 

Niamh White

Control to Collapse is curated by Rebecca Byrne and Liz Elton, the title aiming to encapsulate the range of gestures these nine artists employ, from the tightly controlled to a point where the gesture is undermined and almost allowed to disappear. Under the name ‘PaintUnion’, Rebecca and Liz have collaborated on a number of talks about painting and other projects, including ‘Pool’ at Griffin Gallery and PIY PaintLounge at Sluice Biennial (with Wendy Saunders and Paula McArthur of paintbritain). They are very grateful to Niamh White, co-founder of Hospital Rooms and founder of the Den-tons Art Prize for writing Control to Collapse’s introductory text. 

Download the full press release here

Paul Abbott and Alex Roberts: What Hat am I Wearing Today? MOCA London, 2017

Exhibition catalogue: download the E-Catalogue here  For more information about the recent two-person show, inclusive of writer, Lucy Fry's responses, please visit MOCA London here

Late Night Traveller, 2017 (studio installation view).  Image credit: Laurin Gutwin

“Don’t miss Paul Abbott and Alex Roberts’ touching and unsettling display”

— MOCA London