Expositions Passées

Making the Links - great artists, light and quality (25/06/2011 to 05/08/2011)
Paintings by the late and highly respected Harold Hitchcock show his strong links with visionary painters like Bosch, William Blake, Samuel Palmer and Stanley Spencer. The works in this exhibition show clearly the results of his inspiration to “...paint to create the world I live in mentally or spiritually... the world of this vision”.

Beyond vision – the viewer as interpretive creator (31/12/2011 to 03/02/2012)
This exhibition reflects the breadth of Lambert Kriedemann’s long experience as a painter. He has brought together many strands of a deeply skilled track record in design a portfolio of figurative “realistic” landscape images, and a background influenced by Old Master techniques. And this has then allowed him to let go and, in his own words, “marry the spontaneity of the abstract expressionists to the depth and power of Rembrandt and Turner’s late work.” The result is truly “Beyond Vision”. In these abstract works, the combination of artist as prompter of ideas and viewer as interpreter creates something that is perhaps more than the sum of the parts: a synergy by which the possibilities possess greatly extended boundaries.

Emerging from Canterbury (03/09/2011 to 30/09/2011)
Green Chair Gallery's 'emergence' exhibition features the work of recent graduates from the two art faculties in Canterbury, UK. The shows at University for the Creative Arts and Canterbury Christ Church University fulfilled their promise in producing eclectic and vibrant results. The work of the five we are featuring demonstrates how they have genuinely come to be "Emerging from Canterbury".

Reuniting and Revisiting from Afar – lifetimes of experience (15/10/2011 to 29/10/2011)
Two artists of distinction meet online though their physical paths never did cross. Armand Meffre from France, man of the countryside, actor and artist of note for 60 years. Marc Clark, artist since the age of 14 and still exhibiting in Australia where he has lived since emigrating from the UK in 1962. This is an exhibition of depth and understanding - totally suited to the Canterbury Festival. And the "important pre-war Canterbury connection?" Marc, aged 14, enrolled at the Sidney Cooper School of Art in 1938 where, on his first day, he was shown his seat next to "his friend to be, Eric Hurren", who himself later became Principal of the Kent Instritute of Art and Design in Canterbury (now UCA) for 25 years.

Contrasts - people, places, lives (19/11/2011 to 30/12/2011)
'Manicomio' is a series of images taken inside abandoned mental asylums. These eerie, desolate, derelict buildings are often situated in large tracts of quiet rural countryside, built sufficiently out of the way to ease the social conscience. But traces of former inhabitants remain both inside and outside. Some poor souls stayed in locked rooms or wards, ‘for their own safety’, while others may have been allowed outside in a secure, permitted area. Many were abandoned and forgotten, often living their whole lives in the asylum: the only home they had ever really known. This collection of work is dedicated to those forgotten residents of these institutions and to the ghosts which remain visible and invisible in the cold interiors and shifting gauzy light. Some might see the work as dark and moody, while others see it as magnetic and thought provoking. Not many will be untouched by what they imply and the contrasts with their own lives: striking contrasts in the 2011 world of turbulence we continue to live in. For those who feel an overall resonance with this, and/or for those celebrating Christmas as the exhibition ends, Hamish's photographs may serve as a stimulus for personal reflection. Out of that perhaps will come new resolutions for 2012 and, who knows, a raising of the human spirit.

Picture-poems: an inside story (01/10/2011 to 18/11/2011)
"Picture-poems: an inside story" features a whole series of Sofiah Garrard's mysterious, other-worldly collages with evocative titles.  But there's an added ingredient. Each picture is illustrated with a poem by US-based poet Emmanuel Williams, but based on a different relationship. Before, Sofiah illustrated a book of his poems. This time they've turned it around, with the poems written as a response to the individual pictures.