Preview: Storyboard

Curated by Miranda Boulton and Suzanne Holtom

Paintings are viewed in a moment and then slowly unfold along different timelines as we continue to look and before they are hung in our memories. When viewing a moving image or reading a book there is a chronological time frame, however, in painting, looking can fold in on itself and back out; layers of meaning are accrued whilst looking at looking.

Ideas of the temporal in ‘Storyboard’ might be in Boulton’s atmospheric floral paintings, where she invites you to follow a visceral line which, when untangled, suggests figuration but does not describe specific form. Fogarty’s paintings play around with the formalities of form, colour and pattern but often subvert representational expectations. Holtom excavates the canvas itself, pulling threads from their woven grid and encouraging them to recline in organic coils, which suggest living forms in the painting. Kemp’s fictional landscapes leave narrative clues through his use of repetition and motifs, whilst blurring foreground and background. Marra uses looking as his subject in a loose, impasto style and Strauss uses varied timelines to tell her stories. Her paintings operate between both the still space of the gallery and a structured, moving, speaking layer, which unfolds within a sequential timeline.

All the work in ‘Storyboard’ plays with ideas about how paintings are interpreted by the viewer in time and space, whilst acknowledging the open-ended field of contemporary painting.

About the Artists and Curators

Miranda Boulton

Boulton finished three years on the Turps Art School Correspondence Course in 2015. She was selected for the RA Summer Exhibition 2016, The Salon Art Prize (2011) and The Artworks Open (2010 and 2011). Two-person shows include Off Line On Line at Studio 1.1, London (2015), Solo exhibitions: New Hall Art Collection, Cambridge (2012) and Madame Lillies Gallery, London (2011). 

Róisín Fogarty
Fogarty is based in London. She spent two years on the Studio Programme at Turps Art School finishing in 2016. She was selected for the John Moore’s Painting Prize 2016 and was in a two-person show called ‘In Conversation’ at the Turps Gallery earlier this year.

Suzanne Holtom

Holtom is based in London. She studied at The Slade School of Fine Art. Selected recent shows include Hardware, Centre Studios, Hampstead (2017), Studio 1.1 (2017), Turps Correspond Edinburgh, Halifax, Rye (2016) and two-person exhibition Off Line On Line, Studio 1.1 (2015). She was included in The Jerwood Painting prize in 2003, Jerwood Space, London.

Gareth Kemp

Kemp is a painter based in Liverpool. He studied Art History before recently participating in the Turps Art School Correspondence Course. Selected group shows include Lynn Painter-Stainers Prize (2016), Threadneedle Prize (2014 and 2016) and Discerning Eye (2014 and 2016). He was selected for the John Moore’s Painting Prize (2016).

Enzo Marra

Marra is based in London. He has recently had exhibitions at Zeitgeist Open (2014), The Threadneedle Prize (2010, 2012, 2013 and 2016), Gfest (2010) Charlie Smith Anthology (2011), The Creekside Open (2013 and 2015) and The John Moore’s Painting Prize (2012 and 2016).

Lexi Strauss

Strauss studied MA Painting at the Royal College of Art (2014). Recent exhibitions include Hokey Cokey, Universidad de la Comunicacion, Mexico/ Chalton Gallery, London (2017). Real Lives, Painted Pictures, Crypt Gallery, London and The Cut, Halesworth (2017) and Working From Home, AMP Gallery, London (2016). She was selected for The Catlin Art Prize (2015), Exeter Contemporary (2014), John Moore’s Painting Prize (2014), Jerwood Drawing Prize (2014), nominated for Saatchi New Sensations (2014) and Shortlisted for New Contemporaries (2013).