ABOVE GROUND
Gallagher and Turner
23 July - 4 September 2021
Above Ground is an exhibition of bold minimalist paintings which reflect the design of Modernist and Post-War Architecture by Middlesbrough based artist Emma Bennett. By using colour and pattern in conjunction with her personal connections to place, Bennett examines our localised social histories.
Many of her paintings reference a nostalgic attachment to places and structures that are often overlooked, neglected or under threat of demolition. While growing up on a post-war council estate in the northern town of Redcar, Emma developed an attraction to the materials and surroundings of her environment. Many of the modernist and post-war buildings from her childhood have since been demolished and others are in the process of vanishing. Her work declares the architectural beauty and social importance of these places, buildings that are part of our collective memory.
The colours in her earlier work are influenced by paintings and sculptures of the St. Ives School, an influential artistic community living and working in St Ives, Cornwall in the early twentieth century. She has since created her own colour palette often using vibrant colour combinations. Emma uses photography as a key part of her process, which develops through a set of decisions about the relationships between colour and form. The introduction of pattern in Emma’s work began a few years ago while researching the artist Anni Albers and her use of pattern in screen-prints and tapestry weaving.
For this exhibition at Gallagher & Turner Bennett presents a series of paintings responding to the exterior architecture of the 1950s House of Fraser Department Store in Middlesbrough that was formerly known as Binns. The painting series reflects the artist’s nostalgic connection to place and questions the future of these once monumental buildings.
Emma Bennett: Above Ground — Gallagher & Turner (gallagherandturner.co.uk)
Gallagher and Turner
23 July - 4 September 2021
Above Ground is an exhibition of bold minimalist paintings which reflect the design of Modernist and Post-War Architecture by Middlesbrough based artist Emma Bennett. By using colour and pattern in conjunction with her personal connections to place, Bennett examines our localised social histories.
Many of her paintings reference a nostalgic attachment to places and structures that are often overlooked, neglected or under threat of demolition. While growing up on a post-war council estate in the northern town of Redcar, Emma developed an attraction to the materials and surroundings of her environment. Many of the modernist and post-war buildings from her childhood have since been demolished and others are in the process of vanishing. Her work declares the architectural beauty and social importance of these places, buildings that are part of our collective memory.
The colours in her earlier work are influenced by paintings and sculptures of the St. Ives School, an influential artistic community living and working in St Ives, Cornwall in the early twentieth century. She has since created her own colour palette often using vibrant colour combinations. Emma uses photography as a key part of her process, which develops through a set of decisions about the relationships between colour and form. The introduction of pattern in Emma’s work began a few years ago while researching the artist Anni Albers and her use of pattern in screen-prints and tapestry weaving.
For this exhibition at Gallagher & Turner Bennett presents a series of paintings responding to the exterior architecture of the 1950s House of Fraser Department Store in Middlesbrough that was formerly known as Binns. The painting series reflects the artist’s nostalgic connection to place and questions the future of these once monumental buildings.
Emma Bennett: Above Ground — Gallagher & Turner (gallagherandturner.co.uk)