An intimate portrait of London’s most talked about post code is revealed in 125 new drawings by Adam Dant titled ‘ Soerditch ; Diary of a Neighbourhood ‘.

Dant has created a drawing a day, each of which encapsulates a particular aspect of the life and stories that surround his Shoreditch studio. Taking their form and attitude from the traditional editorial cartoons of Giles et al each of Dant’s drawings combines a familiar location with a random scrap of overheard gossip, profanity, inanity, information or opinion to present a compendium of views that forge a vivid picture of contemporary life.

Choosing to use the areas original soubriquet ‘Soerditch’ after the local ‘sour ditch that issued into the Thames’ the subjects of these pictures are intended to echo the centuries old history of Shoreditch as an extra-mural site of all manner of theatrical and bawdy events and to serve as an echo of the prattle and twitterings of those former ages. In this historical sense they might also be reminiscent of the scenes of daily life encountered in Hiroshige’s One Hundred Famous Views of Edo’ .

A 128 page paperback volume ‘Soeditch ; Diary of a neighbourhood’ has been produced in the fashion of a traditional newspaper cartoon annual and will be available at the exhibition.

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Suicide is known in all human societies. For Freud, it was one possible outcome of severe manic depression, of being caught between feelings of intense love and hate or in an unresolved oedipal conflict. The sociologist, Durkheim, claimed it was the result of anomie - the breakdown of social bonds between an individual and their community - which causes feelings of powerlessness, lack of meaning and isolation.

For women, a sense of self-worth is still largely based on appearance, youth and relationships. Yet the lives of many are dominated by the fear of rape, unwanted pregnancy, male violence, poverty and ageing. While some women experience a fundamental lack of autonomy and self-determination, others are lambasted as ‘over achievers’, who are assumed to be ‘unfeminine’ ‘difficult’ or ‘feisty’. For the creative woman – even in this post-feminist age - there is still a constant pull between the demands of motherhood and creativity, along with the sneaky, guilty belief that she does not have the right to pursue her own vision. The reasons for suicide are, nevertheless, varied: depression, the loss of a relationship, shame, a sense of failure and despair, all play their parts.

Celebrities live under a particular set of pressure-cooker circumstances. Often an innate low self-esteem has been bolstered by a life-style full of unrealistic expectation and false notions of perfection. Those whose careers are failing or who have become enmeshed in scandal are often forced to play out their battles with loneliness, depression, alcohol and drugs in the public domain.

Rachel Howard’s ‘’Suicide Paintings’’ were first shown at the Bohen Foundation in New York, in 2007, and exhibited at Haunch of Venison, London in 2008. The series evolved after an acquaintance of Howard’s committed suicide. He was discovered, not in the imagined drama, ‘swinging from the rafters’, but kneeling in a pose almost of prayer. It was this particular detail that Howard found most disturbing, and which led her to create the series, coupled with the fact that for her, suicide is one of the last taboos. The source material came from trawling through forensic magazines and internet sites. These images were then abstracted from their contexts within Howard’s rapidly executed line drawings.

In response to these the award-winning poet, novelist and art critic, Sue Hubbard, who has written about Howard’s art work, has created a series of poems that sit alongside the images in an emotional and visual dialogue, and illuminate the deaths of women as various as Diane Arbus, Judy Garland, Eva Hesse and a female suicide bomber. Taken from her newly published third collection, The Forgetting and Remembering of Air, these disarmingly, direct and evocative poems explore in a language that is muscular and lyrical, painterly yet spare, the psychology of these very different women in extremis.

This brave, bold, collaboration between two women artists, each highly regarded in her own field, demonstrates that there is still something important to say about the poignancy and tragedy of the human condition.

Rachel Howard is represented by Blain Southern and Sue Hubbard’s new novel, Girl in White is published by Cinnamon Press and her new poetry collection, The Forgetting and Remembering of Air, by Salt Publishing.

JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2013

Elizabeth Cope

MARCH - APRIL 2013

Adam Dant

MAY - JUNE 2013

Sue Hubbard

& Rachel Howard

JULY - AUGUST 2013

Peter Wylie

SEPTEMBER - OCTOBER 2013

Ian Harper

NOVEMBER - DECEMBER 2013

Victoria Kiff

'Making it Different' brings together two bodies of work, both addressing the challenges of housing in our ever growing urban environments.

Room one features Wylie's paintings and sketches of Le Corbusier's monument to modernity, Chandigarh. Commissioned in 1947 following partition, Chandigarh was Le Corbusier's tabula rasa and stood as a symbol of India's faith in its future.

Alongside this, room two houses the collaboration between Peter Wylie & Roger Zogolovitch, architect and developer. Paintings, prints and models are displayed exploring homes in the sky space as the next territory in the city. In contrast to what has gone before Roger & Peter's vision incorporates existing cityscapes. By acknowledging what stands and not bulldozing to start afresh, cities grow in celebration of their pasts. In contrast to the 'clean slate' of Chandigarh, here our cities can be extended upwards, whilst retaining their identity with respect to their histories.

The exhibition also sees the launch of the manifesto, 'Making it Different'. Designed and published in conjunction with Abrahams and featuring an introduction by Fred Scott.

Peter Wylie first exhibited at Eleven Spitalfields in April 2011 with the exhibition, Concrete (Bèton Brut). A collection of works that examined the visionary social housing of the 1960s by architects such as Erno Goldfinger, the Smithsons and Ladsun. These paintings were praised by Owen Hatherley for depicting 'everyday city life and a monumental modernism live together unassumingly'. Peter's work hangs in this years Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, was shortlisted for the Threadneedle Prize in 2009 and was awarded the Lynn Painters-Stainers Prize in 2010. His work can be seen alongside iconic Twentieth Century art collected by Goldfinger for his home 2 Willow Rd, and now under the care of the National Trust. 

As chairman of SolidSpace, Roger Zogolovitch specialises in innovative ways of delivering new housing. He is a member of the Royal Academy Client committee and a Past President of the Architectural Association, where he graduated in 1971.

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Following Ian Harper's 2009 exhibition at Eleven Spitlafields, we will again be exhibiting his atmospheric and evocative paintings. This time with a collection of works inspired by visits to Venice and Istanbul.

Victoria Kiff’s art works are formed and constructed using oil paint, paper and salvaged material, either on wood, linen, paper or board. They are constructions of a living history, immortalizing the discarded and disregarded. Landscape and Sea form the human figure, and internal body. Influences include the work of Antonin Artuad, 'The Projection of the True Body', The paintings of Francis Bacon and William Scott.

Victoria Kiff’s artwork takes in many disciplines. This exhibition features work created through a myriad of processes and techniques. From copper etching to monoprints, rich pigment applied densely to found boards and collaged surfaces, Victoria Kiff’s art works are formed and constructed using oil paint, paper and salvaged material, either on wood, linen, paper or board.

They are constructions of a living history, immortalizing the discarded and disregarded. Landscape and Sea form the human figure, and internal body. ‘Vessels’ takes as its inspiration the work of Antonin Artaud, ‘The Projection of the True Body’, the paintings of Francis Bacon and William Scott.

Victoria Kiff completed her education at Kingston University and Central St Martins School of Art. Her work has been exhibited extensively in London and in East Sussex, where the artist lives and works.

More of Victoria Kiff’s work can be seen at www.victoriakiff.net

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Victoria Kiff’s artwork takes in many disciplines. This exhibition features work created through a myriad of processes and techniques. From copper etching to monoprints, rich pigment applied densely to found boards and collaged surfaces, Victoria Kiff’s art works are formed and constructed using oil paint, paper and salvaged material, either on wood, linen, paper or board.

They are constructions of a living history, immortalizing the discarded and disregarded. Landscape and Sea form the human figure, and internal body. ‘Vessels’ takes as its inspiration the work of Antonin Artaud, ‘The Projection of the True Body’, the paintings of Francis Bacon and William Scott.

Victoria Kiff completed her education at Kingston University and Central St Martins School of Art. Her work has been exhibited extensively in London and in East Sussex, where the artist lives and works.

More of Victoria Kiff’s work can be seen at www.victoriakiff.net

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Following the success of 2011’s ‘Illustrated Guide for the Confused’, Michael Chanarin returns to Eleven Spitalfields Gallery with this exhibition of new work entitled, ‘Illustrated Guide to Wisdom v3.1’.

In his earlier body of work, two years ago Chanarin drew inspiration and imagery from mid-20th Century print publications. Earlier works displayed a pairing of imagery appropriated from books devoted to education or instruction and linking these images with lines of text, mostly fabricated horoscope readings, loaded with dire warning, really sound advice, and also humorous.

The results were described by Stephen McNeilly as containing, ‘weighty themes, but treated with a light touch that knows the weight of the narrative under focus. The artist doesn’t charge us to dwell too long on any individual aspect: the relation itself between the disparate parts and the creative process underpinning them, being the real subject of the work.’

There is a clear lineation between these and Chanarin’s more recent works on display here. The stylized, illustrative aesthetic will be familiar to viewers as being from the conventions of young and teenage children’s literature of the 1930’s thru 1960’s. A time of mostly pre-photographic illustration. A time when illustrators working in pen and ink produced extraordinary drawings. In a way these paintings by Chanarin reflect a respectful tribute to these mostly anonymous, often brilliant illustrators. Appropriating, collaging and distorting their work to form provocative imagery implying a new and perhaps absurd or surreal narrative is a true combined act of homage, creativity and recycling.

The absence of text and the interaction between various characters ensure the narrative qualities of this series of works are quite different to those that preceded them. The distraction of text creating a framework of understanding, real or imagined is absent. The compositions however contain the same ambiguity, the same surreal elements, the same suggestion of parallel universes interacting. They have perhaps more depth with elements rooted in more homogeneous environments.

The source for most of the images, at the time of their publication, 1930’s thru 1960’s provided entertainment and inspiration to a generation of children. In doing so they also bestow a foundation of significant influence as regards gender identity, sense of self, moral frameworks along with a few stereotypical constructions encompassing less than subtle prejudices. Through the telling of tales and inclusion of archetypal characters, children were encouraged to distinguish right from wrong. Chanarin takes these familiar elements and arranges them in a sometimes playful, sometimes subversive way.

Residents of the streets of East London are captured with startling clarity by the enigmatic C A Mathew. The purpose of the photographs remains unknown, but on the morning of Saturday 20th April, 1912, our photographer walked the short distance from Liverpool Street Station into the heart of Spitalfields, taking his camera with him.

In contrast to the more formal, posed photographs of the time viewers may be more familiar with, these photographs engage vividly with a modern audience, who see the people, the streets and the everyday details, just as C A Mathew himself would have seen them.

Mathew lived in Brightlingsea in Essex, having only begun taking photographs a year before these images were made, he passed away 4 short years later in 1916 leaving this series of images that in the words of the Gentle Author of Spitalfields Life are ‘the most vivid evocation we have of Spitalfields at this time.’

Because C.A.Mathew is such an enigmatic figure, I have conjured my own picture of him in a shabby suit and bowler hat, with a threadbare tweed coat and muffler against the chill April wind. I can see him trudging the streets of Spitalfields lugging his camera, grimacing behind his thick moustache as he squints at the sky to appraise the light and the buildings. Let me admit, it is hard to resist a sense of connection to him because of the generous humanity of some of these images. While his contemporaries sought more self-consciously picturesque staged photographs, C.A.Mathew’s pictures possess a relaxed spontaneity, even an informal quality, that allows his subjects to meet our gaze as equals. As viewer, we are put in the same position as the photographer and the residents of Spitalfields 1912 are peering at us with unknowing curiosity, while we observe them from the reverse of time’s two-way mirror.

The other source of fascination here is to see how some streets have changed beyond recognition while others remain almost identical. Most of all it is the human details that touch me, scrutinizing each of the individual figures presenting themselves with dignity in their worn clothes, and the children who treat the streets as their own.

These pictures are all that exists of the life of C.A.Mathew, but I think they are a fine legacy for us to remember him because they contain a whole world in these few streets, that we could never know in such vibrant detail if it were not for him. Such is the haphazard nature of human life that these images may be the consequence of a delayed train, yet irrespective of the obscure circumstances of their origin, this is photography of the highest order. C.A.Mathew was recording life.

- Gentle Author, Spitalfields Life

edited version of article dated 21st September, 2010.

C A Mathew’s Spitalfields images are preserved in the archives at Bishopsgate Institute and have been carefully restored by contemporary Spitalfields photographer Jeremy Freedman.

Limited Edition prints available for purchase with Bishopsgate Institute receiving a donation from each print sale.

A series of events curated by Bishopsgate Institute will run concurrently with this exhibition. More information to follow.

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Following the success of 2011’s ‘Illustrated Guide for the Confused’, Michael Chanarin returns to Eleven Spitalfields Gallery with this exhibition of new work entitled, ‘Illustrated Guide to Wisdom v3.1’.

In his earlier body of work, two years ago Chanarin drew inspiration and imagery from mid-20th Century print publications. Earlier works displayed a pairing of imagery appropriated from books devoted to education or instruction and linking these images with lines of text, mostly fabricated horoscope readings, loaded with dire warning, really sound advice, and also humorous.

The results were described by Stephen McNeilly as containing, ‘weighty themes, but treated with a light touch that knows the weight of the narrative under focus. The artist doesn’t charge us to dwell too long on any individual aspect: the relation itself between the disparate parts and the creative process underpinning them, being the real subject of the work.’

There is a clear lineation between these and Chanarin’s more recent works on display here. The stylized, illustrative aesthetic will be familiar to viewers as being from the conventions of young and teenage children’s literature of the 1930’s thru 1960’s. A time of mostly pre-photographic illustration. A time when illustrators working in pen and ink produced extraordinary drawings. In a way these paintings by Chanarin reflect a respectful tribute to these mostly anonymous, often brilliant illustrators. Appropriating, collaging and distorting their work to form provocative imagery implying a new and perhaps absurd or surreal narrative is a true combined act of homage, creativity and recycling.

The absence of text and the interaction between various characters ensure the narrative qualities of this series of works are quite different to those that preceded them. The distraction of text creating a framework of understanding, real or imagined is absent. The compositions however contain the same ambiguity, the same surreal elements, the same suggestion of parallel universes interacting. They have perhaps more depth with elements rooted in more homogeneous environments.

The source for most of the images, at the time of their publication, 1930’s thru 1960’s provided entertainment and inspiration to a generation of children. In doing so they also bestow a foundation of significant influence as regards gender identity, sense of self, moral frameworks along with a few stereotypical constructions encompassing less than subtle prejudices. Through the telling of tales and inclusion of archetypal characters, children were encouraged to distinguish right from wrong. Chanarin takes these familiar elements and arranges them in a sometimes playful, sometimes subversive way.

‘As we make our way through the myriad of ‘stuff’ which remains – the familiar, forgotten and unfamiliar, we discover and rewrite the past, calibrating our memories and thoughts, shifting the sense of ourselves and our life story.’

This exhibition presents a collection of drawings made by Fay Ballard since her father, the novelist J. G. Ballard, died in 2009. The ‘House Clearance’ of the title refers to that of the parents’ home following such a bereavement. The artist described this as a ‘daunting task’, where ‘the past is present in each room, on the staircase banister, on the light switches, the window ledges, mantelpieces and door handles.’

It was on a summer holiday in Spain, 1964 that Fay Ballard’s mother died suddenly of pneumonia, aged 34. The young family returned to Shepperton, and continued their lives with no discussion about the tragic loss they had just experienced. There were no photographs of the artist’s mother on display in the home, she became ‘invisible, almost erased’.

Room One of the exhibition features drawings of the artist’s mother made from photographs discovered hidden away at the family home. Amongst them a pair of small photographs of the artist as a baby with her parents in Chiswick House Gardens. The parents took it in turn to pose with their young daughter in front of a large stone statue of the Sphinx, the man-eating mythical beast who guarded Thebes. The photographs show a young happy family, the statue acts as an omen of their impending tragedy.

Whilst clearing her father’s house – the family home, Fay found herself confronted with ‘stuff’. Small possessions, containing countless memories that shape us and the stories we tell about ourselves. It is on these small objects that the artist’s attentions are focused in the second room of this exhibition. Drawn in incredible detail and grouped into ‘Memory Boxes’, of which there are 3. Box 1 comprises objects drawn from life, with every crack, crease and speck of dust accounted for. Box 2 holds objects drawn from memory and Box 3 contains objects representing the artist’s father, the central figure in her life who brought her and her siblings up single-handedly.

‘The memory boxes commemorate and celebrate these objects which stir the memory and unlock the past. The drawings of my mother make concrete her presence. The process of drawing and making marks on to paper brings her back, and makes her real. They reinstate her into my life.’

The exhibition will be accompanied by a short catalogue containing an essay by writer and curator, Kathy Kubicki.

A related events programme will also be held, including drawing workshops and an evening discussion.

More information to follow.

Eleven Spitalfields is pleased to announce a solo exhibition of sculpture by London-based artist Nick Turvey, curated by Peter Fleissig. This is Turvey’s first exhibition with the gallery, which occupies the two ground floor Georgian paneled rooms of a house originally built by Samuel Worrell in 1720, in the heart of the Fournier Street conservation area in East London.

Continuing Turvey’s use of military metaphor, these latest works treat weaponry as a proxy for the body, scrutinizing the anatomy of power, and revealing connections between the political and more internal or interpersonal forms of conflict. In Wunderkammer style, mixed media pieces occupy floor and wall vitrines lined with period wallpaper, combined with free-standing, cast and painted bronze works. The unease produced by these sinister toys, in which the infantile and domestic turns sexual or violent, may originate in the anxieties of a Cold War childhood, with its repressed fears of confrontation. Yet this witty work also calls attention to how we objectify as ‘other’ those aspects of ourselves we find disturbing. It reminds us that the social contract granting the State a monopoly on violence is equally about allowing its citizens to create a more favourable image of themselves.

Turvey’s multidisciplinary practice encompasses sculpture, design and film-making. He graduated from the Royal College of Art in 2006, after previously studying architecture. Recent exhibitions include solo shows at The Gibberd Gallery, Harlow; The Print Room, London and ASC, London, as well as group shows Interesting Times, Leicester; Surface, Burghley House; Sculptour, Phoenix Gallery, Belgium; and The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. Large-scale works are permanently installed in London, Harlow, and the Pinsent Masons collection.

NICK TURVEY - FOR YOUR SAFETY & SECURITY

INTERVIEW BY PETER FLEISSIG

PF - Cowboys and Indians. Mummy and Daddy. What do you remember of your childhood as a first experience of art?

NT - Probably Heureka by Jean Tinguely at Expo 1964 in Lausanne, a creaking towering great mushroom cloud of metal. I was 5.

PF - Did you have wallpaper in your room?

NT - Yes. It was a cowboys and indians wallpaper, later replaced by Thunderbird.

PF - Mushroom clouds and Thunderbirds - Why didn't you join the UN or Swiss Army to protect and obey?

NT - I never was very good at joining in, perhaps as a result of the fetish for team games at school, with the captains picking their teams, and me always getting picked last, perhaps something to do with the football match where I worked out that I got to kick the ball more often if I stood still in the middle of the pitch rather than chasing it around. I wish I could have joined the Swiss army tho. One of the best things I did last summer was visiting Festung Furigen, a decommissioned Swiss army base carved into a cliff near Lucerne, with all the weapons, cutlery, gas filters, giant doors etc intact. It made me realise how ineffectual the general run of US survivalist fantasies are.

PF - Where do you get your creative juice in London?

NT - I've developed a taste for big narrative historical paintings, so I like dropping in to the National to look at a couple of things. The Science Museum has sparked more than a few ideas. I tend to think quite well while swimming.

PF -  Nick Turvey is an artist interested in the pattern and structure of the natural world, with a background in architecture and film making. True or false?

NT - I am still interested in the pattern and structure of the natural world, but not so much as an artist. Architecture and film are more part of my artist tool kit, in terms of thinking of object as experience, and of interior space as a proxy for mental space. I think the key word for me now is existential, trying to articulate the humour, absurdity and pain of being a mind in a body, trying to communicate with others in a similar predicament. Philip Guston is a name I forgot to mention.

For more information, visit Nick Turvey's website