Broadway Gallery’s latest exhibition titled This Muddy Eden opens on 27 February and brings together new works by landscape artist Hannah Brown and figurative painter Christopher Orr.
The exhibition explores how new methods and technologies are informing the work of seemingly traditional art. At first glance, both artist’s work wouldn’t look out of place hung next to a John Constable or J.M.W. Turner. However, viewers that invest a little more time, will find something more intriguing in the works.
Christopher Orr’s ethereal paintings of figures in landscapes actually take their starting point from collages taken from old magazines, then using Photoshop to finesse the composition, and only then will he begin working with oil paint onto canvas or board.
It is very unlikely that you would find Hannah Brown with a sketchbook making studies that will become her astonishing (and huge) landscapes of parks around the UK as she prefers to take photographs that are slightly altered digitally before she begins to use more traditional methods.
Alongside This Muddy Eden the gallery will also be launching three supporting exhibitions that all look into the possibilities that new technologies can give to figurative artists today. Bob Bicknell-Knight will present paintings, sculpture and film that look at the landscapes found in modern computer games.
Local artist John Vincent’s digital installation and film imagines Letchworth through the eyes of a time traveller journeying to the future in A Garden Futuricity.
Sculptor Rory Menage presents Forest, a series of oak figures, partly developed using computer-aided design on the Broadway Plinth.
The new season of exhibitions at the Broadway Gallery shines a light on the rude health of contemporary figurative art. Far from being old hat, young and established artists are still learning from art history, its traditions and methods, yet through the use of modern technologies are making them relevant for today’s audiences. I hope that the four exhibitions on show will appeal to lovers of tradition, representational painting and sculpture as much as they attract fans of contemporary art.”
This Muddy Eden runs until 26 April. Broadway Gallery is open from 10am-5pm daily from Wednesday to Sunday. For more information, visit broadway-letchworth.com/studio-gallery
