Image: self portrait with rooks wings, plaster, wire, and mixed media – 2010 © Paul Stafford.
PAUL STAFFORD ARBS:
NEW HEADS AND OLD DRAWINGS
This exhibition is dedicated to Mona Mellor.
MENIER GALLERY 26 – 7 May 2011Menier Chocolate Factory PRIVATE VIEW TUESDAY 26 APRIL 6.00pm – 8.45pm 51 Southwark Street, London SE1 1RU T: 07881832291 for information mail@meniergallery.co.uk Opening times: Wednesday 11am – 6pm, Thursday/Friday 11am – 8pm, Saturday 11am – 5pm, Sunday Closed
On the 17th of January 2008 I crash-landed at Heathrow – London. I was a passenger on flight BA038 returning home from Beijing – China. The event had a profound effect on my life. In my work since, I have struggled to wrestle with the conflicts in my head. Sleep was/is elusive and dreams recurrent. “On the floor next to the skirting boards were 4 dead objects, birdlike, one of them was black and the body was like a mouse or bat, I got the black one first and dropped it out of the window, it flew back and started talking to me, he had a small round head with feathers very close to his scalp” excerpt from a recurring dream recorded Sunday 27th January 2008.
All my life I seem to have been obsessed by flight, I wanted to be a pilot but was rubbish at maths, I have painted, drawn and sculpted planes all my life – perhaps my flight was meant to be. None of my heads or drawings are for sale – I hope you can find the time to join me on my journey.
In October 2010 I was elected a member of The Royal Society of British Sculptors in recognition of my contribution to British sculpture.
RUSSELL JOHN
NEW PAINTINGS
Image: A painting in progress with colour swatches
A new series of paintings consisting of imagery collected obsessively from old and new media.
Through content, technique and the activity of painting, I investigate my relationship with liberty and restraint, order and chaos, and the forces at work in the world.