Exhibition
Dark Nature - Poppy Sebire
Artists: Mats Adelman - Roger Andersson - Justin Bartlett - Paul Housley
The tendency for contemporary art to reference the darker side of the human psyche as a response to our troubled times has been prevalent in recent years and has led to many artists referencing imagery that has a direct relationship with death, gothic aesthetics and apocalyptic themes and that has often felt contrived and superficial.
The group of artists presented in ‘Dark Nature’ references those dark themes with a singularity that suggests their relationship to their world is far from a pose. This is work that has a quietness and subtlety and whose near obsessive qualities suggest it could be made in a bedroom whilst listening to Sabbath albums…. backwards. That is not to say there isn’t a knowingness in this work. It is there, and seems to be hard won by constant exploration and the marriage of their chosen mediums with the intensity of the subject matter, resulting in works that possess an atmosphere and directness, whilst leaving space for reflection.
Dark Nature suggests both the artists’ relationships to the natural world, and to the intangible way information is transformed through the creative process, to produce work that exudes a heavy and melancholic emotional weight.
