This exhibition has an audio tour currently available, given by esteemed curator Jo Baring. Click here for audio tour.
This exhibition at The Lightbox Museum will explore the ideas and narratives behind paintings, sculptures, and performance-based artworks by female artists in The Ingram Collection, as part of an ongoing mission to address the imbalance of female representation in galleries, exhibitions and collections.
Three of my artworks, which were acquired by The Ingram Collection in 2019, will be exhibited alongside key figures in the history of Modern British Art, such as Laura Knight, Barbara Hepworth and Elisabeth Frink, will feature alongside emerging and established contemporary artists including Lucy Gregory, Chloe Wing Chow and Tahmina Negmat.
11 August – 20 September 2020
£7.50 Day Pass | Lightbox Members Free | Under 21s Free
Pre-book your timeslot for Main and Upper Gallery exhibitions here.
About the Artworks
Saving Our Souls (from the Net Drawing Series), 2019
The troubled history of the Irish incorporates a long history of war and famine. Boats are an icon of Irish travels across the seas which often ended in separation from families, loss of status and identity, or death. Pan forward to the current global migrant crisis and we can draw many comparisons. The other side of the story is what happens under the water in the hidden currents of reaction: The opposing responses of either capturing and detaining these fleeing shoals of people, or helping them to safety. Nicola Anthony works with NGOs to tell stories of immigrants in her work, but these Net Drawings are a more abstract way of describing the complications of such upheavals, revealing unexpected forms. They became allegorical for the journeys we all make at one time or another, in differing levels of safety, to find a promised New World. The piece is drawn by burning the surface of calligraphy paper - the medium being the scorch marks and perforations on the paper.
Created in response to John Behan's Ghost Boat works, upon special invitation from Royal Society of Sculptors and the Ingram Collection.
The Journey of Our Parallel Lives, 2019
This artwork is about the invisible stories contained within landscapes and our journeys through them. From walks all around the world the artist started keeping an abstract map, noting that every walk in the same place is different "in the particular path which seems to open up to the feet. At the same time, my courses run in parallel to each other, starting and ending together." These drawings represent movement, the invisible meanings of journeys, and mapping the body’s course through them. Feet never trace the same route twice - we all experience life differently even from the same path. Nicola Anthony's drawings are drawn by burning the surface of calligraphy paper - the medium being the scorch marks and perforations on the paper.
Created in response to Walking Group, a sculpture by Kenneth Armitage, upon special invitation from Royal Society of Sculptors and the Ingram Collection.
Maze Fragment, 2019
In the creation of this work Nicola Anthony was concerned with tangles, lines, the maze of words and the labyrinth of time. She studied the myth of Daedalus - “the greatest artist and the creator of the Labyrinth”. The journey of lines across the paper could be geographical contours, a distorted music stave with tumbling notes, or walking tracks in parallel. The lines lose their way along the route and become more haphazard. Anthony's drawings are created by burning the surface of calligraphy paper. This drawing rests on a mirror backing which is designed to reflect the light and shadow, and capture faces in the room as little moments becoming entangled in the puzzle. ‘Maze Fragment' is part of a large series in which the lines connect and span across 50 unique artworks, all existing now in parallel, and in different places - a fragmented map.
In Michael Ayrton’s book The Maze Maker, to which this artwork responds, Daedalus says “I never understood the pattern of my life, so that I have blundered through it in a maze.”
Learn more about these artworks and The Ingram Collection here
