The pandemic has been tough for everyone but perhaps tougher for some. David Whetstone visits a special exhibition in Newcastle.
Clockwise from L to R – Pandemic Puppet by Carole Ann Hall, Mask by Tasmin Armal Duggan, Covid Bowl.
The annual exhibition by the artists of Chilli Studios has opened at VANE, the gallery on the first floor of Commercial Union House on Pilgrim Street, and a visit is recommended.
That it’s on at all is something to celebrate. Many of the exhibitors have been confined to their garrets and only able to attend studio workshop sessions via Zoom.
For all galleries – indeed all involved in the arts – it has been a disconcertingly stop-start 18 months.
But under any circumstances this would be worth seeing. There is some truly accomplished work on display and collectively it’s as good a summation of life under lockdown as you’ll encounter anywhere.
Masks feature, of course. Aly Smith drew herself wearing a splendid specimen, her face a deft outline and the mask in colour to bring it to the fore.
Self Portraits in Mask by Aly Smith (Never Normal, Chilli Studios, VANE)
The picture is an instantly recognisable reflection of life under the pandemic, as everyone will recognise, but it has wider significance too.
According to the artist, her double portrait “represents the stigma of discussing mental health issues and the times I have been too scared to tell people I have bipolar and the times I actually have told people and it has been used against me, provoking feelings that ‘I should have kept the mask on’”.
Tasmin Armel Duggan’s pair of embroidered examples express anger, frustration and even a bit of understandable fear. One is called F*** U and the other Fed Up. A mother-of-two with OCD, she says she got to washing her hands 40 times a day.
But as so often in this show, there is a spark of humour that helps to keep the darkest waves of depression at bay. The masks are quite jolly.
Tasmin has an MA in fine art and a talent that, at the very least, allowed for a creative channelling of emotion.
CrowVid by Deborah Buchan (Never Normal, Chilli Studios, VANE)
There are other more sombre exhibits. Deborah Buchan’s split crow with its punning title, CrowVid, is one of a series called Love in a Time of Covid, which was tricky for everyone.
Michael Crew’s textured painting Social Distance depicts a stricken figure in an apocalyptic landscape with arrows putting in all directions.
Karen Avey’s nightmarish Alarm shows a shiver of pale sharks (yes, apparently that is the collective noun) encircling a green head – expression, she says, of “the many worries people have in lockdown”.
Alarm by Karen Avey (Never Normal, Chilli Studios, VANE)
Chilli Studios, set up in 2004 and based in the Blackfriars Centre on New Bridge Street, is a charity which aims to improve mental health through creativity.
The exhibition shows clearly that it does that brilliantly. Much of the work is exceptional and some of the accompanying artist statements offer an insight into the challenges faced daily by many Chilli Studio users.
With the clever title Never Normal, the exhibition is a timely reminder that for some people ‘normal’ has always been a loaded word, regardless of whether we’re talking old or new.
The exhibition is at VANE until July 27. The gallery is open Wednesday to Saturday, 12 noon to 5pm. Do see the exhibition… and thereby also take the chance to enter a building which is not going to be with us for very much longer.
It is due to be demolished which raises valid questions about the future of the many creative organisations and individuals it has accommodated for more than a decade.
Find out more about VANE at www.vane.org.uk and more about Chilli Studios at www.chillistudios.co.uk