Portrait by Sam Ford in Alice Hartley’s Deptford studio
CURRENTS, an exhibition of new paintings from aunt and niece, Emma Hartley and Alice Hartley
12th-17th October at the gallery@OXO
CURRENTS - a movement of water, air or electricity in a particular direction
Alice’s new series of paintings have grown from a place of comfort, a memory of a land and time within it but have evolved into something new - creating an energy more frantic, more concerned. Lush reminiscent greens are cut with hard interventions of straight lines and ridged, sharp marks. Alice’s work has shifted, shifted from being a witness to a moment, into something more sure and involved. There is haste and impatience in the mark, the voice is louder and there is a much greater need to act.
Alice sees these paintings as biographical, and has taken great inspiration from Deborah Levy’s memoirs, The Cost of Living, Things I Don’t Want to Know and Real Estate, where psychological upheaval finds a parallel in geographical displacement. A lot of Alice’s pace comes from her ever-constant studio playlists including music from Burial, Julianna Barwick, Solange and Kelly Lee Owens. Her ties and memory of the well-known land are ever-present, she sees the paintings as emotive landscapes that create a sounding board for playing out one's own role.
Alice Hartley
Hartley set out in printmaking, making large scale woodcuts, her work referenced dreams, familiar landscapes and with fragments of her own text. Her time in the printmaking department at the RCA encouraged her to push scale as far as she could and take her mark making to a more expressive outlet in mono screen printing. The mark became more intuitive, forceful and the voice more urgent.
Alice Hartley has had two sell out shows at Blue Shop Cottage in 2021 and we are thrilled to now be representing her as a gallery artist. Alice is a true painter working through a silk screen and directly onto the canvas and her emotive expressive works have brought thousands of collectors down to the gallery here in Camberwell, South East London.
Over the last 10 years Hartley has used this process to make giant site-specific installations, filling gallery walls, billboards, disused car parks and shop fronts. Her palette is recognisable as is her text, from it we get a sense of something deeply personal but always ambiguous.
Ahead of her next show at the brand new Blue Shop Gallery Alice Hartley is taking part in this joint show with her aunt Emma Hartley at the OXO Gallery. These works were painted in Hartley’s studio in Deptford 2022, all painted and drawn in oil, charcoal and pencil.
BA Kingston University | MA Royal College of Art
