PAST EVENTS Archive: Art Fairs, Exhibitions and Previews

EXHIBITION: Peter Brown ‘On The Streets of London’

22 November – 22 December 2023

Fresh from a recent collaboration with Banksy and inclusion in his ‘Cut and Run’ retrospective at GoMA, this exhibition presents a new series of paintings of London by plein air painter Peter Brown. Showcasing 50 views of life on the streets of the city, the exhibition follows two previous presentations by Brown recording the same city subject in its ever-evolving state. ‘A Big Year’ (28 October – 28 November 2020) and ‘London: The Return’ (23 March-24 April 2022), both shown at Messums London, documented the changing life of the city’s streets over two turbulent years.

EXHIBITION: Breathing New Life – The Elisabeth Frink Woolland studio reimagined

18 October – 17 November 2023

This October, the Elisabeth Frink studio will be reimagined in our Cork Street gallery and house a collection of her artwork which has been collected over time.

EXHIBITION: Christie Brown Drawings

18 October – 17 November 2023

It is little known that life drawing has been integral to the practice of internationally renowned ceramicist Christie Brown. For this exhibition, Brown presents a new body of work which includes a series of large-scale drawings which integrate characters derived from her life drawings over many years.

EXHIBITION: Makoto Kagoshima with Hiromine Nakamura and Morito Toyonaga

20 September – 13 October 2023

Makoto Kagoshima’s quirky and exuberant ceramics bridge gaps between folk art, craft and fine art through his imaginative motifs of the natural world, both animal and botanical. His colour palette is full and bright, and his draughtsmanship is clean and illustrative, and the resultant works have a pattern-like quality that simultaneously recalls the decorated black and red narrative vases of the ancient Mediterranean and the refined geometric graphics of post-modern European design.

EXHIBITION: Charles Poulsen ‘Time’

20 September – 13 October 2023

Drawing has, in recent years, been Poulsen’s primary means of expression which for him offers immediacy and a direct means of communication. He comments, “it evokes and suggests rather than fixes, it feels transitory and ephemeral, echoing the lives we live”.

EXHIBITION: Peter Godwin ‘Landscape as Experience’

9 August – 8 September 2023

For over 15 years, Peter Godwin was painting, drawing and making prints while pursuing his teaching career, but at the time was hesitant to exhibit his work. He is rapidly becoming recognised as one of Australia’s most accomplished painters and printmakers.

EXHIBITION: Tuesday Riddell ‘In Shadows’

31 July – 1 September 2023

This exhibition will mark Tuesday Riddell’s third solo show at our Cork Street Gallery following the celebrated success of her previous two exhibitions in 2019 and 2021. Riddell was part of Messums Emerging Talent programme and is one of a number of artists represented by the Gallery whose practice is underpinned by extraordinary craftsmanship in the execution of their work. Riddell works with japanning, a technique originally developed in the 17th century as an imitation of Asian lacquer work

EXHIBITION: Tyga Helme ‘In the Wings’

31 May – 30 June 2023

Recently I have been drawing the wild and exquisite world of undergrowth, of brambles and nettles and a million plants I daily forget the names of. I like getting to know these forgotten, overlooked corners, and returning to the same spot day after day, drawing or painting directly from life.

EVENT: Photo London Fair

11 – 14 May 2023

The work of four female photographers take centre stage at the Messums Photography booth, Atong Atem (illustrated), Yan Wang Preston and Polly Penrose are presented together with a unique set of prints by Dr Ingrid Pollard.   

EXHIBITION: Tom Waugh

26 April – 26 May 2023

Tom Waugh makes sculptures from stone and marble that depict discarded, mass-produced objects. Plastic bags, cardboard boxes, and tin cans are squashed, crushed, and wrinkled, documenting the casual imprints of human use

EXHIBITION: Jean-Vincent Simonet

26 April – 26 May 2023

Jean-Vincent Simonet (b. 1991) graduated from École cantonale d’art de Lausanne in 2014. His practice fuses analogue images, digital techniques, collage, montage, sculpture and painting with remarkable fluidity. His work is permeated by a sense of overload and exuberance and characterised by a penchant for sheer entropy.

EXHIBITION: Shaun Fraser

26 April – 26 May

Shaun Fraser’s work frequently comments upon notions of identity, links to landscape and connections with place. His practice questions how the landscapes, spaces and places which we inhabit form us and can be translated through personal engagement, privileging one’s own memory as a principal source.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: John Walker

The impact of the work of British-born artist John Walker has resonated for over 50 years. His unique and imaginative painterly language has influenced generations of artists. Walker represented England at the 1972 Venice Biennale, won the 1976 John Moores Painting Prize, had extensive survey shows at both the Tate and Hayward galleries and was nominated for the Turner Prize in 1985. His work is represented in collections across the world.

ONLINE TALK: John Walker: Abstraction – A Language Shared

Wednesday 22 March, midday

A rare opportunity to join an online discussion event with the internationally renowned artist John Walker, in conversation with a panel of artists and academics exploring the trajectory of Walker’s practice, his inspirations and influences.

EXHIBITION: John Walker

22 March – 21 April 2023

The impact of the work of British-born artist John Walker has resonated for over 50 years. His unique and imaginative painterly language has influenced generations of artists. Walker represented England at the 1972 Venice Biennale, won the 1976 John Moores Painting Prize, had extensive survey shows at both the Tate and Hayward galleries and was nominated for the Turner Prize in 1985. His work is represented in collections across the world.

EXHIBITION: Richard Hoare ‘Threshold’

6 – 17 March 2023

“All these places are just places, the random legacy of erosion and deposition, ancient volcanic activity, isostatic rise. When we look at the mountains, we see shape and monumental stillness animated, if at all, by the weather: passing rain-showers, the smudges of fog and cloud, sudden bursts of sunlight.

MELBOURNE EXHIBITION: Makoto Kagoshima

Thursday 2 and Friday 3 March

Messums is thrilled to announce the arrival of new works by international artist Makoto Kagoshima in Melbourne, Australia this March. Based in Kyushu, the southern island of Japan, Makoto Kagoshima originally studied ceramics in Okinawa, Japan before working in the design sector and becoming a full-time artist at age 35.

EXHIBITION: Martin Smith ‘The Poetics of Geometry’

15 February – 17 March 2023

A key figure in British ceramics, Martin Smith is an artist who approaches clay with the mindset of an architect. He studied at Bristol Polytechnic Faculty of Art and Design and the Royal College of Art, emerging in the midst of the new ceramics movement in the late 1970s and becoming known for his multi-disciplinary approach to design and practice. Smith is a Senior Research Fellow at the Royal College of Art having been Professor of Ceramics and Glass at the school for 16 years. In his new role he is researching the potential of the digitally printed ceramic surface.

AUSTRALIA EXHIBITION: Laurence Edwards: A Gathering of Uncertainties

4 February – 16 April 2023

Developed in partnership with Messums Wiltshire, this exhibition will be the first exhibition of contemporary sculpture in the recently completed North Gallery at Orange and will radically transform the space, offering Australian audiences a rare encounter with Laurence Edwards’ work.

EXHIBITION: Jack McGarrity ‘Theatre as Studio, Studio as Theatre’

11 January – 10 February 2023

One of Messums’ Emerging Talent artists, Jack McGarrity trained at The Glasgow School of Art and The Royal Drawing School with residencies at the Prado and in Florence.

ONLINE TALK: Photographer Jeffrey Milstein in Conversation

Monday 19 December, 4pm

Join Jeffrey Milstein in conversation with Anthony Matsena, as they explore the processes and stories behind Jeffrey’s iconic photographs.
Jeffrey Milstein was born in the Bronx in 1944, received a degree in architecture from UC Berkley in 1968 and practising as an architect before turning to photography in 2000. Growing up his two interests were art and flying, becoming a pilot at the age of 17.

EXHIBITION: Jeffrey Milstein ‘Patterns of Culture’

23 November – 6 January 2023

On the occasion of Jeffrey Milstein’s first solo show in the UK, Messums London presents a selection of works documenting patterns of culture in Europe and the United States as viewed from above. Milstein trained as an architect before turning to photography. Growing up his two interests were art and flying; becoming a pilot as a teenager. His first portfolio, Aircraft the Jet as Art, has been exhibited throughout the world, including a year-long solo show at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum.

EXHIBITION: Kitty Shepherd ‘Word of Mouth’

19 October – 18 November

This first major collection of playful ceramic works from Kitty Shepherd includes ceramic jars, plates and vases and displays multifaceted stories. At heart, ‘Word of Mouth’ is a simple story of names, colours and social history.

EXHIBITION: Richard Hoare ‘Helios’

23 September – 14 October

9 paintings to celebrate the 9 month of the year and the Autumn Solstice. Homeric Greek: Ἠέλιος
This selection of work by Richard Hoare centres on an object so omnipresent that we rarely account for its existence, but stop to look, feel and its remarkable nature becomes all the more surprising.

EXHIBITION: Antony Williams ‘In stillness – Life’

14 September – 14 October

This exhibition will showcase a collection of paintings by one of the leading contemporary figurative artists, Antony Williams, and will present two significant series of portraits.

EXHIBITION: on Surface | Perspectives on Painting

10 August – 9 September

on Surface showcases the work of a group of emerging contemporary artists who share certain affinities and approaches – Anna Brass, David Cooper, Laurence Grave and Henry Ward – together with works from Messums’ artist and selector of the exhibition, Tom Robinson.

EXHIBITION: Tom Robinson ‘In Between Them Doing’

6 July – 5 August

Tom Robinson lives in Norfolk, England. His work space is a large garage-turned-studio without windows where light is drawn through opaque panes of glass in the ceiling. The work in progress is hung on each of the four walls surrounding the artist, creating an intense if sometimes claustrophobic atmosphere. The arrangement allows the works to speak to each other across the room and for different bodies of work – small and very large paintings; paintings on panel and canvas; paintings in vivid colour and in black and white – to proceed in concert.

ONLINE TALK: Body, Land and Photography

Wednesday 1 June, 2pm

Charlotte Jansen and Yan Wang Preston in conversation introduced By Zelda Cheatle. A discussion with artist Yan Wang Preston in relation to the four major bodies of work in her solo exhibition With Love

EXHIBITION: Yan Wang Preston ‘With Love’

1 June – 1 July

Dr Yan Wang Preston (b. 1976, Henan Province, China) is recognised for her expert ability to excavate humanity at the heart of landscapes and explore the mercurial relationship between people, nature and place through photography and performance.

EVENT: Photo London

12 – 15 May 2022

Messums London presents Laura El Tantawy (UK/ Egypt), Nii Obodoi (Ghana) and Yan Wang Preston (UK/ China) at Photo London 2022.

EXHIBITION: Francesco Poiana

27 April – 27 May

Francesco’s diaphanous and dream-like watercolours of Italy are like memories; both contemporary and rooted in history. Working during the spring and summer 2020 in the Italian countryside Francesco’s en plein air paintings are spontaneous notes on the landscape

TALK & BOOK SIGNING: Peter Brown

Wednesday 6 April, 1pm

Meet Peter Brown at the Cork Street gallery for a chat with Johnny Messum and a signing of his new exhibition catalogue.

EXHIBITION: Peter Brown ‘London: the return’

23 March – 22 April 2022

A record in 50 oil paintings of a desolated London and its inspirational return to the streets we see once again today.
Pete’s next show show at Messums London: ‘London: the return’ follows on from his 2021 ‘Big Year’ exhibition which recorded the Uk’s pandemic experience.

Alexander Lindsay ‘Bonnie Broukit Bairn’

EXHIBITION: Henry Lamb RA ‘In Arcadia’

16 February – 18 March 2022

Henry Lamb was born in Adelaide, Australia in 1883 shortly before his father moved the family to Manchester having taken a post in the Mathematics department of Manchester University.

ONLINE TALK: Contemporary African Photography in Focus

Friday 4 February 2022

On the occasion of Messums London first contemporary photography exhibition ‘Resonances’, visual artists Nii Obodai and Justin Keene were in conversation with Stephanie Blomkamp, founder of Oath magazine, on the visibility, circulation and championing of African photography today.

MELBOURNE EXHIBITION: Makoto Kagoshima

10 – 28 February

We are hosting a pop-up exhibition online and in Melbourne, Australia of a new capsule collection by Makoto Kagoshima. Makoto trained as an artist, and then worked for the Conran Shop in Japan, but it is with clay that he has found his medium. 

ONLINE TALK: ‘Scratching the Surface’ with Photographer Justin Keene

Friday 21 January 2022

Messums London presented its first contemporary photography show by artists Nii Obodai and Justin Keene. Through a selection of delicately composed and elusive images, this exhibition encourages us to ponder our relationship with nature and read cultural history through the environment.

ONLINE TALK: ‘Land as a Conscious Being’ with Photographer Nii Obodai

Friday 14 January 2022

Land as a conscious being: Nii Obodai presented ‘Big Dreams’ and ‘Paradox of Paradise’.
Messums London presents its first contemporary photography show by artists Nii Obodai and Justin Keene.

ONLINE TALK: Packaging. What is the Solution?

Wednesday 12 January, 6:30pm

Can plastic packaging ever be better for the environment than paper? Why don’t we just get rid of packaging altogether?

EXHIBITION: Resonances | Nii Obodai and Justin Keene

12 January – 11 February 2022

Messums London presents its first contemporary photography show by artists Nii Obodai and Justin Keene. Through a selection of delicately composed and elusive images, this exhibition opens up layers of entry points for the viewer, allowing us to consider within an aesthetic language our relationship with nature and read cultural history through the environment.

ONLINE TALK: Minette Batters Farming Today: Leading or Lost?

Wednesday 15 December, 6:30pm

Join us to discuss with Minette Batters why Farming is facing potential ruin through ill advised trade deals.
What farmers are actually doing for the environment and net zero and what more they could do given the chance.
Minette is the President of the National Farmers’ Union of England and Wales, representing 55,000 farming businesses. She has agreed a target for the NFU of net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2040.

EXHIBITION: Dod Miller ‘Birdmen’

14 December – 7 January 2022

On the occasion of the release of the highly anticipated book ‘Birdmen’, Messums London organises an exhibition of unique vintage photographs by Dod Miller and a book signing in our Cork Street gallery.

EXHIBITION: Kurt Jackson ‘Orwell’s Jura, Morag’s Skye’

1 December – 7 January 2022

Two series of paintings from two different residencies on Scottish islands. One in George Orwell’s old house, Barnhill by the sea on the Isle of Jura. The location for the writing of 1984 – a remote and isolated house where time has stood still since Orwell’s own time there.

ONLINE TALK: British Eccentricities through Photography

Monday 22 November 2021

With guests the acclaimed documentary photographer Martin Parr CBE, social and art documentary photographer Sophie Green and documentary photographer Dod Miller as they discussed British eccentricities, cultural customs and humour in photography.

EXHIBITION: No Boundaries | Contemporary Canadian Ceramic

10 – 26 November

This important exhibition gathers together for the first time in the UK four Canadian artists who span the last three generations, and regions from the east to the west coast.

EXHIBITION: Tyga Helme ‘Urgent is the Rhythm’

3 – 26 November 2021

Trained at Edinburgh College of Art and The Royal Drawing School in London, where she won the Machin Foundation Prize, Tyga Helme uses nature as a metaphor for feelings of being overwhelmed.

EXHIBITION: 20th Century British Art and Design

7 – 29 October

This exhibition features works from artists including Lucien Pissarro, Rose Hilton, Sandra Blow, Henry Lamb, Sir Terry Frost, Clive Bowen and Stephen Dixon amongst other prominent names from British art shown alongside iconic pieces of design including a Jane Atfield RCP2 chair which is the first chair to be made from recycled plastic.

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EXHIBITION: Laurence Edwards ‘A Rich Seam’

We are delighted to showcase these remarkable sculptures here on Cork Street and to preview the maquette and concepts for the public commission to be installed at Printers Office Street, Doncaster in May 2020. In 2018 Laurence Edwards was awarded a commission by the town of Doncaster for a sculptural installation celebrating and remembering the […]

FILM SCREENING & ONLINE TALK: Storytelling and the Documentation of Conflicts with Photographer Laura El-Tantawy

Wednesday 22 September, 6:30pm

Join us for a talk with award-winning British Egyptian documentary photographer Laura El-Tantawy interviewed by our director of photography Dr Julie Bonzon.

ONLINE TALK: Collecting Capa: A Conversation with David Kogan

Wednesday 15 September, 6:30pm

David Kogan will introduce his photography collection which includes work by the renowned war photographer Robert Capa.

EXHIBITION: Laura El-Tantawy ‘In the Shadow of the Pyramids’

15 September – 1 October

Messums Photography present a selection of works from the series ‘In the Shadow of the Pyramids’ by award-winning British Egyptian documentary photographer Laura El-Tantawy, on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Egyptian revolution.

EXHIBITION: Close Enough: Robert Capa

15 September – 1 October

Robert Capa (1913 – 1954) is a legend in the history of photojournalism and possibly the most famous war photographer of the last century.

ONLINE EXHIBITION & SALE: Start a Collection

Online exhibition and sale 25 – 29 August
Starts 9am 25 August

Collecting is about making an object part of your life. It is also about the enjoyment of deepening your knowledge of a field and the pleasure of exploring its perameters.

EMERGING TALENTS: Francesco Poiana ‘Recent Work’

18 August – 10 September 2021

Francesco Poiana’s diaphanous and dream-like renditions of Italy are like memories, both contemporary and rooted in history. Working en plein air in the Italian landscape, these recent paintings are spontaneous, visual notes that speak to the past as well as something of our contemporary concerns.

ONLINE TALK: Nature and Natural: Photographer Yan Wang Preston discusses her series ‘Forest’

Wednesday 28 July, 6:30pm

Join us talk with photographer Yan Wang Preston interviewed by our director of photography Dr Julie Bonzon.

ONLINE TALK: Biodiversity with Artist Kurt Jackson

Wednesday 21 July, 6:30pm

Artist & environmentalist Kurt Jackson has created a new body of work and a book about biodiversity. The exhibition is on tour from May.

ONLINE TALK: Understanding Photography, A Collectors’ Guide

Wednesday 14 July, 6:30pm

In this online talk, Johnny Messum and Julie Bonzon will share advice on how best to start a collection of photography.

EXHIBITION: Tuesday Riddell

14 July – 13 August 2021

It is with great pleasure that we welcome Tuesday Riddell back to Cork street for her highly anticipated second solo show at Messums London.

ONLINE TALK: Korean Ceramics with Paul Greenhalgh & HyunJoo Kim

Wednesday 30 June, 2pm

During the Korean ceramics exhibition in Messums Yorkshire, ceramics director and curator Paul Greenhalgh and designer HyunJoo Kim discuss the work of Ree Soo-Jong. HyunJoo Kim works with Ree Soo-Jong and introduced us to his work.

EXHIBITION: Elliot Walker ‘Plenty’

EXHIBITION: John Walker ‘Seal Point’

16 June – 9 July

From as early as the 1970’s Walker was one of the most influential and imitated painters working in the UK; he exhibited alongside Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein, represented his country at the 1972 Venice Biennale, had extensive survey shows at both the Tate and Hayward galleries and was nominated for the Turner Prize in 1985.

London Gallery Weekend

4 – 6 June

We are delighted to join the inaugural edition of London Gallery Weekend. Over 130 of London’s leading contemporary art galleries are coming together this summer to launch a new, free to attend, annual event, celebrating culture and creativity in the UK’s capital city.

ONLINE TALK: Karen Blixen’s legacy in Kenya with author Michelle Angwenyi

Wednesday 2 June, 6:30pm

A conversation with Michelle Angwenyi on the photography, literature and memory and Karen Blixen’s legacy in Kenya.
The Karen Blixen photographic collection offers intimate depictions of Karen Blixen’s daily life in Kenya through her brother’s eyes.

ONLINE TALK: Visual Artist Dr Ingrid Pollard discusses the Karen Blixen archive

Wednesday 19 May, 6:30pm

Online talk with Dr Ingrid Pollard and photography historian Dr Julie Bonzon. A response to Karen Blixen’s photographic archive.

EXHIBITION: Christie Brown ‘Untold Forms of Life’

12 May – 11 June

Christie Brown’s figures teeter on the foggy intersection between art and craft. Very clearly sculptural but informed by a deep history of clay. Upon graduating from a diploma in Studio Pottery at Harrow in the early 1980’s, Brown found her work without an obvious niche.

EXHIBITION: The Karen Blixen Archive

12 May – 11 June

Messums London is pleased to present Tales of Africa, an exhibition of 15 photographs of renowned author Karen Blixen’s life in Kenya and a commentary on the objects as markers of colonial history.

ONLINE TALK: Christie Brown

11 May, 6:30pm

Join us in conversation with Christie Brown for the opening of her exhibition ‘Untold Forms of Life’. Christie will talk with Johnny Messum in our Cork Street gallery about her new collection of ceramic sculpture and show us around the exhibition.

EXHIBITION: Graeme Black ‘Trunk Show’

EXHIBITION: Antony Williams ‘Memento Mori’

14 April – 7 May

Artist Antony Williams works almost exclusively in egg tempera – a painstaking, exacting medium in which egg is used instead of linseed oil as the binding medium. While oil allows for a degree of flexibility and manipulation of the painted surface before it dries, many days after initial application, this technique does not easily allow for alteration.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Makoto Kagoshima

9 – 25 April

This spring ceramic artist Makoto Kagoshima will exhibit his latest pieces in the Elisabeth Frink studio at Messums Wiltshire, a collection of which were inspired by the

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Makoto Kagoshima

9 – 25 April

This spring ceramic artist Makoto Kagoshima will exhibit his latest pieces in the Elisabeth Frink studio at Messums Wiltshire, a collection of which were inspired by the sculptor.
Makoto Kagoshima, based in Kyushu, the southern island of Japan, illustrates whimsical and heart-warming motifs on clay, making each ceramic object a unique, one-of-a-kind piece of art.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Laurence Edwards ‘While the Whole Earth Changes Tune’

17 March – 10 April

Laurence Edwards’ While the Whole Earth Changes Tune was born out of a shift in approach to making and suggests the start of a new juncture in his work. With his foundry closed during the national lockdown and clay difficult to use in the hot weather Edwards turned to plaster. Rather than throwing away left over plaster he poured it into an old mould of a favourite figure.

EXHIBITION: John Beard ’22 Vesalius’

17 February – 13 March 2021

Messums is delighted to represent the important contemporary painter John Beard, whose work has been exhibited worldwide and is held in the collections of major gallery museums and institutions, and to welcome to the gallery for his first UK since 2013.
John Beard is a painter of the late 20th century whose subject is as much the process of painting as it is the artworks he makes and his practice, which has spanned over forty years, explores important propositions about the role of painting in the 21st century.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Henry Lamb RA (1883 – 1960) ‘In Arcadia’

4 February – 13 March

We are delighted to announce an exhibition of oil paintings and sketches from the Estate of Henry Lamb.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Elliot Walker ‘Plenty’

In 2021 the programme at Messums has sought out artists that fuse together skill, traditional technique, and contemporary concepts. Elliot Walker will be debuting in Messums London with his first solo show in this very vein. Born in Wolverhampton, the son of a cobbler, Walker was familiar with glass from a very young age having grown up surrounded by crystal glass companies.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Beth Moon ‘Oaks of England’

23 January – 21 February

For over a decade Beth Moon has been documenting the biggest, oldest and rarest trees in the world. This exhibition focuses on some of the most famous oaks in the UK.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Kurt Jackson ‘The Green Ways’

15 January – 28 February 2021

An exhibition of paintings by Kurt Jackson, one of Britain’s leading environmental landscape artists and campaigners, documents the spring of 2020 and the arcadia he found bursting into life immediately outside his front door in a remote part of west Cornwall during the challenging period of national lockdown.
The exhibition focuses on paintings of trees that he and his wife, Caroline, planted twenty years ago and that have, over time, formed hollow ‘greenways’ or paths in the interstices between the lines of planting, along which he walked every day from his house to his studio.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Francesco Poiana ‘Italian Journey’

8 January – 7 February 2021

Born in Faedis near Trieste, the son of an architect and winemaker, Francesco Poiana attended the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome and then the celebrated Albicocca fine art printing workshop in Udine before studying for a Masters degree at St Martin’s College of Art in London.

Makoto Kagoshima – 12 Plates of Christmas

12 – 23 December 2020

We are delighted to be celebrating Christmas with Makoto with twelve special ceramic pieces. Inspired by the traditional Christmas carol from 1780 ‘twelve days of Christmas’ marks twelve unusual and festive gifts bestowed upon a true love. We will be releasing the new collection for sale on 12:00 on the 12 December.

ONLINE TALK: Richard Hoare

Wednesday 9 December, 6:30pm

As Richard’s exhibition ‘Alchemy of Light’ opens at Messums Wiltshire, join us online for a conversation with Richard and Johnny Messum.
Richard’s work is always moving forward, evolving, a reflection of a pilgrimage. This is despite the apparent paradox of his regular return to stand on the same spot in the same locations seen in his work, year after year. The journey begins, rests and then continues with every step, enriched by his experience of Light.
In his new exhibition Hoare explores the landscapes of Wiltshire, where he now lives, Dorset and South Cornwall. A focus is the lake belonging to the Fonthill Estate near Tisbury. Central to the park laid out by the estate’s original owner William Beckford in the 18th century the lake is surrounded by a myriad of caves and bridged by a weir.

EXHIBITION: James Dodds ‘The Work of Human Hand’

2 – 23 December

Messums is delighted to announce the forthcoming solo shows of long represented artist, James Dodds.
Dodds began his artistic career at Chelsea School of Art before going on to the Royal College of Art, graduating in 1984. In many ways however it began when he left school to work as a shipwright where he learnt the craft that would continue to influence him and his creative practice.
Though initially drawn to abstraction the tidal pull of the fascinating and at times surreal beauty of the built vessel bought him back to his true focus. Floating on plains of colour, away from the human hands that built them, these paintings, which still draw on an element of abstraction, are anatomical studies. To Dodds, these vessels are his models, his sitters that come into the studio to sit for a portrait.

ONLINE TALK: Dante Marioni – Challenging Form – Contemporary Glass

Saturday 14 November, 6:30pm

Bridge continents and join in the online conversation with Dante Marioni, the world’s greatest glassblower live from Seattle.
Hear first hand from the master of glass making. As enigmatic as the vessels that he creates, Dante is seldom in front of camera or in conversation. We welcome him here to talk about the importance of mastering technical craft to push the boundaries of form and how aesthetics underpin good design.

EXHIBITION: Custodians for Covid

10 – 30 November

We are delighted to help support the fundraising initiative ‘Custodians for Covid’ set up by Oxford-based photographer Joanna Vestey and collaborator Tara Rowse in order to raise funds for threatened arts institutions. It’s first edition focuses on raising money for theatres currently in crisis due to the Covid-imposed lockdown. This includes world renowned theatres such as The National Theatre, The Roundhouse and the Young Vic. It’s second edition will be displayed, one photograph or institution a day, in our Cork Street gallery window.

EXHIBITION: Peter Brown ‘A Big Year’

28 October – 28 November

A new exhibition of paintings by Peter Brown documents the spring and summer of 2020; from the empty streets of London to the masses crammed onto the beaches of the south coast of England.

EXHIBITION: Jørgen Haugen Sørensen ‘A Dark Story in White’

30 September – 24 October

Jørgen Haugen Sørensen, born in Copenhagen in 1934, is one of Denmark’s most esteemed and decorated sculptors and we are delighted to represent his work in the UK. Throughout
his entire artistic career he has consistently and independently focused his attention on the human condition in society and has shifted effortlessly between materials and modes
of expression within the sculptural sphere – each transformation has been mastered with continuous success.
Whilst Jørgen works in materials including bronze and marble, this exhibition – his debut at Messums London – will focus on his white clay works, one of the most basic of materials
that has always been in line with his aesthetic approach.
According to legend, God modelled human figures out of clay. He breathed life into them, let them live and will determine if they deserve to burn in hell or not.
In front of Jørgen’s work, we lose our sense of position and we experience uncertainness for
a moment as we determine if we are looking
at sculptures or if we are looking at ourselves. With the positions he chooses, the situation
of the human and the clay, Jørgen unveils the relationship between the human and his own filth. When we look at his figures, we don’t know what to see: the humanity of the clay or the muddiness of humanity. Is he presenting to us a humanity we don’t know or what we don’t want to know about our humanity?
Armen Agop

EXHIBITION: Daniel Agdag ‘Radio Silence’

2 – 26 September

Daniel Agdag is an artist and filmmaker based in Melbourne, Australia whose practice sits at the nexus of sculpture and motionography. He creates highly detailed sculptural pieces that have been described as ‘architectural in form, whimsical and antiquated in nature and inconceivably intricate’ and we are delighted to welcome him back for his second solo show with the gallery this autumn.
Daniel sits within a group of artists represented by the gallery who take quality and the handmade to the extreme. His works, made primarily from cardboard, take many hours to complete and are strikingly beautiful in their intricacy. Drawn to the utilitarian origins and monochromatic presentation of his material, Daniel creates a paradox of fragility and strength with structures that resemble architectural forms and machines by utilising a medium that is essentially paper, preserving them under glass vitrines or bell jars. His work is both delicate and eccentric and he spends a lot of time thinking about and absorbing objects in the built environment, their peculiar details and functions, which, once resolved in his mind, begin to slowly emerge, and coalesce.

Andrew_Hemingway_Loo_Roll_Series_- AH006

EXHIBITION: Andrew Hemingway ‘Sanctity in the Mundane’

2 – 26 September

There is nothing too inferior or not worthy of being turned into a work of art according to Andrew Hemingway. Like the Dutch painters of the Golden Age or the Italian painter Giorgio Morandi, Hemingway finds inspiration in the ordinary fixtures of domestic life and turns them into pieces of visual poetry.
So it is with his latest series of 16 pictures of cardboard toilet roll interiors which appear almost anarchic as an artistic subject yet are translated by the immense skill and sensitivity of the artist into objects of beauty, personality – even dignity.

STUDIO STORY: Jørgen Haugen Sørensen

Wednesday 19 August, 11am

Jørgen is one of Denmark’s most esteemed and celebrated sculptors. Listen to him discuss his fascinating life and work with Johnny Messum ahead of his show at Messums London this Autumn.

Atong_Atem_photography_portraits

EXHIBITION: Atong Atem ‘Self Portraits & Family Studies’

8 – 28 August 2020

Atong Atem is an Ethiopian born, South Sudanese artist living in Melbourne. Atem works primarily with photography and video to explore contemporary identity through portraiture and in particular the fluidity of migrant narratives and postcolonial practices in the African diaspora.
Atem explores concepts of home and identity through a critical and sentimental lens and references the works of photographers Malick Sidibe and Seydou Keita as well as science fiction writers such as Octavia Butler as her aides in navigating these liminal spaces.
Atem has exhibited her work across Australia, including MUMA Monash, Gertrude Contemporary, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art and Internationally at Red Hook Labs in New York, Vogue Fashion Fair in Milan and Unseen Amsterdam art fair.
First collected by this gallery on a visitto Melbourne in 2019, we are delighted to welcome Atem to Cork Street as part of our Emerging Talents programme and to be exhibiting her collection of self-portraits and family studies. Her work is hung alongside the work of New York born and raised Neal Slavin, providing a juxtaposition of individual responses to the thoughts of how we identify both as individuals and as groups.

EXHIBITION: Photography

8 – 28 August

This summer at Messums London we will focus on photography as part of the wider picture alongside our debut for Emerging Artist Atong Atem. Nancy Bundt will be headlining this new collection with her iconic images of the musician Prince. Photographing fame and power, from pop stars to prime ministers, the journey of Bundt’s career led to her being the official photographer of Prince’s Purple Rain tour in the mid 1980s.

ONLINE TALK: with artist Paul Benney

Wednesday 5 August 2020

An online discussion with artist Paul Benney, currently exhibiting in our London ‘Curating in Contrast’  Show interviewed by curator Catherine Milner.
Paul Benney has worked as an artist and musician in both the U.S. and U.K. and is represented in public collections world wide including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The National Gallery of Australia, The National Portrait Gallery, The Royal Collection, The Eli Broad Foundation, AIG Houston, and Standard Life.
Benney has twice won the public choice award in the BP Portrait Awards and has been short listed on two occasions. In 2013 he was invited to be one of the judges for the Threadneedle prize at the Mall Galleries.
A member of the Neo-Expressionist group of the early 80’s in New York’s East Village, Benney became known for his depictions of stygian themes and dark nights of the soul. Also one of the country’s leading portrait artists, he has painted many prominent cultural and political figures.
Benney’s work is held in many public and corporate collections worldwide including, Metropolitan Museum of Art, 20th Century Wing. New York, National Portrait Gallery, London, National Gallery Canberra, Australia, World Bank, Washington DC, House of Congress, Washington DC, House of Lords, London, House of Commons, London, Eli Broad Foundation, Los Angeles, First Bank of Minneapolis, Rothschild Foundation. Uk. Israel, Royal Bank of Scotland, Museum of Modern Art, Catanzaro, Italy.
Attendees will receive a Zoom link in their order confirmation email.

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ONLINE EXHIBITION: Atong Atem ‘Self Portraits & Family Studies’

until 14 January 2024

Atong Atem is an Ethiopian born, South Sudanese artist living in Melbourne. Atem works primarily with photography and video to explore contemporary identity through portraiture and in particular the fluidity of migrant narratives and postcolonial practices in the African diaspora.
Atem explores concepts of home and identity through a critical and sentimental lens and references the works of photographers Malick Sidibe and Seydou Keita as well as science fiction writers such as Octavia Butler as her aides in navigating these liminal spaces.
Atem has exhibited her work across Australia, including MUMA Monash, Gertrude Contemporary, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art and Internationally at Red Hook Labs in New York, Vogue Fashion Fair in Milan and Unseen Amsterdam art fair.
First collected by this gallery on a visitto Melbourne in 2019, we are delighted to welcome Atem to Cork Street as part of our Emerging Talents programme and to be exhibiting her collection of self-portraits and family studies. Her work is hung alongside the work of New York born and raised Neal Slavin, providing a juxtaposition of individual responses to the thoughts of how we identify both as individuals and as groups.

STUDIO STORY: Daniel Agdag

Daniel Agdag discusses his working practice with writer and ABC broadcaster Fiona Gruber. Working in pared down materials and at an incredible level of detail we explore how his work sifts film and the imagination in pursuit of inspiration, ahead of his show at Messums London and Wiltshire this Autumn.

STUDIO STORY: Atong Atem

Monday 27 July 2020

South Sudanese-born and Melbourne-based photographer Atong Atem discusses her work with writer and broadcaster Fiona Gruber ahead of her UK debut as part of our Emerging Talents at Messums London this August.

STUDIO STORY: online talk with John Beard

24 July, 6.30pm

John Beard’s work has been exhibited worldwide and is held in the collections of major gallery museums and institutions including The Tate, The National Gallery of Australia, The Art Gallery of New South Wales and The Gulbenkian’s Centro de Arte Moderna in Lisbon, Portugal.
Born in Aberdare, Wales in 1943, Beard studied at the University of London and the Royal College of Art. Beard has had a distinguished teaching career throughout England and Australia co – producing and appearing in a series of programmes for BBC 2 television in the UK . In 1989. he resigned from teaching in order to devote his full attention to his practice, Beard traveled extensively, living and exhibiting in New York, Madrid, Lisbon and London before establishing a Sydney base in 1997.

EXHIBITION: Curating in Contrast

8 July – 5 August 2020

In the last four months we have had more than the usual time to plan for this exhibition. Whilst we did not know when we would be able to re-open, we made the decision at the beginning that whatever journey we were about to go on we were going there with our artists and we needed to help each other. This show is a thank you to all of those artists who have made this last period a shared experience and we are delighted to bring this together as the first exhibition in our London Gallery.

STUDIO STORY: with Sonia Leber and David Chesworth

Friday 26 June, 11am

A podcast interview with multimedia artists Sonia Leber and David Chesworth by journlist Fiona Gruber exactly one year since the start of their residency at Messums Wiltshire. Sonia Leber and David Chesworth were artists-in-residence for five weeks during which time they created work in response to the thirteenth century tithe barn and it’s surroundings to be exhibited in December 2020.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Kurt Jackson ‘the Glastonbury Paintings’

from Saturday 20 June

Such is the popularity of Kurt’s work that paintings of this scale are rarely available and these are arguably some of his most important in that they capture unique moments in time, that can never be repeated.

Kurt Jackson has been artist in residence at Glastonbury Festival for the past twenty years. These significant paintings on canvas depict his unique record of the world’s most famous music festival, painted over the past ten years. They include scenes of massed, ecstatic armies, lost revellers, panoramic landscapes of waving flags, neon, and the wood smoke that swirls across the Vale of Avalon after summer solstice.

“I sketch and draw and paint and scribble above the crowds, in the crowds, under peoples feet, in their faces; I aim to immerse myself in the Glastonbury experience and come away with some kind of record on paper showing what I’ve seen, felt and experienced.” he explains.

“The great thing about Glastonbury is that it’s about fun and delight (and a bit of hedonism) but also engages with the serious issues of the future of the planet and our environment. I’ve been at most of the festivals, I’ve painted over a quarter of them.”

ONLINE TALK: with Landscape artist Kurt Jackson

Join us for an online talk and Q&A with the landscape artist Kurt Jackson during the week his new exhibition ‘Time & Tide: the Port Quin Paintings’ opens on our website.
The show consists of a series of 25 paintings positioned on a tideline, a point on the coast to engage with the idea of this shifting transient marker. For this collection Kurt chose Port Quin as his inspiration, a North Cornish cove he has known since childhood.

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STUDIO STORY: with Christie Brown

Christie Brown is an artist and Emerita Professor of Ceramics at the University of Westminster in London. She graduated from Harrow School of Art in 1982 and set up her north London studio that year. At Westminster she taught on the BA, MA and PhD programmes while maintaining and developing her sculptural practice. She was Principal Investigator on the AHRC project Ceramics in the Expanded Field, awarded to the University’s Ceramics Research Centre-UK in 2011, which included her solo exhibition DreamWork at the Freud Museum in London in 2012. Recent major exhibitions include Marking the Line at the Sir John Soane’s Museum (2013), Material Earth 1 and 2 at Messums Wiltshire (2017 and 2018), Humanism at the ClayArch Gimhae Museum, Korea (2018), Dream On at the V&A Museum of Childhood (2018), Cultural Icons at the Potteries Museum and Beyond the Vessel at Mesher, Istanbul (2019).
She continues to exhibit her ceramic sculpture widely in the UK and abroad and frequently lectures about her practice at international residencies and conferences. Her work is featured in several private and public collections in Europe and the USA, including the Victoria and Albert Museum UK and the Mint Museum USA.

STUDIO STORY: with Poet and Artist Gommie

What does a travelling poet do during lockdown? Join us for a talk with Gommie and an introduction to his new body of work.
“On Tuesday 17th of March 2020, I was in Llandudno Junction in North Wales. Boris had just shut the pubs and I realised that I could no longer morally roam from place to place the way I had been doing.”
Lockdown has affected us all and no more so than artist and travelling poet Gommie. Taking government sanctioned daily walks Gommie began mapping out the shape of our new way of life. Noting fragments of language coming to the fore and engaging more with life online.
“I had some beautiful and hilarious conversations with people from all over the world about their experiences of lockdown. I realised how romantic so many of us are. How funny and silly and poetic we all have the ability to remain during abrupt change.”

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Gommie – If you like you can just snog me & then drop me off at the hospital

Wednesday 3 June

In one of the first artistic responses to the current global climate we have seen, these new works are a seismograph to the silent rumblings of our connected thoughts and feelings, transcribed into a visual tapestry of poetic form.

VIRTUAL TOUR: Inuit Sculpture

Saturday 30 May, 11am

As part of our online programming, join us for a virtual tour of Inuit Sculpture, an exhibition of significant Inuit sculpture from the mid to late twentieth century from a single owner collection. Beautiful objects in their own right they also speak of a culture leaving a lasting record.

ONLINE TALK: Inuit Sculpture

Friday 29 May, 6:30pm

Join Inuit art specialist Pat Feheley for an online talk on Zoom as an introduction to our Inuit sculpture exhibition.
As part of our online programming, we are delighted to present a collection of significant Inuit sculpture from the mid to late twentieth century from a single owner collection. Beautiful objects in their own right and a lasting record of the Inuit culture past and present, Inuit sculpture also plays an important role in the development of Western art.
Gallery owner and Inuit art specialist, Pat Feheley will discuss the works in the exhibition on Zoom with a chance to ask questions afterwards. All attendees will receive a link to join in the event.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Inuit Sculpture

from Saturday 23 May

We are delighted to present a selection of Inuit Canadian sculpture and textile, which have been brought together by Pat Feheley, Director of one of the last remaining commercial galleries in Canada dedicated exclusively to traditional and contemporary art from the Canadian Arctic and an expert on the work of Inuit textile artists.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Peter Brown ‘Life in Lockdown’ & ‘The New York series’

From Wednesday 20 May

We are delighted to present two bodies of work by Peter Brown NEAC. The first collection is a snapshot into an evolving world. These are the recent works to have been completed in Peter’s studio. Here time is different, it is contemplated and paintings are returned to over 24hr cycles. Nothing moves in between. This greater period of study lends these works an intensity of observation that is in contrast to the flurry of constant action in Pete’s street scenes It is to Peter’s credit and to our enjoyment that he is able to carry off both.
The second series are street scenes from the busy metropolis of New York, this collection was originally scheduled to be part of a show on British Observational Art on New York’s upper east side this May.  They are in so many ways the diametric opposite of the Life in Lockdown series. They capture street scenes of bagel stands and the view north from Madison square, to the early morning sunlight in Greenwich Village and rain falling in Soho.
He says of the en plein air paintings:
“I work entirely from life using the cities and the countryside as my subjects. I start with what tickles me, and this is likely to be a certain play of the light, weather, space and everyday life. Most of my drawings and paintings take several sittings over consecutive days and in that time I may meet police officers, dog walkers, road sweepers, residents and tourists.”
Peter Brown is president of The New English Art Club and a member of The Pastel Society, The Royal institute of Oil Painters and Bath Society of Artists. His studio is based in Bath.

STUDIO STORY: with Peter Brown NEAC

As part of our Studio Story series of events we will feature a podcast interview with the en plein air artist Peter Brown NEAC as we launch a series of his New York cityscapes online. These works were originally scheduled to be shown as part of a Messums’ exhibition focusing on British Observational Art in New York this May.
Peter rarely paints from reference in the studio preferring to work directly from the subject en plein air whatever the weather, refusing to use photographic reference.
“I work entirely from life using the cities and the countryside as my subjects. I start with what tickles me, and this is likely to be a certain play of the light, weather, space and everyday life. Most of my drawings and paintings take several sittings over consecutive days and in that time I may meet police officers, dog walkers, road sweepers, residents and tourists.”
Peter is president of The New English Art Club and a member of The Pastel Society, The Royal institute of Oil Painters and Bath Society of Artists.

STUDIO STORY: with Tuesday Riddell

Join us for a virtual tour of Tuesday Riddell’s studio as she works on her new pieces through the fascinating processes of gilding and japanning. These new artworks will be launched on our website on 13 May on the same day they were planned to preview in our New York show, postponed due to the ongoing situation.

Our Emerging Talent artist from 2019, Tuesday Riddell defies easy classification. Her work is attractive, decorative and fantastical yet rooted in dark themes of mortality and contemporary environmental concerns.

Through processes of japanning and chinoiserie these creations are grounded in dramatic tones of black and gold. The ornate surface of the works, together with the depth of narrative, are traversed together in a rare marriage of the imagined world and the decorated surface.

Tuesday Riddell graduated with a BA (Hons) in Fine Art Painting from City & Guilds of London Art School. She has concluded her Painter-Stainers Decorative Surface Fellowship at City & Guilds – the only Fellowship in the UK that provides specialist training in the craft of decorative surface techniques to ensure that endangered skills are kept alive and vibrant in contemporary practice, focusing on historic techniques such as gilding, japanning, chinoiserie and marbling.

STUDIO STORY: with Photographer Alexander Lindsay

Friday 8 May

Photographer Alexander Lindsay considers the great outdoors to be his studio as for the past forty years, Lindsay has brought his cameras to the most extreme situations and environments on the planet. We are delighted to be joined by Alexander on Friday 8 May live on Zoom at 6:30pm as his online exhibition opens on our website.  Alexander will talk us through the images and locations in South America also the fascinating stories behind the works.

Alexander Lindsay creates photographic landscapes of extraordinary beauty. From his earliest experiences with the Maasai tribe, a five year spell in Afghanistan during Soviet occupation and his expeditions to photograph and film the wreck of the Titanic 4km beneath the oceans waves, Lindsay has always sought to immerse himself in situations where, as he explains, ‘the imagination is rendered unnecessary’.
Having recently photographed in Namibia, Lesotho and South Africa, Lindsay’s lifelong project is to continually further our appreciation and comprehension of what is possible in photographic landscape art. His work has been exhibited internationally, including France, London, USA and South Africa. His prints are included in major private and corporate collections in the US, UK and Europe.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Tuesday Riddell: The New York series

5 May – 2 July 2020

Tuesday Riddell’s rich, symbolically charged lacquerware pieces take us into an ethereal nocturne of fantastical narratives and acute observation, highlighting themes of mortality and contemporary environmental concerns. It is perhaps then fitting that this new body of six paintings – originally scheduled to be shown as part of a focus on British Observational Art in New York this May – are being offered direct to our clients during this time, when both are in the forefront of our minds.

Tuesday’s intricate pieces recall sottobosco painting of the Dutch 17th Century as they magnify insect life and the of flora and fauna of the natural world. They also employ a visual language that links fairy tales and the fabulous with the real life underworld that is both harmonious and perilous, beautiful and decaying.

She is one of a number of artists supported and represented by Messums whose artistic practice is underpinned by extraordinary craftsmanship in the execution of their work. Similar to Asian lacquer work, Japanning is a European technique brought to Britain in the 17th Century that is both laborious and today is rarely studied. Tuesday’s synthesis of this traditional practice with a modern sensibility and awareness of nature points to a generation of artists who venerate the present, question the future and have embraced technical skill.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Alexander Lindsay ‘Microcosms in Scale: Portraits of South America’

As a prelude to his solo show in the Long Gallery this September, we present an online exhibition by photographer Alexander Lindsay. We are delighted to include Alexander as one of Messums Wiltshire’s represented artists. The online exhibition of photography by Alexander Lindsay documents his 8 month journey around South America, from Bolivia to Tierra del Fuego and around Cape Horn.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Charles Poulsen Drawings

Charles Poulsen’s large-scale drawings are realised in layers of pencil, wax and gouache to create striking abstractions that capture the energy of drawing as a primary means of expression.

“I was particularly influenced by commentary in Tate Modern’s catalogue for an exhibition of Agnes Martin (2015), as follows: ‘The root word for ‘grid’ in both Latin and Greek denotes ‘wicker work’ – flexible twigs or shoots woven criss-cross into a horizontal-vertical format.’* This released me – from the idea of the grid as simply a rigid structure of straight lines – and led me to start drawing loose, overlaying structures of irregular spatial elements based on fragments of the grid.” Charles Poulsen

The drawings start with the square sheet of paper and a drawn square frame within. The square is chosen for its stability, calmness and because there is not the same association with landscape or the portrait of a rectangle. They are more about energy than any particular subject matter – the invisible energies, the internal organic forces of growth, the forces which drive the winds and currents the energies within the earth. They are often drawn to music as the musical language of harmony, melody, rhythm and form has a very close relationship to the language of his drawings.

The materials he employs are deliberately limited: pencil (he favours a hard lead to begin, capable of creating grooves in the paper, but may turn to the very soft at the end of a drawing); gouache (opaque water-soluble pigment); wax (a ‘resist’ medium over which coloured wash can be laid, Poulsen sculpts a range of drawing edges from blocks of it). He begins and often ends with pencil. His process is one of layering, building form and space. There is an established sequence of his media: wax is usually the second to be laid down (where white is needed), then gouache (to provide light tones), then more wax, and so on, with the final application of gouache providing darker tones.

Charles has shown his drawings and sculpture throughout the UK and his book ‘Charles Poulsen Drawing’ was published by Hughson Gallery in 2017. He lives with his wife, the textile artist Pauline Burbidge, in the Scottish Borders.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Material: Textile – Modern British Female Designers

This year’s Material: Textile is an online exhibition of historically important and highly collectable textiles by some of the most important Modern female designers working in Britain. Brought together for the first time – and offered as an online and virtual exhibition with an accompanying catalogue and podcast – the exhibition highlights the relevance of these mid-century textiles and the vital role they played in the evolution of taste and culture. It offers us all a unique insight into the artistic vision and originality of these women.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Tintypes by Tif Hunter

An inaugural exhibition of original tintypes and by photographer Tif Hunter. The alchemy of tintypes is one Tif Hunter has mastered in the background of a highly successful career as a professional photographer. Celebrated by agencies for his exacting detail in the pre-digital era, Tintype has been his sole focus now over the last decade and has seen him develop this mercurial early means of image capture.  It is now a celebrated medium in its own right, praised for its uniqueness and authenticity in an age that has seen image manipulation become a filter through which we are looking.

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Francesco Poiana: The Win Green Series

Starts: 31st March 2020
Ends: 1st May 2020

Brought up amongst the groves and vineyards of Faedis in northern Italy, the son of an architect and winemaker, Francesco Poiana has exchanged the alluvial plains and terraces of the Mediterranean for the wild and open chalk downs of Wiltshire.
Francesco joined our emerging talents programming following his masters degree at St Martin’s art college in London in 2019. Later that summer he was invited to Wiltshire to spend time in the landscape surrounding Messums. It was a culmination for him of a reverse Grand Tour, that saw him trace a path from Italy to the landscape from which so many of the most legendary tours started. His interest however was in a connection to the landscape far more ancient; in particular he has been taken by the area around Cranborne Chase with its striations and lush gradations of green and the Bronze Age barrow of Win Green that stands high on a ridge above it.

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ONLINE EXHIBITION: Makoto Kagoshima ‘New Works’

Preview: 18th March 2020
Starts: 18th March 2020
Ends: 23rd April 2020

Based in Kyushu, the southern island of Japan, Makoto Kagoshima’s celebrated ceramics are a fusion of design and heartwarming motifs making each object a unique, one-of-a-kind work of art. His hand produced and decorated works are designed with a variety of plants and animals remembered from his childhood. They speak of whimsy and elegance and […]

ONLINE EXHIBITION: Thiébaut Chagué

Preview: 18th March 2020
Starts: 18th March 2020
Ends: 23rd April 2020

Thiébaut began his career in 1976, training in France, Belgium and in England under Michael Cardew and Richard Batterham. Returning to France in 1981 he set up his first workshop in the Loire Valley and in 1984 built a new studio in the Vosges with a wood-fired kiln. Examples of his work can be found […]

EVENT: Tuesday Talks with Francesco Poiana

Date: 10th March 2020

As part of our Tuesday lecture series which accompanies each exhibition we are excited to welcome Francesco into the gallery for an in depth discussion and presentation on his work and his processes and printmaking methods. The talk will accompany Francesco’s series of prints that will be on as part of our emerging talents programme. […]

EMERGING TALENTS EXHIBITION: Francesco Poiana

Starts: 3rd March 2020
Ends: 14th March 2020

Describing the kind of Japanese paper he uses to make his prints, Francesco Poiana says; ‘It is very thin and also very delicate. I like its feeling of lightness and also the rich tradition and history of paper from which it comes, which has had such a big cultural influence in the West; van Gogh […]

EXHIBITION: Korean Ceramics curated by Paul Greenhalgh

Starts: 19th February 2020
Ends: 14th March 2020

Leading ceramics expert Paul Greenhalgh takes us back to where it all began, introducing two of the biggest names in Korean ceramics working today for their debut in London, as part of our focus on Ceramic across both London and Wiltshire venues.

EVENT: Pop-Up Pod

Preview: 7th February 2020
Starts: 8th February 2020
Ends: 15th February 2020

Saturday 8 – Saturday 15 February Preview Party: Friday 7 February, 6 – 8pm  RSVP Collectors Tour: Saturday 8 February, 11 – 12pm  RSVP   The Pod at Messums Wiltshire is a unique retail space presenting a fusion of artists and makers brought together to explore the margin where art meets design and craft. The […]

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EXHIBITION: Gommie – Artworks and Performance

Preview: 8th February 2020
Starts: 8th February 2020
Ends: 15th February 2020

Gommie’s pictures are a testament to one of the most extraordinary years in British history. We have had the vote and these are the first responses from an artist at the coalface of an area that was once a Labour heartland. Gommie started to make these pictures during one of the lowest ebbs of his life […]

ART FAIR: London Art Fair

Preview: 21st January 2020
Starts: 22nd January 2020
Ends: 26th January 2020

Messums London and Wiltshire are delighted to be back at the London Art Fair in January 2020. The London Art fair aims  to provide a space to showcase the most exceptional modern and contemporary art of our time, a place to discover and to buy. Specially curated for the art fair, Messums will be showing […]

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EXHIBITION: Laurence Edwards ‘Doncaster Heads: Portraits of a Mining Community’

Starts: 15th January 2020
Ends: 15th February 2020

We are delighted to showcase these remarkable sculptures here on Cork Street and to preview the maquette and concepts for the public commission to be installed at Printers Office Street, Doncaster in May 2020. In 2018 Laurence Edwards was awarded a commission by the town of Doncaster for a sculptural installation celebrating and remembering the […]

EXHIBITION: Norman Ackroyd ‘Images of the North’

Preview: 15th January 2020
Starts: 15th January 2020
Ends: 15th February 2020

An exhibition of pictures by one of the most distinguished observers of the British landscape, Norman Ackroyd, will be on show at Messums in London throughout January. Twenty-two aquatints and etchings of the Yorkshire countryside – from the snowy plains of the dales to the shadowy presence of Whitby Abbey – will reveal the majesty not only of the landscape of the North but of Ackroyd’s technical skill.

EXHIBITION: Aboriginal Art – Papunya Tula Artists

Starts: 15th January 2020
Ends: 15th February 2020

  PAPUNYA TULA ARTISTS Paintings and Woodblock from the Western Australian Desert   Indigenous Australian people have lived in the remote deserts of Australia for tens of thousands of years. In the late 1960s, the Australian government moved several communities from the Western Desert region – primarily Pintupi, Luritja, Warlpiri and Arrernte peoples – to […]

TALK & TAPAS: The Process and Significance of Landscape Painting

Date: 10th December 2019

This December our Talks and Tapas event will explore the work of Kurt Jackson. Alongside authentic Spanish tapas and champagne there will be an in-focus discussion led by art critic David Boyd Haycock examining Jackson’s artistic process. Working both out on the riverbank and in the studio Jackson’s work takes many forms but never deviates […]

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EXHIBITION: Kurt Jackson ‘The Stour: From the Source to the Sea’

Starts: 4th December 2019
Ends: 21st December 2019

Kurt Jackson has for a long time been a champion of the environmental movement. Whilst his paintings, with their range of media and texture and their three dimensionality, are clear calls to experience the physicality of the world first hand – to get in there amongst it all, to realise that this landscape – so threatened as rivers […]

TALK: Kurt Jackson at The Royal Academy ‘My practice, 35 years as an environmentally informed artist’

Date: 3rd December 2019

SOLD OUT 3 December 2 – 3pm. The Royal Academy lecture theatre £20 Due to overwhelming demand to view Kurt Jackson’s work at Messums London, the gallery will now be open before and the Royal Academy talk from 10am – midday and later from 6 – 8pm. Attending the gallery is free of charge but […]

TALK & TAPAS: with Celebrated Sculptor Albert Paley

Date: 27th November 2019

The Talk & Tapas with Albert Paley on Thursday 28 November is now sold out so due to popular demand we announce an extra date on Wednesday 27 November. Messums London and Wiltshire is honoured to represent the celebrated sculptor Albert Paley’s work and studio in Europe and Australia. Albert Paley joins a roster of […]

EVENT: The Last Drop Dinners – A uniquely curated evening of fine art, fine food & fine spirits

Starts: 19th November 2019
Ends: 21st November 2019

Three remarkable evenings designed to appeal to our senses of occasion and exploration have been curated by Johnny Messum, Rebecca Jago and Alex Motture. You are invited to take your seat at the table to enjoy a pairing of exceptionally rare and aged spirits from The Last Drop Distillers with a five course supper prepared […]

EXHIBITION: Albert Paley – Drawings and Sculptures

Starts: 6th November 2019
Ends: 30th November 2019

Messums London and Wiltshire is honoured to announce representation of Albert Paley’s work and studio in Europe and Australia. Albert Paley joins a roster of artists whose working practice is exemplified by their choice of material. As representatives of Paley’s work in Europe and Australia we are delighted to present an exhibition of his drawings […]

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TALK & BOOK SIGNING: Philippa Stockley ‘Restoration Stories: Patina and Paint in Old London Houses’

Date: 29th October 2019

Tuesday 29 October, 6:45pm, £10 Join us for an illustrated talk by the award-winning journalist, novelist and painter Philippa Stockley discussing her new book Restoration Stories: Patina and Paint in Old London Houses. The book features interviews with the owners of sixteen restored London period properties, one of which is her own, alongside ravishing photographs […]

TALKS & TAPAS: The Art of Drawing

Date: 15th October 2019

Tuesday 15 October 18:30 – 20:30 £15 Our Tuesday talks and tapas are an opportunity to delve into a theme that springs from the artists on show at the time. From the 8th of October we are excited to have the drawings of Brian Taylor and Henry Lamb in the gallery and therefore our evening […]

EXHIBITION: Henry Lamb MC RA (1883-1960) Artist – Doctor – Artist ‘Works from 1914 – 1921’

Starts: 9th October 2019
Ends: 2nd November 2019

As representatives of the Henry Lamb Estate we are delighted to present a collection of oils and drawings by Henry Lamb from 1914 – 1921. The exhibition will go some way to telling the story of Lamb’s multifaceted experiences of war and how this nervous, sensitive, physically fragile artist come to be a front-line doctor […]

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EXHIBITION: Brian Taylor ‘ Drawings from the 1984 Naum Gabo Studio Series’

Starts: 9th October 2019
Ends: 1st November 2019

Drawings by Brian Taylor inspired by a period of time he spent in Naum Gabo’s studio in Connecticut will be on display at Messums London from 9  October – 1 November 2019. Taylor rarely made drawings of his subjects in advance of sculpting them in clay, but in 1984 he went to stay in New […]

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EVENT: The Pod Pop-Up

Starts: 7th October 2019
Ends: 4th November 2019

We welcome back The Pod at Messums Wiltshire to Cork Street for a pop-up exhibition this October. The Pod at Messums Wiltshire is a unique retail space inside our 13th century tithe barn. It curates a fusion of artists and makers brought together to explore the margin where art meets design and craft. The Pod […]

EVENT: British Art Fair

Starts: 3rd October 2019
Ends: 6th October 2019

We would like to welcome you to visit the British Art Fair where Messums London has been invited to take a stand presenting Modern British Art on the ground floor of the Saatchi Gallery. The works we will have on show range across the Modern British genre from textile to ceramic and are from both our London and Wiltshire galleries. […]

EVENT: Talks and Tapas, Laurence Edwards

Date: 17th September 2019

Messums London would like to invite you to the first of our monthly Tuesday Talks and Tapas evenings. An in-focus event for our collectors and friends to get together and explore the work of Laurence Edwards. Laurence is a creative titan who’s unique and world class casting methods have made him one of the UK’s […]

EXHIBITION: Laurence Edwards ‘A Gathering of Uncertainties’

Starts: 13th September 2019
Ends: 4th October 2019

Messums are delighted to announce a double show of works by sculptor Laurence Edwards. The show is in divided into two parts, with large-scale public and private commissions on view in Wiltshire and recent works and studies in Cork Street. Encompassing works from the studio and a presentation of commissioned pieces including the unveiling of […]

EXHIBITION: Maquettes by Laurence Edwards – a collection of the unique, the series and the editioned

Starts: 13th September 2019
Ends: 4th October 2019

In addition to the main show, ‘A Gathering of Uncertainties’ there is on display a new maquette series fresh from Laurence Edwards’ foundry. These pieces are a menagerie of unique studies and individual pieces, some created in preparation for larger scale works and some playful maquettes, unique examinations of the human figure. These sculptures work […]

ON VIEW: Camden Town Group

Starts: 9th August 2019
Ends: 23rd August 2019

An exciting selection of some of the key works from the Camden Town Group exhibition remain at Cork St. These highlights come from our exhibition on the Camden Town School and Royal Academicians representing the lifetime obsession of Christopher Mason-Watts with completing this collection. So often the context of a gallery is to allow an […]

POD POP UP: Window Take Over

Starts: 8th August 2019
Ends: 23rd August 2019

‘The Pod’ at Messums Wiltshire is a unique retail space inside our 13th century tithe barn. It curates a fusion of artists and makers brought together to explore the margin where art meets design and craft. This window takeover in London focuses particularly on the medium of wood and its organic and versatile nature. Fritz Baumann, […]

EXHIBITION: Tuesday Riddell

Starts: 7th August 2019
Ends: 23rd August 2019

Tuesday Riddell’s work takes us down to the forest floor and a glorious insight into the world that captures her imagination, that ethereal nocturne when all cycles of life and death carry on with rarely a watchful eye. However it is also her unique craftsmanship in the ancient art of japanning that catches the eye. […]

EXHIBITION: Malene Hartmann Rasmussen ‘FANTASMA (Ghost)’

Starts: 17th July 2019
Ends: 2nd August 2019

Danish artist Malene Hartmann Rasmussen works with figurative narrative sculpture and installation, creating work from individual hand-modelled ceramics and found objects. She is part of a vanguard of artists who choose not to define themselves by discipline or craft but instead blur the boundaries between Applied Art, Design and Fine Art, with exceptional hand-craftsmanship at […]

EXHIBITION: Antony Williams

Starts: 3rd July 2019
Ends: 2nd August 2019

As one of the leading contemporary figurative artists working today Antony Williams is dealing uniquely with matters of reflection and thoughtfulness in a context embedded in tradition and provenance. This series of beautifully conceived works perfectly examples Williams’s recent development towards, not only the human psyche, but how this relates to the natural landscape. Williams’ […]

EXHIBITION: Daniel Agdag ‘STATES’

Starts: 3rd July 2019
Ends: 12th July 2019

Daniel Agdag, an artist and filmmaker from Melbourne, creates models that come to life through the medium of stop motion animation. As static objects, however, these pieces invite close personal inspection and maintain suggestions of whimsy and narrative. Agdag’s pieces make no attempt to conceal the mechanisms and materials of his process. For Agdag, cardboard […]

EXHIBITION: A Very British Collection

A Very British Collection is a selection of 20th Century work that provides a unique opportunity to see together both a remarkably complete collection of Camden Town Group and British Figurative paintings. It is also an insight into the desire to collect, and how personality can shape that process. This collection comes directly from one source and is being offered for sale in its entirety through Messums London. Included are iconic works by Sickert, Pissarro, Bevan, Lamb, Gore and Manson. Many are works that were in formative exhibitions, and most have been bought with a collector’s eye from places such as the Fine Art Society, Piccadilly Gallery, Agnews and as well as Messums.