From June 10 – 15 at London’s Mall Galleries we have a unique opportunity to discover the intimate relationship that exists between artist and critic. All 24 members of the Visual Arts and Architecture section of the have curated a show of their artistic heroes – putting their own discipline of analysis on display in the process.
Mask by Frances Aviva Blane
Member of the Critics Circle, Corinna Lotz selected the London-based painter, Frances Aviva Blane as her choice for the show. Lotz says, “Throughout her career Frances Aviva Blane has explored – indeed subverted – the powerful relation between paint and personality. In doing so, she brings to the surface a hidden and complex dialectic of form and content. She mines the properties of oil paint for all they are worth, deliberately taking it beyond the point of no return. The surface is tortured, scarred, scored, scorched and turbulent, sometimes even gouged out.
Red on White by Frances Aviva Blane
“It’s perhaps because we share the ability (and to other people it can be shocking) that we can be agonisingly direct. Perhaps some would call it emotional intelligence. Others may find it embarrassing. But with the Critics’ Secrets show I am so thrilled that I can fulfill what I’ve always seen as the true role of the art critic. It should be not to pander to existing taste and commercial interests but to champion artists who defy the norm. That is why Emile Zola’s championing of Manet inspired me when I first studied art history. He brought to light the pioneering contribution of a painter who today no-one doubts as a classic.
Self portrait by Frances Aviva Blane
“What makes great art is probably even more disputed today than it was when artists like Courbet, Manet and Van Gogh first came on the scene. This pioneering selection by Critics at the Mall Galleries will hopefully stimulate a debate not just on art but on how critics can and should work today in the age of the internet.”
Centenary Exhibition of the Visual Arts & Architecture Section of the Critics Circle is on from 10-15 June at The Threadneedle Space, Mall Galleries, The Mall, London SW1
The private view takes place on Wednesday 12 June, 6-8pm
by Nico Kos Earle