Separation Anxiety: New Paintings by Michael Evans 

Private View: Tuesday 9 February 5-8pm

The University of Northampton’s Avenue Gallery presents an exhibition of new work by Michael Evans, Senior Lecturer in Painting at The University’s School of The Arts.

The exhibition offers the first opportunity to view a series of paintings which Mr. Evans has produced as part of his research towards a practice-based Phd with London Metropolitan University in which he is investigating questions relating to the imaginative creation of form in abstract painting.

Whilst much contemporary abstract painting appears to relinquish any claims of illusionism or reference to external sources, Mr. Evans is interested in how and why imagined, non-representational forms can nevertheless hold meaning for both artist and viewer. The forms that emerge in his paintings are often ambiguous, inviting a number of different readings rather than imposing one point of view.

Mr. Evans explains further;

“To create a painting with this deeper resonance the painter has to find language and form anew in each painting.... The work here suggests form but when looked at closely it becomes difficult to pin down. Often form is evasive, and what may initially appear solid can subsequently be seen as space. The ambiguity of these works, I hope, matches my desire for an openness which remains sufficiently free from the deadening weight of a fixed reading, instead opening on to multiple, shifting and uncertain interpretations.”

‘Separation Anxiety’ will run from 8 February – 5 March and is open to the public Mondays-Fridays 10am-4pm. Admission is free. Avenue Gallery is located in The University of Northampton’s Avenue Campus on St. George’s Avenue, Northampton NN2 6JD. For more information about the exhibition please contact the Gallery on 01604 893046 or email gallery@northampton.ac.uk.