About
The China Shop is pleased to present Justice, a retrospective exhibition by Henny Acloque.
In Justice, Acloque brings together two of her most recent bodies of work to present a dialogue across her practice and explore the moral and religious references throughout her work.
Acloque's most recent works are appropriations of paintings by deceased artists sourced from auction catalogues and postcards. The original images are theoretically and literally dismantled as figures are removed from the landscapes then wittily reassembled with abstract brushstrokes that darkly undermine and disrupt the fantastical visions. The retrospective works in Justice are Acloque's updated pictorial version of Bruegel's sixteenth century Tarot cards. These haunting images are mixed with a personal interest in the Spanish rituals and dress during Semana Santa and thus her characters sport sinister red hats worn by the penitents disguising the full identities of the tarot characters. A loss of ideologies and a reminder of our mortality underpin Acloque's entire practice, while some symbols give the work a disturbing air, the gentle landscapes throughout the works add to the mystery and sense of foreboding.
Justice is an exhibition of Acloque's smaller works on canvas created with numerous thin groundings of acrylic paint given depth by a thick layer of resin.
They are timeless, glossy scenes that encapsulate curious creatures and symbolic, recurring motifs drawn from unnerving memories, myths and melancholic reverie into which the viewer is seduced.
Henny Acloque (b. 1979) and lives and works in London. Recent solo exhibitions include Lugar de Culto, Ceri Hand Gallery, Liverpool, 2012, Circumstances, First Floor Projects, London, 2010 and A Dressing, Ceri Hand Gallery, Liverpool, 2009. Group exhibitions include Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy, London, 2012, Polemically Small, Orlean House, London, 2012, The Threadneedle Art Prize, Mall Galleries, London, 2011, THE FUTURE CAN WAIT presents: Polemically Small, Torrance Art Museum, LA, USA, 2011, Fade Away, Transition Gallery, London, 2010 and The Future Can Wait, The Truman Brewery, London, 2009. Henny won the Exeter Open, 2010 and was nominated for the Jerwood Drawing Prize, 2009.
Henny Acloque is represented by Ceri Hand Gallery.
