Nothing Endures but Change

About

Responding to the festival theme of ‘Transforming Minds’, the exhibition title, Nothing Endures but Change, comes from Heraclitus, better known for saying, ‘you cannot step into the same river twice’. Impermanence is a basic tenet of Buddhism. Buddhism and Hinduism share the doctrine that nothing lasts, everything is in a constant state of change.

Most of the sculptures in the show are ephemeral in the way they are made and they are also about change, transformation and the ephemeral – impermanent, transitory, short-lived, temporary. The artists’ wide-ranging approaches are intriguing and highly original. At one end of the timescale, the gradual adaptations of evolution, a suspended work draws on Darwin’s visit to the Galapagos. At the other, a sculpture encrusted with old clocks and watches refers to the seconds mercilessly ticking by.

‘…flow-everlasting…’ is a work inspired by the ‘self-re-circling dream-wake book’, Finnegan’s Wake, and a large house sparrow created from wild bird seed highlights the sparrows’ devastating decline since the 1970s. A structure echoing the Jewish ‘chuppah’, the canopy used in wedding ceremonies, is made of a delicate fabric into which pieces of a baby’s dress are sewn, reminding us of past stages in our lives. There will be a paper hammock that offers no rest and an enigmatic tent that offers no shelter ‘yet whose beacon light within calls to the weary’, made with the Waterloo homeless in mind. We hope that there will be something for everyone and that all who visit find a measure tranquillity and food for thought.

A London Group & Friends exhibition

The artists include: Sophie Alston, Wendy Anderson LG, Peter Avery, Keith Ball, Vanya Balogh, Rosalind Barker, Alison Berry, Clive Burton LG, Andrea Cavallari, Rebecca Feiner, Cadi Froehlich LG, Ann Grim', Mandee Gage, Susan Haire PLG, Alexandra Harley, Katie Hayward, Aude Hérail Jäger LG, Martin Heron LG, Alexander Hinks, Vera Jefferson, Marilyn Kyle, Chris Marshall, Venetia Nevill, Sarah Pager, Janet Patterson LG, Michael Phillipson LG, David Redfern LG, Jim Roseveare, Tommy Seaward LG, Chris Simpson, Angela Carol Stocker, Franny Swann, Almuth Tebbenhoff LG, Paul Tecklenberg LG, Graham Tunnadine, Bill Watson LG, Tisna Westerhof LG and Angela Wright. 

ABOUT THE LONDON GROUP The London Group was set up in 1913 by thirty two artists including Robert Bevan, Henri Gaudier Brzeska, Jacob Epstein, Duncan Grant, Wyndham Lewis, Lucien Pissarro and Walter Sickert, with the aim of creating a powerful artist-run group to act as a counter-balance to institutions such as the Royal Academy. The founding group created a unique structure for an organisation, that has gone on to successfully nurture the careers of many of Britain’s best-known artists.