Spring Syllabus

About

Spring Syllabus unites nine artists whose idiosyncratic methods blur the distinction between innate process and studied gestures. Resisting conventional art world labels - invariably based on education or formal training - Slominski invites us to look at how the psyche seeks familiarity through repetition, reflection, recording and reappropriation.

Discussing the participating artists, Slominski explains: Spring Syllabus is, in part, about exploring a wider totality of contemporary practices happening today. We’re interested in creating a dialogue amongst artists from distinct positions, including those from unexpected circumstances, rather than assigning restrictive labels like Outsider, self-taught, emerging and mid-career. 

Spring Syllabus brings together Brooklyn artists Raquel Albarran and Sophie Larrimore, Sydney-based Alasdair McLuckie, and six artists currently working in the UK: Richard J Butler, Nnena Kalu, Christian Newby, Andrew Omoding, Victor Seaward and Hidekazu Sogabe. These artists embrace repetition through physical process; from Kalu’s densely entwined sculptures to Sogabe's complex and very personal system of audio notation. Art historical references - including Modernism, Romanticism and Medieval tapestries - are juxtaposed with the outcomes of entirely intuitive influences. Together, they form an exhibition that is both familiar and unfamiliar; full of pattern, puppies, pareidolia and painted toes.