Launching our first show is a glorious challenge. Gathering artists and makers from Brooklyn to London and Paris and trying to find a common theme isn’t always obvious – but for us it was.
This exhibition represents our own Wunderkammer, a virtual cabinet of curiosities filled with works that strike us for their beauty, skill or association. Our community of artists and makers are creative explorers, always assessing their own talents and discovering a personal language to communicate through. Filled with colour, originality, texture and draughtsmanship, their art draws from the past to reinvent tomorrow. Like recognising characteristics in people whom we have known and loved, their works reflect the inspirations of the great museum collections.
As passionate collectors, we are reminded of what Wilhelm Hansen, founder of the Ordrupgaard Collection, wrote to his wife Henny: "I may just as well confess now that I have been reckless and made considerable purchases. But I know that I will be forgiven when you see what I have bought”. By opening up our Wunderkammer for view, we hope you will go on to develop your own connection with these works.
Nick Crean and Clementine Perrins, Crean & Company
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Avoiding the Hodgepodge
1 December 2020 - 15 January 2021 -
Alexander Nolan, The Diner (2020), oil on canvas, 42 x 66 in, 106.7 x 167.6 cm
The brushwork of Nolan's characterful imagery is direct and fresh. He is recording his imaginations without hesitation, like any good writer would, and his bold use of colour supports the works' dreamlike qualities as it sets the mood, be it playful or suspect.
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Alexander Nolan, Waiting for his Return (2020), oil on canvas, 18 x 25 in, 45.7 x 63.5 cm
'I enjoy walking through my mind as if it were a forest. I pick out here and there something of interest that I feel like expressing and exploring more deeply through the act of drawing. I am not trying to find anything in particular, other than my own bliss' – Alexander Nolan.
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Tyga Helme, Afterglow, Monte Pellegrino (2020), chalk pastel and watercolour of paper, 27 ½ x 9 7/8 in, 70 x 25 cm
Our artists combine that trilogy of hand, eye and mind to create works of great beauty.
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Tyga Helme, A Moving Blue (2020), watercolour and chalk pastel on paper, 27 1/2 x 9 7/8 in, 70 x 25 cm
Always questioning, always exploring how we encounter nature and our relationship with it, Tyga's pictures will transport you to a wilderness, a mountain, a sea, a simple copse, where nature heals with a patient magnificence.
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Laura Smith, Shakers (2015), oil on linen, 29 7/8 x 36 ¼ in, 75.9 x 92.1 cm
Ideas are easy; making them come alive requires rigour and imagination.
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Laura Smith, Everlasting Flowers (2020), watercolour on paper, 15 x 11 1/8 in, 38.1 x 28.3 cm
Laura’s gloriously disciplined oils and watercolours are lively, colourful interpretations that capture a moment in time with a lingering freshness.
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Avital Burg, Greenpoint Window Self-Portrait (2020), oil on linen mounted on wood, 27 1.8 x 25 5/8 in, 68.6 x 65.1 cm
Avital's draughtsmanship, her disciplined palette draws on her love of the richness and textures of her Renaissance mentors but honed right back to the sensitive colour tones that her time at The Slade School informs.
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Avital Burg, Backyard Rose (2020), oil on paper mounted on wood, 8 x 6 in, 20.3 x 15.2 cm
Collecting wildflowers from her neighbourhood, her method of isolating mundane objects and painting them after many hours of observation is often a way of contemplating slowness
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Lauren Luloff, Beech Forest 6-20 (2020), dye and oil pastel on paper, 15 x 11 ¼ in, 38.1 x 28.6 cm
Lauren's en plein air paintings capture the breeze, the landscapes, the nature, the natural forms and cultures of her memory. There is a language here every bit as beautiful as song.
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Lauren Luloff, A Jumbled Sentence (2014), oil on muslin, 22 x 17 in, 55.9 x 43.2 cm
Bleach, dye, pastels, oils on canvas, these mixed media works bringing an everyday fascination and reflection: out of debris great beauty can be reborn.
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Serena Rowe, September (2019), oil on board, 15 ¾ x 23 5/8 in, 40 x 60 cm
The floral compositions by Laura Smith, Avital Burg, Lauren Luloff and Serena Rowe remind us of hours spent in the Wallace Collection, viewing the Old Masters on faded walls.
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Serena Rowe, Orange Scarf (2018), oil on board, 15 ¾ x 21 5/8 in, 40 x 54.9 cm
It is the everyday that makes Serena pick up a paintbrush. She can see a world of colour and form a narrative in the clutter of the commonplace.
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Amelia Power, Lewisham Landscape (2020), oil on panel, 7 ½ x 9 ½ in, 19.1 x 24.1 cm
There is a search in Amelia's work that pauses as only a memory might... Her work edges towards the dystopian with an unsentimental realism.
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Amelia Power, Whiting (2020), oil on panel, 9 7/8 x 9 7/8 in, 25.1 x 25.1 cm
These often dramatic pieces focus on shapes and colour, re-creating the memory of the extraordinary. As Amelia writes 'I work from my imagination, making drawings and paintings that derive from dreams and memories'.
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Thomas Merrett, Stretch (2019), bronze, 15 ¾ x 7 7/78 in, 40 x 20 cm, 1 of an edition of 9
The pleasure in Thomas’s work is in it vitality: it soars with energy whether in the charcoal line of his drawing or in the defined line of his bronze.
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Thomas Merrett, Study of Dancer No. 1 (2020), 15 x 11 3/8 in, 38.1 x 28.9 cm, charcoal on paper
His work has an elegance for sure but a deep affection and appreciation for his subject. So often, the power of the communication is in the clever poise. Naked or simply clothed, drawn from several angles all on one sheet, gestures become features, those movements are captured in a single and remarkable moment.
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The connection with an artwork can be quite emotional, and like Merrett, Carolina has the ability to engage and challenge through her choice of subject and medium.
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Primarily a textile artist, her embroidered works are 'emotional maps' that create a deeper human pattern.
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Kate Braine, Slash Pot with Butter Press Centre (2020), stoneware with Ivory Coast glaze, 7 x 16 cm, 2 3/4 x 6 1/4 in
For Kate, the joy of being a potter is akin to being in love. 'The joy of pottery is nothing turns out exactly the way you think it will,' she says. 'It is the excitement of "the accident", the process and acceptance of the unknown.'
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Kate Braine, Potted Plant (2019), stoneware poppy red glaze, 7 1/5 x 5 7/8 in, 19 x 15 cm
Her vibrant colours arrest the collector. Craft meets Art and it soars.
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Rupert Shrive, Branching Oyster (2020), oil paint on linen, 12 5/8 x 9 1/2 in, 32 x 24 cm,
Shrive's most recent works were made during self-isolation, during which time the mundane became elevated in status, often rendered humorous or extraordinary.
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His works look for ways to engender a dialogue, to animate through association - always hinting at a hidden narrative and open to interpretation.
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To enquire about any of these works, please get in touch at nick@creanandcompany.com
