Hot off the Press 11

For any print fans that haven't been already, this years Hot off the Press should be scribbled onto your "things to do list" immediately. Associate Director Natalie Suggitt has chosen the very best work from last years MA graduate shows,making this one of Curwen's most contemporary exhibitions.Anyone concerned about the state of printmaking in England today will be firmly reassured by the quality and diversity of this years graduates.Also, as with all our graduate shows, a great opportunity to buy the work of promising new artists before they become too expensive!

This year we had an immensley positive private view.
It was extremely busy, with many familiar faces from
 the world of printmaking in attendance.

Recieving a lot of attention at the private view was the work of Dolores De Sade, a graduate from the Royal College of Art.Rich with irony and a thoughtful playfulness, De Sade's puts disparate elements together to form surreal environments.These scenes make strange an irreverant comments. What these comments actually refer to is a mystery but one assumes the answers lie deep within tomes of contemporary art theory. That is not to say this work is academic or elitist however. As I write a visitor to the gallery is happily chuckling away to "It Was the Best of Times, It was the Worst of Times" where a lonely shed is depicted listing the great spread of curries which now make up a staple of the English diet. 

Dolores De Sade
It Was The Best of Times, It Was the Worst of Times, £495 fr





















Continuing the strain of surreal imagery Eric Storey, a graduate from Camberwell College of Art, has collaged together images from popular culture to make sinister assemblages.His "Forensics in Fairyland" series seem to address the unconscious mind, using the imagery of nightmares to create narratives and scenarios that unnerve and disorientate.One of the most psychologically arresting of the series is No.4, where a potentially infirm girl clutches a ghost dog while being stalked by a pantomime Cricket man.The full series seem to give a map of the many characters which haunt Storey's personal "other world", with the suggestion that all conspire together to eventually undo him.
 

Eric Storey- Forensics in Fairyland 3, £290 fr

 As a whole Hot off The Press can be viewed as an accurate cross section of current movements in contemporary printmaking.At the same time the exhibition also feels like a cohesive whole, with the different artists sharing many similar attitudes to technique, pallet and content. If you haven't been already, you have until 28th January to catch this remarkable exhibition.

Denise Walker- I, £190 fr