Vogl, Julia, Ayres, Gillian, Milroy, Lisa, Wearing, Gillian, Buchanan, Roderick, Siddons, Louise, Hon, Gordon Andrew, Evans, Eszter, Reaney, Andrew, Phillips, Kwame, Magnuson, Jordan, Gillett, Ellen L., Gillett, John, Gibbons, Dave, Mckay, Joy, Atkins, Grace, Blackavar, Jake, Dovey, Tracy, Ffitch-Mitchell, Melanie, F, Claudia, Glen, Sophie, Graham, Barbara, Hay, Carla, Hayes, Caroline, James, Rebecca, Jabi, Yasmin, Light, Olana, Louisa, Alice, Madley, Courtney, Phillips, Kenny, Porter, Deborah, Russell, Clarissa, Warner, Net, Xie, Anzhi and The Winchester Gallery, (2025) Work & Play. Work&Play, The Winchester Gallery, Winchester, United Kingdom.
Abstract
This exhibition at its extremes is absurd and political. It is a celebration of the individual artworks that contain the duality of work and play. The push-pull of working and playing at the same time resists the clarity of one point of view, allowing multiple truths to co-exist.
‘Work & Play is a celebration of simultaneous multitudes.
The exhibition showcases four prestigious works from the Southampton City Art Gallery together with 26 works selected from an open call to artists in Hampshire and the Winchester School of Art community (students, alum and faculty).
Visitors to the gallery will work to find connections between Turner prize- winning Gillian Wearing’s video, Dancing in Peckham, and the Untitled abstract expressionist painting by Gillian Ayres (the first female head of painting in the UK, at Winchester School of Art). They will also literally be able to play with Joy McKay’s Guess Who: Dating, sonically bring to life Anzhi Xie’s Experiment,or get dressed up as dinner in Alice Louise’s Get in the Box.
Working out—as in physical fitness—becomes several kinds of play in Roderick Buchanan’s basketball-inspired Chasing 1000. For artists, the process of figuring something out is an enjoyable part of the work, as Barabara Graham’s Sketch Book makes evident. Lisa Milroy negotiates the blurry boundaries of work and play in her epic vision of Canadian Mounties and Japanese geishas in Togetherness, while in Kwame Phillips’ film, Dreadstar Meets the Space Invaders, the British Empire’s national work of colonisation plays out like levels of a video game.
The exhibition will encourage visitors physically, intellectually and emotionally to explore our everyday orbits of work and play.
-Curated collaboratively by Lecturer Julia Vogl and the MA in Contemporary Curating 24/25 students, in partnership with the Southampton City Art Gallery.
Artists Include: Grace Atkins, Gillian Ayres, Jake Blackavar, Roderick Buchanan, Tracy Dovey, Eszter Evans, Melanie Ffitch-Mitchell, Claudia Friend, Dave Gibbons, John Gillett, Ellen Gillett and Net Warner, Sophie Glen, Barbara Graham, Carla Hay, Caroline Hayes, Rebecca James, Yasmin Jabi, Olana Light, Alice Louisa, Courtney Madley, Jordan Magnuson, Joy McKay, Lisa Milroy, Kenny Phillips, Kwame Phillips, Deborah Porter, Andy Reaney, Clarissa Russell, Trinity Art Group, Julia Vogl, Gillian Wearing, Anzhi Xie.
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