The exhibition, due to launch in Swansea from 3 October 2020, was postponed due to lockdown. You can view the paintings in the slideshow above (click on any image to view full-screen versions) and download the catalogue below.
Vitalistic Fantasies
Artists: Iain Andrews, Amanda Ansell, Karl Bielik, Day Bowman, Julian Brown, Deb Covell, Lucy Cox, Gordon Dalton, Pen Dalton, Natalie Dowse, Fiona Eastwood, Geraint Evans, Susan Gunn, Suzanne Holtom, Barbara Howey, Phil Illingworth, Bryan Lavelle, Paula MacArthur, Enzo Marra, Nicholas Middleton, Stephen Newton, Joe Packer, Stephen Palmer, Ruth Philo, Narbi Price, Freya Purdue, James Quin, Molly Thomson, Judith Tucker, Joanna Whittle and Sean Williams.
Curated by Paula MacArthur
The title of this exhibition is taken from the introduction of Isabelle Graw’s 2018 book, The Love of Painting in which she argues that aliveness of paintings is created not only through the specific ways in which painters personalise their paintings by the traces of activity on the resulting work, but also through the projections of the viewer onto the painting.
She writes: “One key reason I call these fantasies “vitalistic” is because they imaginatively assume qualities of living beings such as subjectivity, liveliness, and animation for dead material. In a vitalistic fantasy, human attributes – like self-command, will, and energy – are projected onto lifeless material”.
The resulting record of the painter’s activity, however energetic or quiet, is suggestive of the artist themselves, the viewer is compelled to project an imagined personality onto the work.
