Here we go then, we’re well into an already busy art year. On with another Five Art Things thing, on we go and never mind the bliss or the selfies in front of the art or whatever we said last time. Five art things, five more art things happening somewhere around right now (or any moment now). Five art shows to check out in the coming days as we repeat ourselves. We do aim to make this an (almost) weekly round up of recommended art events, five shows, exhibitions or things we rather think might be worth checking out. Mostly London things for that is where we currently operate and explore, and like we said last time, these five recommendations come with no claims that they are “the best five” or the “Top Five”, we’re not one of those annoying art websites that ignore most things whilst claiming to be covering everything and proclaiming this or that to be the “top seven things” or the “best things this weekend”. This Five Things thing is simply a regular list of five or so recommended art things happening now or coming up very soon that we think you might find as interesting as we think we will…
And we should add, that entry to these recommended exhibitions and events, unless otherwise stated, is free…
1: Steven Appleby – Nothing Is Real at Space Station Sixty-Five – Steven Appleby’s excellent retrospective goes on over by the Oval in South East London, the exhibition opened last year and we’re getting close to the end now, it is very highly recommended. Steven just posted “My exhibition of ideas, obsessions, objects, paintings, cartoons, constructions, prints, ephemera, animations and aggravations ends with a closing party on Saturday 29th March. I’ll be there from 3.00pm on into the evening. All welcome”. Meanwhile, “this coming Friday, 21st March, from 18.30 – 20.30, there will be a screening of short animated films featuring my characters or designs, followed by a conversation between me and the directors, Pete Bishop and Linda McCarthy. Book your free ticket on OutSavvy by searching for: Space Station Sixty Five” – Pete Bishop is always entertaining, Steven and Pete’ last in conversation event at the space a few weeks back was most rewarding.
Here’s more about the show, a whole load of words and photos – ORGAN THING: Steven Appleby’s Nothing is Real at Space Station Sixty Five Gallery, a little more real than you maybe expected…
Space Station Sixty Five is at Building One, 373 Kennington Road, London, SE11 4PT. The space is open from midday to 6pm Wednesday to Saturday. Nothing is Real goes on until the closing party on Saturday 29th March.
2: Unearthing the Archive at Both Gallery – from 21st March until 6th April 2025 with an opening tonight. A group show that most appeals because of the painterly style of Lee Maelzer. The full artist line up looks like this; Unearthing the Archive, a group exhibition with works by Susan Stockwell, Si Sapsford, Lee Maelzer, Clémence Hemard-Hermitant, Carolyn Whittaker and Justine Hounam.
“A Group Exhibition Exploring Social Histories. Unearthing the Archive brings together six artists who first connected in 2011 through a shared belief in the power of art to uncover hidden narratives. Through sculpture, painting, installation, film, and performance, these artists delve into social history, personal memory, and material culture, creating a layered dialogue between past and present.
Susan Stockwell transforms everyday objects – maps, money, and recycled computer components – into poignant statements on feminism, social histories, and ecological concerns. Justine Hounam’s sculptural and film-based practice interrogates domesticity and personal space, exploring imprints left by time and experience. Lee Maelzer’s evocative paintings depict urban decay and abandoned spaces, capturing a haunting sense of lost histories.
Si Sapsford’s interdisciplinary approach uses found materials and sculpture to examine migration, community, and environmental themes, often drawing from global events. Carolyn Whittaker’s multimedia practice confronts labour rights and systemic inequities, often incorporating ephemeral materials as a symbol of transformation and impermanence. Clémence Hémard-Hermitant’s intricate collages and drawings explore mythology, folklore, and the female condition, weaving together ancient and contemporary narratives. Together, their works intersect through a shared concern for the stories embedded within objects, places, and lived experiences. Unearthing the Archive offers an intimate yet critical lens on how history is recorded, remembered, and reinterpreted”. Shame we had to change the American spellings in the gallery statement just then
Both Gallery is at 323 Archway Rd, London, N6 5AA, The space is open Friday, Saturday and Sunday, Midday until 4pm (6pm on Saturdays). There’s an opening on Thursday March 20th, 6pm until 8pm
Lee Maelzer also has the coming up at Way Out East, I expect we’ll recommend that one next week, it opens on March 27th…
3: Maeve Gilmore at Alison Jacques Gallery – 21st March until 3rd May 2025, with an opening on 20th March, 6pm until 8pm – “British artist Maeve Gilmore (b.1917; d.1983) is one of the twentieth century’s ‘known unknowns’. Although she exhibited during her lifetime, Gilmore was best known for preserving and promoting the legacy of her husband, writer, artist and playwright, Mervyn Peake. However, following Gilmore’s first institutional exhibition at Studio Voltaire, London in 2022, there is now a long overdue recognition of her work, and she is finally acknowledged as a significant artist in her own right”.
“This exhibition offers a comprehensive overview spanning 42 years of paintings, works on paper and objects, contextualised with images of her hand painted murals, which once covered the walls of the family home in Drayton Gardens, Chelsea.
By bringing together all aspects of her creative output – from home making to art making – this exhibition offers an insight into Gilmore as a shrewd and loving observer of domestic life. She took particular delight in the playfulness of her children as they lost themselves in gymnastic stunts, in games of dressing-up, or cat’s cradle, but did not shy away from darker feelings around the coexistence of her domestic role and her steadfast dedication to making art.
Born in Brixton, Gilmore studied sculpture at Westminster School of Art, London and then at Bonn Art School, Germany. From 1936, she travelled around Europe, witnessing the rise of fascism and Hitler’s rallies. Visiting Paris to see the International Paris Exposition, Gilmore was able to see first-hand key works of modernism and the avant-garde. She was greatly inspired by works made and exhibited in 1937, including Alexander Calder’s Mercury Fountain, Joan Miro’s large mural Catalan Peasant in Revolt, and Picasso’s renowned anti-war painting Guernica.
Upon her return to Britain, Gilmore and Peake married, going on to have three children: Sebastian, Fabian and Clare. The family moved to Sark, in the Channel Islands, where Gilmore never ceased to paint. ‘Despite the eternal meals, the fights of one’s children, and the constant demands of domesticity’, she maintained a studio in her family home throughout the decades. ‘In those attic rooms,’ she wrote, ‘I entered the world of my own making, and the familiar smell of turpentine’.
Gilmore’s markedly modernist sensibility and Surrealist spirit is expressed through a highly personal set of symbols. Much of her work is autobiographical, depicting daily family life and events from a keenly feminine perspective, in imagery that is often dreamlike. Her painterly world includes the poetry of the everyday, from still lifes of onions, pears and mushrooms to pet cats and her children playing. Gilmore’s paintings present a carefully constructed interior world, replete with Surrealist imagery as well as portraits of her family, which place domestic scenes centre-stage. For Gilmore, there was never a contradiction between female domesticity and a lifelong commitment to the arts. ‘I have never been able to divorce myself aesthetically, to decide between life and painting… My mainspring has always been the heart and not the head’.”
A filmed conversation between the Maeve Gilmore Estate and The Times newspaper’s chief art critic Rachel Campbell-Johnson, who met Gilmore when she was alive, will be on the gallery website from 14 April 2025.
Alison Jacques Gallery is at 22 Cork Street, London, W1S 3NG. The space is open Tuesday to Saturday 10am until 6pm.
4: Tricia Gillman – Paintings From the Eighties at Clifford Chance – That’s one of Tricia Gillman’s paintings that can currently be seen, for the whole of the year so it seems, as part of Tricia Gillman Paintings From the Eighties, 1985-87 at Clifford Chance, Canary Wharf – Clifford Chance, Canary Wharf, 10 Upper Bank St, London, E14 5JJ. The paintings are only on view by appointment but they are there until December 13, 2025, more via Tricia’s website about the appointment thing
And you really can’t get a sense of the size of that Tricia Gilman painting from just seeing it as a flat image on line like that, here’s some installation shots from the Canary Wharf show that give you a bit more of a flavour. And I do see there is an opening on the evening of March 20th 2025, again, more via Tricia’s website
More Tricia Gillman coverage on these pages – Tricia Gillman, Moment Fields at Benjamin Rhodes Arts – the tiny details feel important, the layers beneath, the things you almost sense rather than see. This, for more than one reason, is a rather recommended exhibition…
5: Mary West, The River Rolls On at Lucinda Dalton Gallery/230 Portobello Road – happening from 26th March until 8th April 2025 – “Lucinda Dalton Gallery presents The River Rolls On by Mary West, a collection of paintings that explores our relationship with nature, and takes solace in the unending flow of the tides and seasons, and the trees that bear witness”.
“As a London artist, Mary West finds that the notion of London as an urban forest inspires her work and draws on it’s innate mystery. Her work merges abstract and figurative elements to explore landscape through light, space and texture. “My paintings explore light, space and texture through landscape. Blurring the lines between abstract and figurative painting, memories of landscape inspire every composition. Each painting is an emotional response to a place and shared encounters. I work in oils, allowing the paint to take on a life of its own through chance accidents and gestural mark making. I paint quickly and intuitively, creating a sense of movement while building layers.” Mary West.
Lucinda Dalton Gallery/230 Portobello Road is found, maybe not that surprisingly at 230 Portobello Road, London, W11 1LJ
And the next Cultivate online show opens this coming Tuesday March 25th, the 199th Cultivate show. All Cultivate online shows can be explored here
THE ORGAN 