Tom Titherington: Mention the War, Senate House Exhibition Hall, University of Liverpool

Tom Titherington: Mention the War

Senate House Exhibition Hall, 

University of Liverpool

17 January - 21 March 2003

The University of Liverpool presents for the first time Tom Titherington's 'War' series, a group of paintings and lino-cuts which explore human experiences during World War II. Tom Titherington grew up in Liverpool during the period, and the series draws extensively upon his own memories and on recollections sent to him by Liverpool people in response to a newspaper feature.

The work successfully captures the often conflicting emotions felt during wartime, and highlights the humanity of the situation with poignancy. The style also allows the artist some licence to develop a lightness of touch. As Tom states, '..what I'm presenting isn't 'real' history .. Everything I do is true, but I don't claim objectivity.' An example is 'A day at the sea-side', in which one sees an imaginary image of Neville Chamberlain and his wife Annie enjoying a walk on New Brighton promenade in the summer of 1930. All the fun of the seaside is shown, with the brilliant yellows of the sand adding to the vibrancy of the image. The very idea of Chamberlain spending an afternoon at New Brighton amongst the ordinary people is itself amusing. The image does not lose sight, however, of the coming war, and Chamberlain's controversial role in the years leading to 1939.

Much of the impact of the series stems from the style of the painting, which is highly original, and draws sensitively on the artist's extensive experiences teaching art to children. At a basic level the images are child-like, or naive, and make use of the immediacy of child art, as well as specific graphic devices, to convey associated emotions. For example, many of the works in the series are punctuated by zig-zag lines, used to denote explosions or shock waves. Tom also adheres printed, found images on to the picture surface, which are partially over-painted to integrate them into the work.

Tom Titherington is a practicing fine artist, with forty years experience of art education. He has shown his work in London and the North West of England. In he 2002 won first prize in the 'Liverpool 8' open exhibition for graduates of the Liverpool School of Art.

Senate House Exhibition Hall 

University of Liverpool

Oxford Street, Liverpool L69 7WY

www.liv.ac.uk

Alan McKernan, University of Liverpool, Senate House Exhibition Hall - Contrasting Light

Alan McKernan: Contrasting Light

Senate House Exhibition Hall, 

University of Liverpool

1 February - 16 March 2001

Enter a new and unfamiliar landscape in this exhibition of photographs of Formby and the Dock Road area by local artist, Alan McKernan. There will be a selection of 36 black and white photos from two recent series called 'Last Light' made at Formby and 'Continuum of Change' taken around the Dock Road.

Laying aside the high-tech digital equipment now available to photographers Alan McKernan decided to show what could be done with the simpler medium of camera, black and white film and daylight. He wanted to demonstrate to himself, and his students at Liverpool's Community College, the continuing potential of traditional camera technology to surprise and please the eye.

Visiting the woods and dunes at Formby, Alan McKernan made a series of photographs often taken in the last light of day. 'The familiar landscape emerged re-drawn in the ever-changing light. The pinewoods and marram grass became reminiscent of equatorial forests, savannah grasslands and dry deserts.' The resulting images in the 'Last Light' series are of unusual and haunting beauty; creating connections with a distant past and echoes of a fairy-tale world.

A stark contrast appears in Alan McKernan's second series of photos, which are of the Dock Road area, actually Regent Road. The grid-like pattern of brick and stone are deeply etched in these strongly urban images. Yet what attracted Alan McKernan to the subject was the 'Continuum of Change' between the man-made structures and the working of natural forces. As the disused warehouses of the Dock Road area age and decay, plants have begun to reclaim the buildings. 'This flourishing of nature symbolises man's transient impact; the apparently random distribution of the plant forms is in contrast to man's attempts to bring order and structure to the landscape'.

The 'Contrasting Light' of the two series are linked by this exploration of the forces of nature and by a common theme of light: 'its ephemeral effects sculpt and re-present the landscape'.

Ann Compton, Curator, University of Liverpool Art Collections

Senate House Exhibition Hall 

University of Liverpool

Oxford Street, Liverpool L69 7WY

www.liv.ac.uk

Bernard Meninsky at University of Liverpool Art Gallery - A singular vision

Bernard Meninsky: A singular vision

University of Liverpool Art Gallery

19 October - 21 December 2000

Brilliant draughtsmanship and an exquisite sense of colour combine to create the 'singular vision' of BERNARD MENINSKY (1891 - 1950). Widely considered one of Britain's finest young artists in the 1920s, Meninsky's work has been gradually eclipsed since his untimely death in 1950. This exhibition is the first held in a public gallery for twenty years. The show brings together forty-five drawings, watercolours and oil paintings from his early family studies through to the late pastoral landscape and figure scenes of the 1940s.

'Minky', as he was known to friends, was a Jewish emigré brought to Liverpool as a baby from the Ukraine. He studied at Liverpool School of Art, in Paris, and at the Slade. After a brief but successful period as a war artist Bernard Meninsky achieved critical success in 1919-20 for an exhibition and book of mother and child studies. Over the next three decades he exhibited regularly, and was an elected member of the London Group and New English Art Club. Bernard Meninsky was a gifted teacher of drawing attracting students from London and abroad. In 1935 he designed the sets and costumes for the ballet 'David' produced by the Markova-Dolin company and in 1946 published an illustrated limited edition of Milton's 'Il Penseroso and L'Allegro'.

Tragically, Bernard Meninsky was afflicted by a highly self-critical and sensitive nature, resulting in periods of breakdown and ultimately his suicide in 1950. Driven by "uncertainties, mysteries and doubts" Meninsky was "indefatigable in extending the boundaries of his art". This exhibition, traces his development from the early, tender studies of friends and family, through sensitive and poetic landscapes of the twenties to the monumental and elegaic figure paintings of the 1930s and 40s.

The exhibition has been organised by the University of Liverpool in conjunction with the Contemporary Art Society. The show marks the generous bequest of the artist's estate by his widow, Nora Meninsky, to the CAS. The exhibition tours during 2001 to Leeds, Sheffield, London and Kingston-Upon-Thames. 

UNIVERSITY OF LIVERPOOL ART GALLERY

3 Abercromby Square, Liverpool L69 7WY

www.liv.ac.uk

Heribert C. Ottersbach, University of Liverpool, Senate House Exhibition Hall - Between Strategy and Attitude

Heribert C. Ottersbach: 

Between Strategy and Attitude

Senate House Exhibition Hall, 

University of Liverpool

6 October - 10 November 2000

Heribert Ottersbach has achieved success internationally but his paintings are little known in the UK. In the second showing of his work in this country ten recent paintings are brought together at the University of Liverpool's Senate House from 6 October to 10 November.

The demolition of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the end of Iron Curtain politics have had a strong impact on the work of Heribert C. Ottersbach. His interest in the fall of the Berlin Wall is part of a broader interest in the cultural traditions of the twentieth century.

Ottersbach often works with 'found images' in his painting. He works freely often adding invented 'archival pictures' to the images he has discovered from existing sources. The images are manipulated using computer software to create a "digital sketchbook or imagepool".

There is nothing mechanical about the creation of Ottersbach's finished paintings. The creative process remains vital: "The moment at which the images generated digitally are transferred to the canvas something different is created: Painting. Painting includes a physical impact, it is 'body-work' far away from written language or computer generated images." This intimate relation between artist and canvas is conveyed to the viewer in the subtlety and delicacy of the paintings themselves. Although primarily an artist of ideas Ottersbach's skill as a painter draws us into a deeper sensory engagement with his art.

'Between Strategy and Attitude' is part of 'Eight Days a Week', an exchange of art exhibitions bringing the work of Cologne artists to Liverpool. 'Eight Days a Week' is being showcased at many Liverpool galleries between 6 October and 10 November 2000.

Senate House Exhibition Hall 

University of Liverpool

Oxford Street, Liverpool L69 7WY

www.liv.ac.uk