Peter Tilley has new sculptures in the group exhibition Reflective Dialogues at The University Gallery, Newcastle. The work by Chris Capper, Andy Devine, Chris Langlois and Peter Tilley will be on view until the 16th of June 2012.
“The four artists whose works are presented in this exhibition collaboratively chose its title. They reflect deeply on their subject matters, absorb underlying themes, and portray personal “dialogues” with their subjects, with themselves and with their viewers. Despite the wide range of imagery, from formalist sculpture to landscapes and still lifes, and their varied techniques, the artists’ reflections unify the exhibition.
Peter Tilley, 'PLOT' 2012, lead and painted timber, 106 x 87cm
We perceive influences from Cornell, Turner, Whistler and Morandi, artists whose reputations are based on, partly, their intriguingly patterned surfaces and the presences they created from otherwise undistinguished objects. Although the influences on each of the artists in the exhibition are diverse and their works are highly individual, all emphasise silence and stillness and the formal qualities of order, negative spaces and the relationships of simple forms within their spaces. Like the artists who influenced them, they create their gestalt from the prosaic.
The images are underlain with personal concerns, which the artists voice candidly. The multiple meanings are intertwined with the aesthetics and make the outward results of the inward “journeys” rewarding for them and for us. Some have used their practices to resolve deeper questions, and for some, these art works were instrumental in personal healing processes.
The images are uncrowded, non-directional, self-referential yet universal, and studying them leads viewers to rewarding personal interpretations.”
- Michael Hedger, March 2012
