CORN STARCH

The title of Jack Otway’s exhibition is taken from an article explaining methods for DIY Foley art.

Presenting a new body of work, Jack Otway takes cues from allegorical market scene painters Pieter Aertsen and Joachim Beuckelaer. Continuing his interest in effects for film he draws from the use of domestic items to create believable spectacle in sound. The threshold at which plausible representation can occur in Foley is an idea that Otway extends to painting. Scrunched up hot water bottles make the sound of tires screeching, celery in a chamois makes the sound of bones breaking, corn starch inside a leather pouch makes the sound of snow crunching.

Crisply described vegetables, faded forms and obscure spaces are rendered differently across the surfaces of these paintings. The picture plane becomes fragmented and collaged; marks and forms are edited, erased and rubbed over with a luminous acidic palette. A big wet cabbage sticks out like a sore thumb. The paintings literally ‘spill their guts’. We are given glimpses into their construction; the alchemy of paint, application and representation is dryly pedestaled and then ridiculed in the same breath. What is a painted cabbage if it is not the sound of a knife through flesh and bone?

Jack Otway graduated in Fine Art from The University of Leeds in 2015. Recent solo exhibitions include Check In. Relax. Take A Shower (2017) Peter Von Kant, London and Peddling Sinister Runic Humbug (2017) Griffin Gallery Perimeter Space, London. Recent group exhibitions include Nail Biter (2018) The Rectory Projects, London, Ultra Sunrise (2017) Set Studios, London curated by It’s Kind of Hard to Explain and MILK, Instant Karma (2017) Achenbach Hagemeier, Dusseldorf. Publications include XL Catlin Art Guide (2016) and Looking at Painting Vol. II (2016). Jacks solo presentation is the opening to; Painting programme is a seven-month programme of painting exhibitions curated by different painters, each of whom are invite by Assembly House studio holders. The exhibitions which will explore the role, possibilities and responsibility of collective artistic activity today as well as expose the curators’ unique approach to making, and their appreciation of dynamics within art.

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Artist

Jack Otway

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Programme Co-ordinators

Suzy Babington | Rufus Newell | Jack Towndrow | Rosie Vohra

Painting Programme is co-ordinated by Assembly House studio holders.