New exhibition represents the human form

DEPICTION – the human form

Sometimes the impression of a figure is veiled, with a suggestion of an unfolding entity in landscape, and might be based perhaps on an old family photograph, an observation, an intriguing story or response to the technical achievement of Leonardo da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man.

Artists’ repertoires outline the joys and disquiets, the distorted and dignified, and are presented mythically or otherwise, oftentimes recording our interconnectivity with the natural world.

The human figure may be depicted anatomically, within composition or in other exploratory ways – using the iPad, drawn from life models and in sculpture.

Both women and men are viewed going about their ordinary day, within and responding to an environment, noticed and observed and conveyed, with artists using mediums of watercolour, oil, the printing press and more.

Sometimes figures pose more formally, dressed in the costume of another era and stories are curiously unearthed.

Artists have worked at times with no pre-determined artistic process to suggest something of our idiosyncratic behaviour and at others with a more defined practice, using mannequins, constructing photo art – and have been successful in enabling the human condition to arise – through truth, pretence, from the bright or dark.

Each artist uniquely reflects humanity figuratively, often within a backdrop of some of the most pressing issues of our time – their depictions shared through a disparate collection, united in honesty to represent the human form.

Words by Ali Day