Between: catalogue

Showing posts with label catalogue. Show all posts

Wednesday, 18 February 2026

Chappel Galleries - 'Peter Rodulfo: Waiting for a bite'

My latest catalogue essay is for 'Peter Rodulfo: Waiting for a bite' at Chappel Galleries. The exhibition opens on 28 February and runs until 29 March 2026.

Peter Rodulfo was born in Washington D.C, USA, in 1958. His early years were spent in Australia and India before coming to England in the mid sixties. He was educated in Suffolk, before going to study painting at Norwich School of Art 1975 – 1979. Since leaving art school he has exhibited all over the world in both solo, group and open shows. Rodulfo has a prolific output in many different mediums, such as oil paint, watercolour, etching, bronze sculpture and assemblages. His work can be found in both private and public collections.

The alluring mystery of everyday life is contemplated in his work and this exhibition:

‘Watching and waiting also characterises the work of the artist in creation. Rodulfo writes of casting a line out and waiting for a bite, not knowing which creature will take the bait, because he suspects that something surprising may be lurking under the surface of his image as it emerges and coheres. Through the patient watching and waiting that the artist undertakes for that emergent something in the work, his images entice, tease and challenge us, as viewers, to pay attention to what is revealed through the interplay between the patterns of form and colour within which our interactions in creation and in community occur. The patterns of shadows, reflections, and echoes seen in these works then evoke memories from different times and places in our own lives. Life is an alluring mystery which changes and passes too quickly for us to apprehend fully. Rodulfo’s images still a moment in time, enabling us to stop, wait, and see by paying attention to the emergent something his art has revealed. What will bite, what will surface, what will emerge, what will you notice, as you watch and wait and see?’

See here for information about my catalogue essay on Alan Caine and here for information about an essay on Damien Hirst, originally written to be a catalogue essay.

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Bill Callahan - Stepping Out For Air.

Tuesday, 30 September 2025

Artlyst - The Art Diary October 2025

My latest Art Diary for Artlyst features exhibitions by several artists whose work I have championed through essays and exhibitions, as well as solo and group shows that explore environmental, social, and spiritual concerns. Read on for news of exhibitions by Michael Landy, Ana Maria Pacheco, Robert Smithson, and Suzanne Treister, among others, together with shows at Compton Verney, Firstsite, Pallant House, and the Engelundsamlingen in Vrå:

'‘Everyday Wonder to Revelation’ at Clare Hall, Cambridge, is an exhibition providing a rare opportunity to see paintings by Caine. These paintings delve into the core Neo-Platonist idea of the oneness of the world, the nodus mundi. We see this in his depictions of everyday objects, such as rugs, mopheads, carpets, and bundles of cloth. Although his subject matter is humble, the intricate depth of his draughtsmanship reveals unity and cohesion. We see it too in his expansive and luminous landscapes. When Caine blends his perceptions of space and shimmering light in the landscape with his exploration of the core in everyday things, he presents us with a vision of worlds beyond. His images invite us to step through a veil into barely imagined possibilities. Through his exploration of the small, the infinite beckons; through his exploration of the wonder of the everyday, revelation becomes possible.

In the essay I wrote for the exhibition catalogue, I note that: “Without reference to standard religious iconography and with a primary focus on landscape, still life, and portraits, Caine imbued and infused his work with spiritual reflection and with spirituality itself. That he did so in ways that allow those who do not share his beliefs to enthusiastically embrace and appreciate his work for their many other compelling qualities is a testament both to Caine’s skill as an artist and the subtlety of his understanding of the connection between earth and heaven.”'

My other pieces for Artlyst are:

Interviews -

Monthly diary articles -

Articles/Reviews -

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Kevin Morby - O Behold.

Friday, 26 September 2025

Church Times - Art review: Millet: Life on the Land (National Gallery)

My latest exhibition review for C hurch T imes is on Millet: Life on the Land at the National Gallery and includes reflection on the artist’s attitude to the poor:

'Simon Kelly notes in the catalogue that “Millet’s interest in religion has been marginalised in modernist readings of his avant-garde practice.” Though Millet was not a churchgoer in later life, Kelly writes that, when asked if he still read the Bible and the Psalms, Millet responded: “They are my breviary. . . It is there I find all that I paint.” The bias to the poor, which is found in the counter-testimony of the Old Testament, is the beating heart of Millet’s work.'

See also my Artlyst review on this same exhibition by clicking here.

Other of my pieces for Church Times can be found here. My writing for ArtWay can be found here. My pieces for Artlyst are here, those for Seen & Unseen are here, and those for Art+Christianity are here.

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Natalie Bergman - Keep Those Teardrops From Falling.

Monday, 15 September 2025

Everyday Wonder to Revelation: an exhibition of paintings by Alan Caine

I was recently honoured to be asked to write a catalogue essay for 'Everyday Wonder to Revelation', an exhibition of paintings by Alan Caine to be held shortly at Clare Hall in Cambridge. Full details of the exhibition can be found below:

Everyday Wonder to Revelation: an exhibition of paintings by Alan Caine
Date: Friday 10 October – Thursday 20 November 2025
Location: Clare Hall, Herschel Road, Cambridge CB3 9AL

Clare Hall is honoured to host an exhibition of paintings by Alan Caine (1936–2022), running from 10th October to 20th November 2025. Visitors are welcome daily between 10am and 5pm.

“Landscape (recollections)” 2000, 122x91cm, Acrylic on plywood

Alan Caine was an innovative and quietly charismatic teacher of art in the Adult Education Department of Leicester University. He took a primary role in the conception, funding and design of the University’s Attenborough Arts Centre, which opened in 1997. He was its associate director and continued teaching there until he was almost 80 years old.

In the midst of that busy academic life he took time, in the upstairs studio of his redbrick terrace house, to paint and draw. Caine’s art grasps at the essence of the everyday natural world. Its detritus found its way into that Leicester studio: fallen leaves, dried grasses, tangled vine stalks, eggs, rugs, and string. In these humble elements, their unfolding patterns, colour and geometry, Caine discovered a profound sense of wonder. Through the familiar and ordinary, he opens our eyes to the possibilities of the beyond.

Alan Caine 2006

Caine was born in South Dakota. After graduating with degrees in art and theology, he moved to France and then to England, where he settled in the mid-1960’s. He would speak of always feeling European. What he meant by European was centrally and crucially being an inheritor to its artists. From his teaching, it was evident Caine claimed for himself a grand succession of masters: Giotto, Fra Angelico, Piero della Francesca, Rembrandt…. of these, it was Piero who was the most important to him. Piero’s Christian Neo-Platonism and his creation of new, or at least relatively unexplored, scenes and images were a magnet to him.

'…spirituality (in art) is not a matter of being, or not being, religious or pious. It is about finding and using marks, shapes, materials; about the pursuit of ideas and visions which may be scarcely understood, but matter.' Alan Caine

Consequently, Caine’s paintings delve into the core, the Neo-Platonist idea of the one-ness of the world, the nodus mundi. We see this in his depictions of everyday objects: rugs, mopheads, carpets, and bundles of cloth. Though his subject matter is humble, the deep intricacy of his draughtsmanship reveals unity and cohesion. We see it too in his expansive and luminous landscapes. When Caine blends his perceptions of space and shimmering light in the landscape with his exploration of the core in everyday things, he presents us with a vision of worlds beyond. His images invite us to step through a veil into barely imagined possibilities. Through his exploration of the small, the infinite beckons; through his exploration of the wonder of the everyday, revelation becomes possible.

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Anna Lapwood - Make You Feel My Love.

Friday, 28 April 2017

'Crucifixions: Francis Bacon' - catalogue and video

Following the 'Crucifixions: Francis Bacon' exhibition at St Stephen Walbrook, Daniel Bourke has created a video based on my reflections on the art of Francis Bacon. The video is now on websites of St Stephen Walbrook and the London Internet Church.

The catalogue for 'Crucifixions: Francis Bacon', including my essay, is now available online at the website for “The Francis Bacon Collection of the drawings donated to Cristiano Lovatelli Ravarino”.

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Rickie Lee Jones - Gethsemene.

Friday, 16 September 2011

Beyond 'Airbrushed from art history' (2)

Walter Navratil was considered one of the most interesting outsiders of the Austrian art scene in the second half of the twentieth century but is now an overlooked figure. I've recently found the catalogue of his 1984 exhibition at the Galerie Würthle and have been impressed with the quality and originality of his work.
Dr Agnes von der Borch, who wrote the texts to accompany the images in the catalogue, writes:

"In the presence of these two pictures [Crucifixion in yellow and Crucifixion], I regret having to speak or write at all. It seems more fitting to give myself up to the contemplation of them. For one thing, their almost two thousand year-old theme is familiar to everybody, and for another, Navratil interprets it in such a way that the viewer can no longer remain a detatched onlooker, a mere receiver of optical signals, but finds himself drawn into a close and intense involvement.

If I were a believer, I would pray ...

I am simply not up to expressing in words the beauty and the sublimity of these <<Crucifixions>>." (Click here to see a related image - Der Schwarze Christus)

In his Foreword Hans Dichand writes that to "a certain extent this is true of the whole of Walter Navratil's work ... There is much that is beyond the power of words to express, and yet we can sense the true validity of this art, its vision, its genius, if we are able, as we look at it, to listen to the voice of our hearts."

We have, of course, not been able to do so because Navratil's work has not been generally valued and discussed since his death in 2003. Borch writes that a "quick survey of Navratil's work shows him to be a painter of great stylistic versatility. Expressionism, Abstract Expressionism, Neue Sachlichkeit, Surrealism, Art brut all these traditional styles are represented in his paintings in new combinations and variations ... What Navratil certainly does is to exploit the possibilities of the style he has chosen to the absolute limit ..."

Kay Haymer wrote, in the catalogue for his 1998 exhibition at the BAWAG Foundation, "The fascination of the paintings by Walter Navratil is based on their ability to alienate the familiar and to bring it back into awareness.”

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Tom Waits - Jesus Gonna Be Here.

Sunday, 20 December 2009

c4m webpage update (30)

On the commission4mission webpage this week are posts about our new catalogue of artists and the donation of Rosalind Hore's The Baptism of Jesus to St Edmunds Tyseley.

Our newly produced catalogue briefly tells our story and profiles our current artists showcasing the wide range of media and styles which can be commissioned from our artists. The catalogue includes an article on the 'Challenges of Church Art' that I have written, a copy of which is included in this post.

The Baptism of Jesus by Rosalind Hore is to find a permanent home in 2010 at St Edmund's Tyseley. The painting is one that I am donating to the Birmingham-based church as a memorial to my father, Revd. Phil Evens, who spent 10 years in Tyseley as Vicar of St Edmunds.

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Lone Justice - I Found Love.

Friday, 4 December 2009

c4m webpage update (29)

I neglected to post an update on the commission4mission webpage last week, so there is more than usual to mention this time around. I've finished posting summaries of the Study Day presentations by adding those from Dr. James Bettley and Bishop David. There have also been profiles posted of our two newest artist members, Valerie Dean and Nadiya Pavliv. Finally, an update post summarised the latest news of members' activities plus gave details of the catalogue of artists which we are currently producing.

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Madeleine Peyroux - I'm All Right.