PAST EXHIBITION
CUT OUT
SERIES 1
18 – 31 May 2023
HM Electric presents Cut Out Series 1, a two-week-long exhibition of paintings and films curated by contributing film-maker Freddie Foulkes.
Born out of a simple and child-like desire to experiment and explore, Cut Out sees new work by Norman Hyams, William Van Hoorn, Charlie Gosling, and Charlie Boothright gracing the walls of HM Electric’s W10 gallery. As a celebration of these four painters, figures who in this scenario play the anti-heroes of contemporary society, hiding themselves away to create, this exhibition finds its roots in the work of Freddie Foulkes.
Using an 8mm video camera, Freddie filmed, edited, and released (on YouTube) two films on each of these painters in their studios, save for William on whom he released three. He makes it clear that he was forever wary of misrepresenting or disturbing the painters’ practice with his lens. His nine short films, to be exhibited at HM Electric, are as much concerned with these painters for what they paint as for who they are. They are simultaneously concerned with art, its history, and its variety, and what, for want of a better phrase, keeps these painters ‘ticking’; what motivates these four individuals to create and crucially keep creating.
Alongside these films, Cut Out Series 1 presents contemporary paintings, both figurative and abstract. What unites these four painters is paradoxically, their individuality. The subjects of the paintings exhibited in Cut Out Series 1 are not exclusively what these individuals have painted. There is in every case an idea, a concept, or a philosophy that we have to thank for these fine examples of post-modern painting. Often, these works have stemmed from a deep-rooted desire to express individuality.
The work of Hyams, Van Hoorn, Gosling, and Boothright is evidence of the fantastically varied, enthusiastic, buoyant, and brave art that London has to offer. Irrespective of differences in age, training, accomplishments, or public recognition, each of the four is dedicated to developing their craft. Testament to their exploration with media, composition, colour, light, and texture (among other formal features), these paintings are exciting to see.
Norman Hyams
The Fight
Oil on linen
30.5 x 25cm
NORMAN HYAMS
Norman Hyams (b. 1966) studied Fine Art at Chelsea College of Art, graduating in 2006, and in 2016 he completed the Turps Art School Studio Programme. As a painter and as a curious human being, he is sometimes dumbfounded by the tangible, despite his knowledge of the intangible; as much as he is a painter in his late fifties, he is a child. He is at once a stargazer and an astronomer.
Charlie Boothright
Red Ground (diptych)
2023
Oil on canvas
320 x 65cm
CHARLIE BOOTHRIGHT
Charlie Boothright (b. 2001) is a painter who, while searching for composition, is simultaneously experimenting with new and unexpected ways to record lived experience through paint. For Boothright the brush works, but sometimes a palette knife, glove, or simply the paint alone works better. She is far from shy of her media, and often at her best she is far from delicate with it. Boothright is a recent graduate of Camberwell College of Arts.
Charlie Gosling
Flo
2022
Oil on canvas
18 x 24cm
CHARLIE GOSLING
Charlie Gosling (b. 2000) is a painter who is rarely found sculpting form by blending strokes – he relies on the viewer’s eye to merge each brushstroke with those it borders. His pictures, patchworks of subtly selected paints and delicately applied brush strokes, become convincing portraits and powerful mementos of a time shared between painter and sitter.
William Van Hoorn
Red, Blue, Gone
2023
Oil on canvas
75 x 121cm
WILLIAM VAN HOORN
William Van Hoorn (b. 2000) is a painter whose often varied manipulation of his medium results in consistently rich and strong works. Accomplished at attaining effect with both oil paint and card collage, Van Hoorn is combines the severe aesthetic of collage with a comparative looseness of painting.