Email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser. Press Release Still Lives - Robert Lenkiewicz 17 April - 31 May 2011 Images from www.flickr.com/photos/rwapress/sets/ An article on Robert Lenkiewicz by Francis Mallett from The Lenkiewicz Foundation, will be available shortly from www.rwa.org.uk/millfrm.htm. Right click to download high res featured paintings, which are: (top) 'The Painter with Mary in Newspaper Magi-Fool's Hats. 1981' 48 x 69 cm. Oil on canvas. Project – The Painter with Mary: a Study in Obsessional Behaviour; (bottom) 'The Glue Sniffer. 1988' 135 x 135 cm. Oil on canvas. Project – Observations on Local Education. For more information or to interview artists, please contact Louisa Davison on 0117 973 5129 (or 01672 811 515) louisa.davison@rwa.org.uk. Still Lives exhibition details Royal West of England Academy, Queen’s Road, Clifton, Bristol BS8 1PX. 0117 973 5129 www.rwa.org.uk (Media only invited to Private View Saturday 16 April 2011, 2-5pm) Public opening: 17 April - 31 May 2011 Monday – Saturday 10am-5pm Sunday 2-5pm Admission: free The most comprehensive exhibition since Lenkiewicz’s death in 2002, of 'one of the few serious painters of contemporary history' (David Lee). and in RWA New Gallery (free entry) Bath Artist Printmakers - Making Our Mark(s) 9 April – 4 May An exhibition of vivid, original prints by members of Bath Artist Printmakers collective, illustrating a variety of printmaking techniques, both traditional and modern, and a range of styles; figurative, impressionistic and abstract, both in colour and monochrome.   David Backhouse RWA 7 May – 1 June The renowned international sculptor will be exhibiting a retrospective of his work to celebrate his 70th year. Please see after 'More information' for events April - July 2011 More information Still Lives, a major exhibition of the work of radical painter Robert Lenkiewicz, comes to the Royal West of England Academy, Bristol from April 17th.   This is the most comprehensive exhibition of the Plymouth-based artist’s work since his premature death at the age of 60 in 2002.   Robert Lenkiewicz was an artist profoundly interested in ‘the business of living’.  ‘Still Lives’ will focus on Lenkiewicz’s choice of the outsider as the subject for his art: the vagrants and street alcoholics who dossed at his studios, families with mentally handicapped children, the elderly, the dying — human beings isolated from one another by their circumstances and from themselves by their preoccupations. Seventy paintings will be exhibited in the RWA’s five upstairs galleries, including one room devoted to the vagrant Diogenes together with his embalmed body.    Lenkiewicz met Diogenes whilst recording the lives of down and outs in London and Plymouth in the 1960s for his project Vagrancy. Lenkiewicz had an understanding with Edwin MacKenzie – Diogenes’ birth name – that when he died Lenkiewicz would take the corpse, the ‘vacated premises’, and have it embalmed. The artist added it to his library with the other artefacts on the theme of death to create a haunting memento mori.   A genuine outsider and radical, Lenkiewicz was consciously at odds with current thinking on ethical and artistic issues. He cared less about the opinion of the art critic than that of the man-in-the-street. His art is generous in its ability to communicate with ordinary people, who are little interested in the more esoteric world of contemporary art; it is democratic and humane but never sentimental.   His paintings, above all, reveal people for what they are without moral judgement. ‘You’re born alone and you die alone,’ he said and the problem was to deal with the isolation of simply being alive. Lenkiewicz found one solution – a richly creative life conducted with panache – and left behind a legacy which will appeal to anyone with an interest in the conundrum of existence.    In his obituary of Lenkiewicz, art critic David Lee observed: “Lenkiewicz’s greatest gift was to show us that an artist could be genuinely concerned about social and domestic issues and attempt the difficult task of expressing this conscience through the deeply unfashionable medium of figurative painting. In that sense he was one of few serious painters of contemporary history.”   If the task of the artist is to show what it was to be alive in a certain time and in a certain place, then the qualities of Robert Lenkiewicz’s work will become increasingly clear to future generations.    Still Lives runs from 17 April to 31 May at Royal West of England Academy, Bristol, open seven days a week. It is organised by The Lenkiewicz Foundation and is supported by The Somerville Gallery and A.K. Acker. Associated events include exhibition tours and talks. For more details call 0117 973 5129 or visit www.rwa.org.uk. Associated events  Saturday 2 April, 11am-12.30pm Talk- Film Photography in the Digital Age RWA Fedden Gallery Free of charge however booking is essential. Please book online at www.bfop.org or 0117 97300622. Now that the world has ‘gone digital’ some photographers persist in using silver based and alternative photographic processes. Martin Edwards gives his personal views on why silver still works for him, and will also be considering analogue photography and processes from a selection of local photographers. The photographic dinosaur is alive, well and very busy.   Saturday 2 April, 2-3.30pm Workshop- Colour Management RWA Fedden Gallery Free of charge however booking is essential. Please book online at www.bfop.org or 0117 97300622. Join Andy Johnson from Calumet who will be discussing colour management from a photographer’s perspective. Learn how to maximise the potential of your images and use colour profiles to prepare images for printing.   Monday 4 April, 6.30pm Film preview: There is a Shipwreck in My Bones Free of charge. Bristol-based dance artist and film maker Lisa May Thomas presents the first show of her latest piece. Looking from both afar and from the intimate space of the dancers, witness a series of movement conversations set against the backdrop of the sea. Moments of contact and tenderness are juxtaposed with a sense of solitude and a state of restlessness. The film was produced as part of the Bristol Dance Associates scheme and Picture This with additional support from Bristol Old Vic.  Funded by Arts Council England.   Monday 18th – Wednesday 20th April 2011, 9.45am – 5pm Course- Painted Land Fee £150/£90 (concessions) per person. To book please call 0117 9735129. Tutor Stewart Geddes RWA has exhibited widely both nationally and internationality, and has works held in numerous public and private collections including the House of Commons, Landmark Plc, the Royal College of Art, and the University of Wales Institute, Cardiff. Until recently he was Head of Painting at Cardiff School of Art and Design. The course will look at developing landscape painting as an equivalent to experience and sensation, as an extension of observation.   Monday 11th – Wednesday 13th April 2011, 9.45am – 5pm Course- Revised Impressions Fee £150/£90 (concessions) per person. To book please call 0117 9735129. Tutor Peter Ford is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers (RE), Vice President of the Royal West of England Academy (RWA) and a member of the International Association of Papermaking Artists (IAPMA). ‘Revised Impressions’ looks at chance and risk-taking as routes to new images in etching, relief printing and constructing collagraphs.  The sessions will include printing without a press and an introduction to the hidden world of bookplate design.   Saturday 9 April, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  James McNeill Whistler £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk Jennifer Spiers MA will be looking at the life, work and times of the highly-talented and innovative artist James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903).  Whistler was one of the most influential figures in the visual arts of the nineteenth century, credited with helping to promote both Aestheticism and Impressionism in England.  An intriguing and colourful character, his paintings introduced strikingly original methods of composition and painting techniques.   Saturday 16 April, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  Baroque Triumphant: The Life And Work Of Gianlorenzo Bernini. £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk Bernini was the outstanding genius of seventeenth-century Rome, a city where painters, sculptors and architects combined to produce works of unprecedented invention and originality. This dayschool with Harriet Batten-Foster MA will study the work and life of the greatest sculptor and architect of Baroque Rome, Gianlorenzo Bernini. Exceptional as a man as well as an artist, these lectures will place Bernini’s art within a religious, social and political context. Themes such as the role of individual patrons and the demands of a Catholic church under siege will be among those examined.   Thursday 21 April, 6-7pm Talk- ‘An Introduction to the Life, Work and Ideas of Robert Lenkiewicz' RWA Fedden Gallery Free of charge but booking is essential. Please call 0117 9735129. A talk by Francis Mallett, The Lenkiewicz Foundation and publisher of monograph on the artist.   Thursday 28 April, 6-7pm Talk- 'The influence of Counter-Culture Thinkers on Lenkiewicz's Projects' RWA Fedden Gallery Free of charge but booking is essential. Please call 0117 9735129. A talk by Francis Mallett, The Lenkiewicz Foundation and publisher of monograph on the artist.   Saturday 7 May, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  Nicholas Hilliard and the Art of the Miniature £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk Nicholas Hilliard captured a glowing, delicate and intimate image of the Elizabethans in his jewel-like portrait miniatures. He has left us a legacy of colour, pattern, symbolism and likeness, as well as an opinionated insight into the thoughts and practices of a sixteenth-century English artist. This dayschool with Dr. Gillian White will explore Hilliard’s career and techniques through a study of his visual images and his written treatise, The Arte of Limning.   Wednesday 11 May, 6-7pm Talk- 'Art, Culture and Aesthetics' RWA Fedden Gallery Free of charge but booking is essential. Please call 0117 9735129. A talk by Kim Charnley, doctoral researcher in art and philosophy, University of Essex   Saturday 14 May, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  Cubism in Wartime and Interwar France £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk This session with Dr. Louise Hughes will trace in detail the development of Cubism in France, before, during and after the First World War. Particular emphasis will be placed on the changes the Cubist aesthetic underwent in the wake of conflict and within the complex cultural politics of the interwar period. The session will also cover a wide range of artists and artworks, including the work of Georges Braque, Juan Gris, Fernand Léger and Pablo Picasso.   Saturday 14 May, 2pm Gallery tour- ‘Still Lives’ exhibition with Anna Navas from The Lenkiewicz Foundation Free of charge   Thursday 19 May, 6-7pm Talk- 'Contested Bones: Changing Perspectives on the Display of Mummies from Antiquity to the Present' RWA Fedden Gallery Free of charge but booking is essential. Please call 0117 9735129. With Jason Semmens, assistant curator Horsham Museum   Saturday 21 May, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  St. Ives between the Wars: Wood, Wallis and Nicholson £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk In August 1928 a meeting of artists occurred in St. Ives that changed the face of British art forever - Ben Nicholson, born into an artistic family and leading light of the ‘Seven and Five Society’; Alfred Wallis, a 73-year-old retired fisherman who had turned to painting for company after his wife died; Christopher Wood, the only British painter to inhabit the Parisian circle of Picasso and Cocteau.  This dayschool with D. Cox MA discusses the wonderful art that resulted from this momentous encounter.    Tuesday 24 May, 6-7pm Talk: 'Philosophy, Life and the Move towards Death' RWA Fedden Gallery Free of charge but booking is essential. Please call 0117 9735129. With Dr Will Large, Senior Lecturer in Philosophy, University of Gloucester, author of texts on Heidegger, Blanchot and Levinas   Thursday 26 May, 6-7pm Thinking about Death – a panel discussion Main galleries Free of charge but booking is essential. Please call 0117 9735129.   Saturday 4 June, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  Charles Rennie Mackintosh & The Art Nouveau Movement £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk This course takes an in-depth look at the art, life and times of Charles Rennie Mackintosh and his famous collaboration with Herbert McNair, and Margaret and Frances Macdonald, who became known collectively as The Four, or The Spook School. Jennifer Spiers MA will consider the inspirations and values that informed the Art Nouveau movement and the rise of Mackintosh as one of the leading exponents of the Art Nouveau style throughout Europe.   Saturday 11 June, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  Figures of Immaterial Enlightenment: The Life and Work of El Greco £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk The paintings of El Greco - derided and neglected until the late nineteenth century - are now recognised as works of genius. This dayschool with Harriet Batten-Foster MA will trace El Greco’s career from its humble beginnings in Crete, through the periods spent in Venice and Rome assimilating the works of the Italian masters, to his eventual residence in Toledo and resultant works of astonishing religious mysticism and fervour. This course will examine also El Greco’s legacy and the profound influence he had on modern artists such as Pablo Picasso and Jackson Pollock.   Saturday 18 June, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  Modern Romantics: Romanticism in Twentieth-Century British Art £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk The ‘Neo-Romantics’ Paul Nash, John Piper and Graham Sutherland are perhaps the best known twentieth-century British artists to have drawn inspiration from the 19th century romantic tradition of William Blake and Samuel Palmer. However, throughout the twentieth century, many more artists have also been stimulated by this artistic heritage. This class with Rachel Flynn MA will explore both the diversity of the established Neo-Romantic movement of the 1930s and 40s and the wide-ranging responses to Romanticism found in modern and contemporary British art.   Saturday 2 July, 10am-4pm Art History Day School-  The Art and Life of Paul Gauguin £30 per person, call 0117 973 5129 or email kate.morgan@rwa.org.uk This dayschool with D. Cox MA looks at the amazing art and life of Paul Gauguin, whose ‘brilliant’ recent Tate exhibition was well-received by both critics and public alike. From Paris to Pont-Aven, from Martinique to the Marquessas, this course follows Gauguin’s relentless search across the oceans for artistic inspiration, a man unable to escape from either himself or his own myths. His methods, his motivations and his legacy to Western art are discovered. Editor's Notes High resolution downloadable images of a selection of the paintings are available at www.flickr.com/photos/rwapress/sets/  solely for use with media reports of this exhibition. To download high res pictures, please click on the image you require, then click ‘Actions’ then select ‘View all sizes’, then select ‘Original’ to download. This press release copyright of RWA and used solely to promote this exhibition. For more information or to interview artists, please contact Louisa Davison on 0117 973 5129 (or 01672 811 515) press.office@rwa.org.uk. The RWA has seven galleries within the 19thcentury building. The five upstairs galleries – Sharples, Winterstoke, Stancomb-Wills, Methuen and Milner - host the main exhibition/s. Artists can apply to hire the downstairs New Gallery for their own exhibitions (which forms the New Gallery programme). In the basement are the RWA Friends’ Room (with occasional Friends’ exhibitions), and also the newly refurbished Fedden Gallery which often exhibits some pieces from the RWA’s permanent collection and is available to hire as a conference and meeting space. All gallery spaces are available for private hire for special events, such as weddings and parties. If members of the media would like a tour, please contact Louisa as above.   RWA also hires out pieces from its permanent collection as part of the ‘Art in Your Workplace’ scheme, see www.rwa.org.uk/workfrm.htm.  The Royal West of England Academy (RWA) is one of only five Royal academies of art in the UK. It is a registered charity which has been self-supporting for over 150 years and possesses an outstanding Grade II* listed building, galleries and permanent fine art collection. The RWA has HM Queen Elizabeth II as its patron. The RWA is an established venue for the fine arts and embraces an artistic awareness of the widest nature. The exhibition programme provides a showcase for one-person and mixed exhibitions in a variety of media, which attract large numbers of visitors nation-wide. The Academy is situated in the academic heart of Bristol at the Clifton Triangle, where Queens Road meets Whiteladies Road, next to Habitat and opposite the Victoria Rooms. The latest news and events from RWA. artsnews@absolutearts.com from this list | Forward to a friend | Update your profile Our mailing address is: Royal West of England Academy Queen's Road, Clifton Bristol, England BS8 1PX Add us to your address book Copyright (C) 2011 Royal West of England Academy All rights reserved.