13th – 18th April

This April the Cambridge Art Salon is being taken over for one week by students on an alternative education course at a local charity, Romsey Mill. The Step-up course helps to improve the confidence and aspirations of young people (14-16) who are struggling to engage with, or at risk of exclusion from, mainstream school and the range of art work being displayed represents the students’ efforts towards achieving a Level 1 Arts Award. Within the week there will be a special open evening on Tuesday 17th April (6-9pm) when the students, who come from the Manor, Netherhall and Parkside schools, will be joined by friends, family, Romsey Mill staff and school representatives.

Romsey Mill is a Cambridgeshire Charity creating opportunities with young people and families to overcome disadvantage and social isolation.

www.romseymill.org

CAS Creative Director Ruthie Collins says ‘The Cambridge Art Salon is really happy to give young artists the chance to showcase their work in a white cube gallery to family, peers and the community. Romsey Mill do excellent work and it’s a pleasure to be able to support them once again. This show is a real insight into what can be achieved when young people are given support in the pursuit of art and creative excellence.’

Paintings by Alice Hill

Friday 6 – Tuesday 10 April (closed monday)

Private view Friday 6 April 7.00-9.30pm Please RSVP

Alice explores organic forms within her paintings. She is inspired by the natural world and uses its boundless imagery, from ripples in the sea, to rain drops on a petal, to a weather worn, smooth shell discovered on the beach. Alice continuously aims to push the pronominal constraints and meanings of these entities and draws from them as an initial starting point to a painting. However, the final outcome is typically very free and abstract, perhaps suggesting and provoking more feeling to the viewer than the original drawing. To achieve this Alice is a big believer in experimenting and taking risks. She applies vivid colour and adds spontaneity to an oil painting by using spray paint and gloss paint, mediums that can be unpredictable. This hopes to convey a feeling of expression and movement in her work. Alice enjoys playing with the imagination and is fascinated with people’s responses to her work and what they discover within a painting. Further more, colour is hugely important to her, as she believes it evokes different feelings and reactions in people, spurring on dreams or recapturing distant memories. Alice’s work is an infusion of her inspirations, combining impulsive painting with a stylised element.
   

This April 2012, Alice goes back to her roots to hold her first solo exhibition at the Cambridge Art Salon. ‘Bright Imaginings’ will feature new and exciting work up for sale. The exhibition runs over the Easter weekend Friday 6^thApril to Tuesday 10^thApril (opening Friday night, closed Monday). Alice’s work has been featured in online magazine Running In Heels, national newspaper The Guardian and Inspirational Woman Magazine. Her vibrant paintings have been sold to collectors and art lovers in Cambridge and the East of England. She is 26. A fine artist who graduated from Cambridge School of Art in 2008, Alice continued to live and paint in Cambridge exhibiting her work at restaurants such as Cottos and The River Bar and Kitchen until May 2010 when she relocated to Norfolk. She’s also exhibited with ‘Changing Spaces’ in Summer 2009; Positiveworld Studios’ group show ‘Transforming Space’ in October 2009; ‘All Things Said’ with two other contemporary female artists at The Shop, Jesus Lane in December 2009. She’s also exhibited installation work at The Theatre Royal in Bury St. Edmunds, as part of a ‘Shakespeare Sonnet Walk’ organised by the theatre; plus appeared at The Bicycle Shop in Norwich.

From 30 March – 4 April

An Exhibition by Robert Wilson

Rob graduated from UWE Bristol with a BA (Hons) in Illustration. Using traditional materials such as pen and ink, pencil and sometimes paint, his work swings between humourous/satirical images, and the more dark and sinister. He describes his latest work as having a macabre quality.

Over the years Rob has been inspired/influenced by lots of different artists; comic artists such as Robert Crumb, Daniel Clowes and Adrian Tomine, some artists who do ‘retro’ type illustrations like Josh Agle and Derek Yaniger, and well-known illustrators e.g. Ronald Searle, plus plenty of others. For this most recent work, the most likely parallel interms of overall style would be the drawings of Edward Gorey.

23 to 27 March (Private View 23rd March, 6.30-10.00pm)

Participating artists:
Sculptors: Linda Towning and Giulia Portuese-Williams
Photographer: Francesca Re Manning
Painter: Stefan Luszczak

From the transparencies of photographic images to the malleability and harmony of alabaster….to the magic of colour in landscapes and the atmospheric scenes in abstract paintings, at the Cambridge Art Salon, you’ll find an inspiring group of four artists who interpret art in their own unique way linked by a discovery of natural shapes and their friendship.

For more information please see personal websites:

www.contemporarysculptors.co.uk for Linda and Giulia
http://asaucepanandasuitcase.blogspot.com for Francesca

Photography Exhibition by Rowan Lamb

16-20 March

Rowan Lamb calls himself a “Full Time Gentleman Amateur” photographer. His pictures very rarely contain a horizon, such is his focus on things found on the ground. He is interested in the way that city-dwellers interact with nature, and the way that nature finds its own niche in the urban environment. Rowan has a degree in Documentary Photography from the Newport University, has exhibited in Wales and London, and has also had work featured in a national photography magazine. He lives in Cambridge with his girlfriend Ellen, and they want to get a dog.