A review of my show at the New Schoolhouse Gallery by Eliza Gregory, artist, musician, writer.

I am grateful to Eliza for writing this piece; she is going to choose one of my works as a cover for one of her E.P.s.

 

York, New School House Gallery

New School House Gallery directors Paula Jackson and Robert Teed are a discerning pair, known for exhibiting outstanding UK artists who work in all manner of mediums. Their latest offering, a selection from Cornwall based painter Kate Walters’ work is no exception and continues to uphold their unparalleled standards in North Yorkshire.

The first thing to strike you about Ms Walters work is that of a certain naivety. Don’t be fooled; the longer you look it becomes apparent that the painted images of long limbed animals, sparse dark landscapes, and the forms of pre-Christian-like-people-as-deities are deliberate, considered but instinctual and contain a mythology which speaks to a primeval part of yourself you didn’t know to be present. Part cave painting, part vision, there’s something incredibly unique and unsettling about the minimal palette. The use of pinks and purples mixed in with ghostly charcoal taps into your subconscious making for a compelling view.

Immediately you see that Walters’ native area of Penzance, steeped in folklore and ancient culture, inhabits her work truly. The lost Cornish culture is a fine mix akin to other Celtic strains yet the Iron Age legacy defines an aspect of its identity more so than in its prevalently known cousins. In using this culture as a filter the artist has captured what it is to discover expressing ones inner world with an external medium – which could sit comfortably on a canvas or a secluded cliff face, such is its authenticity.

Whether to your taste or not you cannot deny Kate Walters sincerity, depth of experience or context; the future can very much be seen through the eye of the past.

Eliza Gregory


Musician/Poet/Artist
www.headsearchingforbody.tumblr.com