Transition Gallery
Encyclopedia
Transition Gallery is a contemporary art project space in Hackney, East London. It is run by artists Cathy Lomax
and Alex Michon
. Transition Editions the gallery's publishing arm produces publications to accompany shows as well as two bi-annual magazines Arty
and Garageland.
, Hackney
, London, and is run by artists Cathy Lomax
and Alex Michon
to show work by established and new contemporary artists.
Show titles have included Golden Fluffer, The English Museum, The Painting Room, Awopbopaloobop, Prozac and Private Views (the first Stella Vine
solo show), Goth Moth and Girl on Girl. There is often a provocative polemic accompanying the shows. The Girl on Girl (January 2004) text stated:
Transition Gallery received press attention in February 2004 when a painting exhibited by then-obscure artist Stella Vine
was bought for by Charles Saatchi
and given international media coverage for its controversial depiction of Diana, Princess of Wales
. It was titled Hi Paul Can You Come Over and showed the Princess with heavy eyes and blood dripping from her lips.
In March 2004, Liz Neal
's Archway council flat studio was recreated as an installation inside the gallery for a show called The Lair of the Lotus Eater. Her work was exhibited in the Saatchi Gallery
's New Blood show in the same year.
In 2005, Evening Standard
critics, Nick Hackworth and Brian Sewell
, visited the gallery. Hackworth wrote:
It looks like a small garage workshop, but instead of Star Motors the legend reads: "You don't have to be blonde to be an artist, but it helps." Inside, the walls are papered with magazine pages, photographs and postcards on the theme of quintessential Englishness; among them are paintings by Lomax and Michon. There is a subversive innocence about the installation.
In 2006, the gallery moved slightly further west to Regent Studios, which is also home to the MOT
gallery, and close to the gallery hotspot of Vyner Street. The gallery address is Unit 25a Regent Studios, 8 Andrews Road, London E8. The nearest tube is Bethnal Green. Other galleries in the area are Vilma Gold and IMT
.
In the summer of 2007 Transition organised the bank holiday weekend art festival O Dreamland on the Kent coast with the Folkestone based Club Shepway. Participating artists included Lucy Harrison, Delaine Le Bas and Russell Herron. The second Transition off-site event was That's Entertainment which was part of the 2008 Whitstable Biennale.
, Annabel Dover, Rose Wylie, Jake Clark, Hew Lock, Emma Talbot, Zoe Mendelson
, Nadia Hebson, Cathie Pilkington and Mimei Thompson
Cathy Lomax
Cathy Lomax is a London artist, curator and director of the Transition Gallery.-Life and career:Cathy Lomax is an artist mainly known for her figurative paintings. She has a BA Fine Art from London Guildhall University , and an MA from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design...
and Alex Michon
Alex Michon
Alex Michon is a British artist, based in London, and runs the Transition Gallery in Hackney with Cathy Lomax.-Career:Alex Michon is a graduate of Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, London. She exhibits her work, which is mostly painting and drawing. She also writes for Arty magazine...
. Transition Editions the gallery's publishing arm produces publications to accompany shows as well as two bi-annual magazines Arty
Arty
Arty is an independent British art fanzine started by the artist Cathy Lomax in 2001. Arty is for art fans written by artists themselves and published by Transition Gallery's editions department, the artist-run space in East London.-History:...
and Garageland.
History
Transition Gallery was founded in October 2002 in a converted garage close to Victoria ParkVictoria Park, East London
Victoria Park is 86.18 hectares of open space that stretches out across part of the East End of London, England bordering parts of Bethnal Green, Hackney, and Bow, such as along Old Ford Road, London E3 and Victoria Park Road E9. The park is entirely within the London Borough of Tower Hamlets...
, Hackney
South Hackney
South Hackney is a district in the London Borough of Hackney situated north east of Charing Cross.It is immediately north of Victoria Park and the area centred on Victoria Park Road and Lauriston Road...
, London, and is run by artists Cathy Lomax
Cathy Lomax
Cathy Lomax is a London artist, curator and director of the Transition Gallery.-Life and career:Cathy Lomax is an artist mainly known for her figurative paintings. She has a BA Fine Art from London Guildhall University , and an MA from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design...
and Alex Michon
Alex Michon
Alex Michon is a British artist, based in London, and runs the Transition Gallery in Hackney with Cathy Lomax.-Career:Alex Michon is a graduate of Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, London. She exhibits her work, which is mostly painting and drawing. She also writes for Arty magazine...
to show work by established and new contemporary artists.
Show titles have included Golden Fluffer, The English Museum, The Painting Room, Awopbopaloobop, Prozac and Private Views (the first Stella Vine
Stella Vine
Stella Vine is an English artist, who lives and works in London. Her work is figurative painting with subject matter drawn from either her personal life of family, friends and school, or rock stars, royalty and celebrities.After a difficult relationship with her stepfather, she left home and in...
solo show), Goth Moth and Girl on Girl. There is often a provocative polemic accompanying the shows. The Girl on Girl (January 2004) text stated:
- Girl on Girl examines a new sensibility in art. Made by girls and about girls it makes a virtue of discontent, sexual disruptiveness and bad manners. This work reclaims the girly and the slutty not in a riot girl, feminist or ‘woman in art’ way but with a cultural celebration, that has both the shy and the brash as equal role models. Think PJ HarveyPJ HarveyPolly Jean Harvey is an English musician, singer-songwriter, composer and occasional artist. Primarily known as a vocalist and guitarist, she is also proficient with a wide range of instruments including piano, organ, bass, saxophone, and most recently, the autoharp.Harvey began her career in...
, Frida KahloFrida KahloFrida Kahlo de Rivera was a Mexican painter, born in Coyoacán, and perhaps best known for her self-portraits....
, The SlitsThe SlitsThe Slits were a British punk rock band. The quartet was formed in 1976 by members of the bands The Flowers of Romance and The Castrators. The members were Ari Up , who died of cancer in October 2010, and Palmolive , with Viv Albertine and Tessa Pollitt replacing founding members, Kate Korus and...
, Karen KilimnikKaren KilimnikKaren Kilimnik is an American painter and installation artist.-Life and work:Karen Kilimnik trained at Temple University, Philadelphia.Her installations reflected a young viewpoint of pop culture...
, Artemisia GentileschiArtemisia GentileschiArtemisia Gentileschi was an Italian Early Baroque painter, today considered one of the most accomplished painters in the generation influenced by Caravaggio...
, Patti SmithPatti SmithPatricia Lee "Patti" Smith is an American singer-songwriter, poet and visual artist, who became a highly influential component of the New York City punk rock movement with her 1975 debut album Horses....
, Meg WhiteMeg WhiteMegan Martha "Meg" White is an American drummer best known for her work in the Detroit rock duo The White Stripes.-Early life:...
, think sense of conviction and to hell with the consequences.
Transition Gallery received press attention in February 2004 when a painting exhibited by then-obscure artist Stella Vine
Stella Vine
Stella Vine is an English artist, who lives and works in London. Her work is figurative painting with subject matter drawn from either her personal life of family, friends and school, or rock stars, royalty and celebrities.After a difficult relationship with her stepfather, she left home and in...
was bought for by Charles Saatchi
Charles Saatchi
Charles Saatchi is the co-founder with his brother Maurice of the global advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi, and led that business - the world's largest advertising agency in the 1980s - until they were forced out in 1995. In the same year the Saatchi brothers formed a new agency called M&C...
and given international media coverage for its controversial depiction of Diana, Princess of Wales
Diana, Princess of Wales
Diana, Princess of Wales was the first wife of Charles, Prince of Wales, whom she married on 29 July 1981, and an international charity and fundraising figure, as well as a preeminent celebrity of the late 20th century...
. It was titled Hi Paul Can You Come Over and showed the Princess with heavy eyes and blood dripping from her lips.
In March 2004, Liz Neal
Liz Neal
Liz Neal is an artist based in London.Neal grew up in North Wales. She makes paintings and installations which reference sexual, consumer and fantasy imagery. From 2001-2003, Neal turned the front room of her North London flat into an installation by covering every surface of the space with...
's Archway council flat studio was recreated as an installation inside the gallery for a show called The Lair of the Lotus Eater. Her work was exhibited in the Saatchi Gallery
Saatchi Gallery
The Saatchi Gallery is a London gallery for contemporary art, opened by Charles Saatchi in 1985 in order to exhibit his collection to the public. It has occupied different premises, first in North London, then the South Bank by the River Thames and currently in Chelsea. Saatchi's collection, and...
's New Blood show in the same year.
In 2005, Evening Standard
Evening Standard
The Evening Standard, now styled the London Evening Standard, is a free local daily newspaper, published Monday–Friday in tabloid format in London. It is the dominant regional evening paper for London and the surrounding area, with coverage of national and international news and City of London...
critics, Nick Hackworth and Brian Sewell
Brian Sewell
Brian Sewell is an English art critic and media personality. He writes for the London Evening Standard and is noted for artistic conservatism and his acerbic view of the Turner Prize and conceptual art...
, visited the gallery. Hackworth wrote:
It looks like a small garage workshop, but instead of Star Motors the legend reads: "You don't have to be blonde to be an artist, but it helps." Inside, the walls are papered with magazine pages, photographs and postcards on the theme of quintessential Englishness; among them are paintings by Lomax and Michon. There is a subversive innocence about the installation.
In 2006, the gallery moved slightly further west to Regent Studios, which is also home to the MOT
MOT (gallery)
MOT is a contemporary art gallery in east London run by Chris Hammond.-History:The MOT gallery was founded in 2002 by Chris Hammond, Floyd Varey and Mally Mallinson...
gallery, and close to the gallery hotspot of Vyner Street. The gallery address is Unit 25a Regent Studios, 8 Andrews Road, London E8. The nearest tube is Bethnal Green. Other galleries in the area are Vilma Gold and IMT
IMT Gallery
IMT Gallery is a contemporary art gallery in Bethnal Green in London's East End.-History:IMT Gallery was founded by Lindsay Friend in 2005 and launched with the first London solo exhibition by O Zhang. Other artists to have been given their first London solo exhibitions with IMT Gallery include...
.
In the summer of 2007 Transition organised the bank holiday weekend art festival O Dreamland on the Kent coast with the Folkestone based Club Shepway. Participating artists included Lucy Harrison, Delaine Le Bas and Russell Herron. The second Transition off-site event was That's Entertainment which was part of the 2008 Whitstable Biennale.
Artists exhibited include
Paul Housley, Ruth Claxton, Delaine Le Bas, Tom Hunter, Carlos Noronha FeioCarlos Noronha Feio
Carlos Noronha Feio is a Portuguese artist. His work is in a variety of media, including video and book works, occasionally requiring craftspeople and industrial makers such as in a series of war rugs made in the Arraiolos tradition....
, Annabel Dover, Rose Wylie, Jake Clark, Hew Lock, Emma Talbot, Zoe Mendelson
Zoe Mendelson
Zoë Mendelson is a London-based British artist. Her father is television comedy writer Paul Mendelson.-Biography:Mendelson studied Fine Art at Chelsea College of Art and Design from 1995–1998 and at the Royal College of Art from 1998–2000...
, Nadia Hebson, Cathie Pilkington and Mimei Thompson