Exhibition by Joanna Whittle on display at the Harley Gallery from 01.08.2020 – 01.11.2020
Whittle’s exhibition at the Harley Gallery on the Welbeck Estate responded to the Portland Collection and surrounding estate. We made trips to various sites on the estate meeting with curators past and present and an expert on costume. I collaborated with JW, lending support in the display and framing of work.
I also included two works pictured above titled: ‘Nine Marvels (from beyond the Interstitial Passageway)’ & ‘Eight Marvels (from beyond the Interstitial Passageway)’, hand dyed, c-type prints.
The titles were informed by a novel written by Margaret Cavendish Duchess of Newcastle titled Blazing World.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blazing_World
My dyed photographs (of collages) catalogue the keepsakes recovered from the Blazing World.
In ‘Between Islands’ [Whittle] explores the relationship between ‘creating worlds’ and ‘creating collections’ and the role curation and display of collections plays in developing narratives- real or imagined.
[Whittle] has produced the paintings, drawings and ceramics on display in response to the landscape of the Welbeck estate and items in The Portland Collection and has displayed these as a collection of artefacts from an imagined world called Do><ia. The project has involved collaboration with artist David Orme, to explore the determinations of display and the decisions made to formalise the fictional into the authentic.
The world described is heavily influenced by the rich fabrics and fine ceramics in The Portland Collection and the secret landscape within the estate- creating islands of silk draped structures, hidden tunnels and overgrown gateways alongside ceramic artefacts from this imagined society.
Installing ‘Between Islands’
