Artist Tim Ridley reveals his new Women & Animals Collection in Exeter exhibition

Artist, Tim Ridley, is showing a new series of oil paintings from the series ‘Women and animals’ at Sapphire Blue Collective’s exhibition, Radiance, Rubrics & Rituals: So We Are Held at MakeTank in Exeter from 17th-29th July.

The exhibition features work by ten contemporary artists who each contribute their unique perspective and distinctive style while demonstrating exceptional skill and versatility across a range of mediums and disciplines including:- ceramics, painting, weaving, photography, fine print, drawing, object making and installation.

The Sapphire Blue Collective was established during the Covid pandemic when a group of artists who were facing unprecedented challenges developed a close-bonded network and ‘crit club’ to foster creative exploration and a push towards academic excellence during their postgraduate studies at Arts University Plymouth. Since then, the Sapphire Blue Collective has become an intimate but dynamic community that fuels the personal growth of its members and celebrates the value of mutual support.

The show’s title “Radiance, Rubrics and Rituals: So We Are Held” not only references the various strategies and approaches to art making that are employed by the artists but it also draws inspiration from the group’s manifesto which emphasises kindness, kinship and resilience. “Radiance, Rubrics and Rituals: So We Are Held” promises to be a visually striking and thought-provoking exhibition that invites viewers to explore the boundaries and transformative powers of contemporary art.

Having completed an MA in painting at Arts University Plymouth Tim has continued his exploration of the strange and dynamic relationship between animals and humans using oil paint. Working from found photographic imagery making larger scale works in his Penzance studio he goes about playfully obscuring the reference imagery, allowing for obsessive working of pattern, Tim unlearns technique and lets each painting grow. Working to minimise his use of new materials, Tim salvages wooden panels from palettes and allows the surfaces to affect the painting as it progresses.

‘Hold’ is a painting made from an image of an artist friend clutching a vixen, which she befriended as a child. The limitations of the photographic process in the reference image interact with the underdrawing and subsequent layers of paint to produce an outcome which moves towards abstraction. The arms and fingers enclose and protect or maybe trap the vixen.

‘The space between us’ was made with reference to an image of Jane Goodall and a chimp which she worked with in the 80s. Here in the natural habitat of the chimp, the human figure is somehow distant and ‘out of place’ Jane’s crouching stance is awkward and the chimp seems to be weary. They are separated by a space and colour being clothed and unclothed, with language and without language.

The poster image for the exhibition, ‘No Mates’ is a painting made from a collage of two elements. One is a picture of a singer at the Cornish Bank in Falmouth, the other is a cut out of an Australian parrot. Combining the two produced a strange effect, the parrot out of its usual territory and the singer caught in mid performance. Two elements which should not work together, but the painting brings them together.