London exhibition notes: Wylie, Howson, Howeson, Greenwood and Troughton

Rose Wylie, Lilith and Gucci Boy
2024, oil on canvas
diptych, overall: 81 1/2 x 120 1/2 inches (207 x 306 cm)

London yesterday, and a great variety of art on show. Rose Wylie at the RA opens to the public on Saturday. Having RA Friends access meant I could walk around relatively empty galleries and enjoy clear views of each themed room. What impressed me most was her ability to retain the freshness and immediacy of the sketchbook drawings in her very large canvases. Doodlebugs, ducks, and characters from films she’s seen are all realised with the same summary, notational style that is sometimes spoken about as childlike. I am not sure that is the best way to discuss it though, as the paintings struck me as very sophisticated, especially with regard to her use colour and ability to balance active elements in the space that surrounds them. There is an undeniable visual wit and a sense of the world as somehow carnivalesque and absurd. The absence of earnest, polemical themes is noticable, and to me welcome. No wonder ‘The Picture Comes First’ is the title of the exhibition.

Nearby, in the Linnean Society, an engraving of a louse was one of 50 niche objects in ‘Wonder’ a small exhibition about cabinets of curiosity, aka Wunderkammers.Then work by 56 in 26 At Flowers Gallery who are celebrating their 56th year. A small pencil drawing on gesso by Pete Howson caught my eye.

Over at Standpoint Gallery Twinkle Troughton’s residency exhibition ‘Occlusions of the City Forest’ reflects on the trees of Hoxton, especially the London Plane, and their links to the character of the city, empire and colonialism. Some very assured works in oil on paper that evoke light through thinning and removal of paint, rather than the addition of white.

After a revisit to ‘Weird Weather’ by Jane Hayes Greenwood at Ione & Mann it was over to The Place, Canonbury Place, to hear Anne Howson in conversation with David Keenan. A packed event and lots of themes of interest discussed, including ghosts, atmospheres, and literary influences.