The Pollinators

Details:

Oil paint on Tracing paper, 13 heads and poppies on a Frieze 22 metres long and 2.2 metres high.

With a multitude of animals and flowers set into the panelling.

Statement for ‘Be Still Media’ 

‘The Pollinators’ is precisely what your prompt is preoccupied with and I admire what you stand for and are achieving.  

This Painting installation is a memorial to my friend Sermad that died 3 years ago. We grew up together, discovered and shared our cultural influences. It is a homage to all the values and magic that comes from being immersed in Art and friendship. 

There are 13 heads that represent a cross section form all those beneficial figures that have shaped us both. They include musician Gil Scott Heron, writer James Baldwin, photographers Vivian Maier and Diane Arbus, alongside friends and family. They have all confronted prejudice, malice, alienation and much more but have remained true and inspirational. Each of them gives a wealth of inspiration but such a gathering is a juggernaut of tenacity and wisdom.  

Painted on tracing paper, we can see through to the crumbling regency plaster, scarred with thousands of bullet holes from ‘escape rooms’ and to graffiti, vandalism and the evidence of raves and community projects.  Like an enlightened jury, they float in this semi derelict Court room and surround Sermad, as the child I remember flanked with flowers and mayflies. These Pollinators dance across all the figures, who are themselves Pollinators of progressive ideas, generosity and empathy. 

Set into all the mahogany panelling there are monkeys, birds, bats and flowers, that reflect his sensitivity with the natural world and his sadness with its demise. They are a powerhouse of beauty and wonder.  Above an image of my mother who cared for us both oversees all the performances, readings, discussions that reignited this abandoned building including my own son DJ’ing. 

Together with Matthew Benington, (depicted above) we curated ‘Unstable Monuments’ in this leviathan of bygone civic power and authority. Its history is a vessel for the imagination, and a cauldron of all that makes us human. See @unstable.monuments.bristol on Instagram. 

We invited over 20 young artists and students to show alongside 30 established artists and to develop ideas during a 2-week residency there. This built in a natural form of mentoring and a powerful camaraderie amongst all involved. Through a crowd funder we managed to raise funds for the young creatives and for costs, but we received no fees ourselves. However, its deeply rewarding to see so many positive legacies arise, especially now the building has been renovated and will be a hub to support young people. @thecourtsbristol

It’s important to me that any exhibition I curate can be a catalyst for a venue’s transformation and new life. Redundant factories, boarded-up schools, desolate car showrooms, and even an ex-coffin store have all became cinemas, art centres or workshops after the shows.

‘Family’ is a central theme of my work, an ever-evolving set of relationships in which emotion, desire and identity are tangible, fluid and vivid. But family includes all those that have encouraged and inspired us, it’s a kaleidoscopic and never-ending web of connections. The recent images ‘Descendants’ depict individuals whose life experiences embody themes around trauma, vulnerability and solace. During their painting they often adopt other personas, other friends, family or imagined characters, reflecting the legacies we resist or embrace.

‘The Pollinators’ is about the enduring interconnectivity of role models, but essentially how its housed in my feelings for my friend and his healing influence on me and those he knew. 

Photos by Alban Roinard