George Meyrick - Simple Matters at Penzance Exchange

Several weeks ago I visited the Exchange Gallery in Penzance, where they are showing George Meyrick's Simple Matters installation until the 14th April.

Meyrick describes the work as 'Geometric wall paintings and sculptural interventions'.

The Exchange says that 'Meyrick revisits and reworks the simple triangle; sculptural versions intersect corners or emerge from the surface of walls, while others are combined with flat wall paintings'.

Two dimensional photos can't really do justice to showing the way that the works 'evolve' over the positive corners of the gallery.

 
Moderately interesting ... but it didn't immediately seem particularly new or original to me (at first I couldn't stop thinking of oversized origami).

However, Meyrick cites the constructivists and the minimalists as influences - and this piece by Fiona Robinson does a better job of putting his work into context than the notes provided by the Exchange. It makes the work seem more intriguing.

Some of the most interesting pieces are those which include spaces that are drawn with coloured cord, as below.

Why not go along and judge for yourself? (free until April 14th)

Also showing in February (but now finished) was this exhibition of artist-designed skateboards. They'd run out of information sheets - so that's all I know. Pretty cool boards though.

Print! at the Exchange, Penzance

Since April the Exchange Gallery in Penzance has been showing an exhibition of contemporary &  historic prints, and alongside has been running print workshops and holding demonstrations of printing techniques.

 

The Exchange is a large T-shaped space and, for the duration of the exhibition, the area on the left of the room is devoted to printing. There is a press in the corner, paraphernalia needed to produce works of art, and rows of draft prints drying across the wall - the results of the workshops so far.

The exhibition itself draws upon a wide range of print examples. There is work by Terry Frost and Barbara Hepworth, but also work by street art/comic book artists such as Faile, and older material from the archives of Falmouth Art Gallery and other Cornish collections.

The prints are of all types - monoprints, collographs, woodcuts, screen prints and more. They are laid out in imaginative ways across the length of the gallery walls but, unfortunately, they are not individually labelled. Instead it's necessary to refer to the maps provided to identify what's what. This is a shame because what might have been fun and educational can turn into a bit of a chore.

Nevertheless, there is much to enjoy here and you can easily spend an hour or more just investigating the wide range of techniques on display. Print! finishes on July 2nd.