New publications from MOSTYN: Richard Wathen and Nick Hornby
New Eyes very Time
Rooted in the historical canon of painting, Richard Wathen’s (b. London, 1971; lives and works in Suffolk, United Kingdom) work focuses largely on portraiture, portraying figures in states of hesitation and contemplation: listening at walls, pretending to sleep, moon bathing, or engaging in other apparent states of uncertainty. Wathen’s works depict the tumultuous and complex array of negative human emotions, from anxiety and sorrow to despair, brought on by the socioeconomic pressures of contemporary living. The intensity created through the use of small details is powerful and emotional as an expressive gesture. His works subvert the genre of figurative painting through a bold play between representation and abstraction, between the solid density of the matte surface and the fragility of the figures represented.
The catalogue presents a selection of the large- and medium-format works that can be read as an investigation of the human condition in an age when an image is considered a stand-in for a sentient being. With essays by Alfredo Cramerotti, Juan Bolivar and Rebecca Geldard.
Link here
Zygotes and Confessions
A a new publication devoted to the work of London-based artist Nick Hornby, and has been produced to accompany his first solo exhibition in a public gallery. The exhibition, which shares its title with the publication, is presented at MOSTYN, Wales, UK, from November 2020 to April 2021.
Hornby is known for his monumental site-specific works that combine digital software with traditional materials such as bronze, steel, granite and marble. In this publication he presents a substantial new body of smaller, more intimate work comprising three discrete yet interrelated series of works inspired by the history of sculptural busts, modernist abstractions and mantelpiece ceramic dogs. United by glossy photographic surfaces created by means of an industrial process in which his marble and resin composite sculptures are dipped into liquid photographs, these new works explore themes of portraiture, the body, identity, sexuality and intimacy in the digital era. A number of the works have been made in collaboration with fashion photographer Louie Banks.
Along with a foreword by Helen Boyd, Head of Marketing and Publisher Relations at the Casemate Group, the publication features a text by MOSTYN director Alfredo Cramerotti and an essay by London-based publisher, editor and writer Matt Price. Price writes: ‘With one eye on the sculpture of the past and the other on that of tomorrow, technology is at the heart of London-based Nick Hornby’s practice and is central to the production of his often imposing, mind-bending and futuristic-looking sculptures. Using materials such as bronze and marble, his work points back towards the Renaissance or the nineteenth century, yet his use of resin and digital technology positions him very much in the present, exploring languages both figurative and abstract, often simultaneously.’
The texts are presented in both English and Welsh. Newly commissioned studio photography of the works by Ben Westoby, along with installation views of the exhibition commissioned by MOSTYN from Mark Blower, illustrate the publication, which has been designed by Joe Gilmore / Qubik. The publication is co-published by MOSTYN, Llandudno, and Anomie Publishing, London, and distributed internationally by Casemate Art, a division of the Casemate Group.
Link here
New exhibitions and forthcoming events at MOSTYN from November 2020
A new exhibition season at MOSTYN. Exhibition Dates:
14 November 2020 – 18 April 2021
HANNAH QUINLAN AND ROSIE HASTINGS
In My Room / Yn Fy ‘Stafell
Commissioned by Focal Point Gallery, In My Room is presented in partnership with MOSTYN and Humber Street Gallery, Hull.
Hannah Quinlan and Rosie Hastings’ first solo institutional exhibition In My Room brings together film, fresco painting and works on paper. As a new body of work, In My Room develops the artists’ inquiry into the politics, histories and aesthetics of queer spaces and culture. This inquiry builds on their travels across the UK whilst making ‘UK Gay Bar Directory (UKGBD)’ 2016, a moving image archive of gay bars, responding to the systematic closure of LGBTQ+ dedicated social spaces. To Quinlan and Hastings, it became apparent through this research that the gay scene caters predominantly to white gay men. This prompted them to consider how this scene strengthens the historic male access to capital and power within the urban landscape.
Rosanna Mclaughlin as been commissioned by Focal Point Gallery to write an accompanying essay, ‘Now You See Me’. Please see her essay in here. Curator: Juliette Desorgues, Curator of Visual Arts, MOSTYN.
NICK HORNBY
Zygotes and Confessions / Sygotau a Chyfaddefiadau
Supported by The Moondance Foundation.
Hornby brings high-tech processes to figuration, pulling historical, material forms into the era of screen culture. His works defy conventional distinctions of form and media and exhibit instead what Hornby terms ‘meta-cubism.’ In this pluralistic approach to perception neither image nor form takes centre stage. The sculptures are produced using digital and industrial processes, but retain the artist’s touch through their final process whereby a liquified image is applied to each work. Gender and sexual identity are explored by the artist in this new series for the first time. Whilst Hornby’s work has previously resisted autobiographical connotations here he explores a sense of personal intimacy or ‘confessions.’
Curator: Alfredo Cramerotti, Director, MOSTYN. A monograph on Nick Hornby, edited by Matt Price, will be published by Anomie in 2021. An exhibition catalogue of Zygotes and Confessions is available for sale at MOSTYN shop from December 2020.
RICHARD WATHEN
New Eyes Every Time / Llygaid Newydd Bob Tro
Rooted in the historical canon of painting, Wathen’s work focuses largely on portraiture, depicting figures in states of hesitation and contemplation: listening at walls, pretending to sleep, moon bathing, or engaging in other apparent states of uncertainty. Wathen’s works depict the tumultuous and complex array of human emotions, from anxiety and sorrow to despair, brought on by the socio-economic pressures of contemporary living. The intensity created through the use of small details is powerful and emotional as an expressive gesture. His works subvert the genre of figurative painting through a bold play between figuration and abstraction, between the solid density of the matt surface and the fragility of the figures represented.
Curator: Alfredo Cramerotti, Director, MOSTYN. An exhibition catalogue of New Eyes Every Time is available for sale from MOSTYN shop from February 2021.
DIGITAL PROGRAMME Autumn 2020:
QUEER IS NOT A LABEL
23 November – 28 November 2020
QUEER IS NOT A LABEL, is a series of six online performances to be published here on MOSTYN’s website, and on our Instagram channel at 6pm (GMT) daily from 23rd to 28th November 2020.
www.mostyn.org/event/queer-not-label
Supported by Fluxus Art Projects.
QUEER IS NOT A LABEL is a series of events at the crossroads between art, music and performance, initiated and founded in Paris in 2019 by Kévin Blinderman (artist, curator) and Paul-Alexandre Islas (artist, sex worker, DJ), that supports and celebrates radical gender-questioning artists. For this collaboration with MOSTYN, the series includes online performances by Noemi, DJ Fingerblast, Nuh Peace, Bunny Intonamorous, Neurokill, and TRISTAN.
LUMIN RADIO: LOCAL 37
7, 14, 21 December 2020
MOSTYN presents Local 37, a three-part radio series developed in collaboration with LUMIN, an artist-run radio and publisher led by Sadia Pineda Hameed and Beau W Beakhouse.
www.mostyn.org/event/lumin-radio-local-37
This project was made possible through funding from the Arts Council of Wales’s National Lottery Fund.
The radio series will be broadcast weekly on 7th, 14th and 21st December 2020 at 6pm GMT and will be hosted here on MOSTYN’s website. A full line-up of contributors will be announced shortly.
Local 37 is a fictional underground radio station transmitting dialogue and strategies for the artist as worker. Inspired by the Filipino Labour Union founded in the US in 1933, later called ‘Local 37’, and Carlos Bulosan’s short text ‘The Writer as Worker’, this radio series inhabits the intersections of creation, transmission, and anti-colonial and working-class collectivisation. Local 37 is a manifesto for the artist, building ‘a world of mutual cooperation, mutual protection, mutual love.’
Curatorview [Alfredo Cramerotti] 
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