25 Years’ Photographic work, ‘ GroupThink'

Co-exhibitors:

Dinu Li, Katie Deith, Suky Best, Finlay Taylor, Paul Ryan, Paulette Phillips, Neville Gabie, Dunhill and O'Brien, Elpida Hadzi-Vasileva, Freya Gabie, Helen Maurer, Richard McVetis, Nicholas Pace, Oona Grimes, Nicky Hodge, Antonio Riello, Katrin Hanusch, Annie Whiles, Katharine Fry, Marie-France & Patricia Martin, Fran Burden, Abraham Kritzman, Sophie Lascelles, David Bate, Kim L Pace, Marc Hulson, Nicky Coutts, Andreas Philippopoulos-Mihalopoulos and Jan Hogan, Rieko Akatsuka, Gerry Smith, Heather Ross, Kate Scrivener, Kathleen Herbert, Effie Paleologou, Louisa Fairclough, David Cotterrell

25 Years, our summer exhibition, was due to open in mid-June 2020 to celebrate 25 years of the gallery. Over 40 artists were invited to reflect on the notion of time (scientific, philosophical, real or imagined) with site-specific artworks to be installed in the Georgian space, which has housed the gallery for the last 25 years. Then time stopped due to the Pandemic, the gallery closed; the artists were confined; some studios had to close; teaching had to be ‘performed’ online; some felt loneliness setting in; others had to multitask. Many of the artists were left with no time or space to produce new work. A sabbatical for some, harshness for others, a challenging time for all.

However, this did not stop the Danielle Arnaud gallery, and they decided to proceed virtually in a space more conforming to traditional galleries than the very eccentric surroundings of a Georgian house. They kept the theme, but all the proposed artworks had to be revisited, re-selected, and they had to accept that some would simply not work in this new format. The works in the show explored time in its different manifestations, our different relationships with its concept. There is an irony when they presented an exhibition on Time in a space where time stands still, and space does not exist. Yet the pandemic has brought time to the forefront of people’s minds - the way we measure it, its elasticity, the way it drags and drips and pours away.

David Cotterrell exhibited his artwork 'Groupthink' (2019), which is a photomontage of headshots. The work combined every angle necessary to reconfigure a three-dimensional version of the actor. This potential for the removal of a subject from their context and their non-consensual reformation invoked anxieties about the manipulation of the context of speech and identity.