Last day 02 / 11 / 27
02 / 11 — Moon
Nine oils painted from one north-facing window over a single winter, where a pale moon climbs the blue ridge and the snow keeps hold of almost all the light.
Last day 02 / 11 / 27
Nine oils painted from one north-facing window over a single winter, where a pale moon climbs the blue ridge and the snow keeps hold of almost all the light.
Last day 23 / 12 / 27
Two summers in an unmown field at the edge of the city, recording what came back each week: seed heads, thistle, bees and a great deal of grass.
Last day 04 / 03 / 27
Small crowds caught mid-stride in high summer, painted wet into wet so the figures blur and the green ends up doing most of the talking.
Book ahead for artist talks, Thursday late openings and the quiet Sunday viewings we keep for small groups.
Solvej Gallery opened in 2005 inside a disused public swimming baths, taken on by two framers and a painter who wanted somewhere to hang the work that nobody else would show that year.
The deep end became the sculpture room and the changing cubicles became storage. People came first for the strangeness and stayed for the work, and by the third winter there was a waiting list of artists.
Three floors now, four residencies, and a Thursday evening that half the neighbourhood treats as a standing appointment. The tiles are still on the walls downstairs.
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There is no route through the three floors. Start at the top, sit down often; the benches are there because looking is tiring.
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A picture is finished the day you stop wanting to fix one corner of it.
At Solvej we hang a show slowly. A wall gets tried, taken down and tried again, because the order of the pictures changes what each one is saying. Most of our exhibitions come out of long conversations with artists who are still working something out, and we would rather show you that than a tidy conclusion.
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Nobody looks at a painting for longer than four seconds until somebody asks them a question about it.
So we started asking. Every show has one question printed beside the door, and the answers visitors write get pinned up next to it. It has changed what we hang, and it has certainly changed how long people stay in the room.
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A gallery is one of the few rooms left where nobody expects you to hurry.
We keep one wall by the entrance for whoever asks first, and we have never once regretted it. Half the artists in this year's programme walked in off the street with a folder, and two of them now teach the Saturday class.