Mary Griffiths (b1965, the Wirral) has long been making drawings of (frequently derelict) industrial sites. A year and a half ago, she was introduced to Astley Green Colliery, a former coalmine in Lancashire, which was closed in 1970 and knocked down but for its winding house and headgear – rare examples of 1908 working-class engineering. Spending time at the site, walking around the surrounding geography, reclaimed by nature with trees, grass and mosses, and talking to the volunteers (the colliery is now a museum), Griffiths filled myriad A6 sketchpads with figurative drawings, focusing on aspects that intrigued her, from details of the machinery to a visiting colony of pigeons.
Mary Griffiths, Circuit Gate, 2018. Inscribed graphite on gesso on plywood, 21 x 1.8 x 29.7. Photo courtesy Alan Cristea Gallery.
From these drawings, she then extrapolated her larger abstract works, made on plywood, with layers of acrylic gesso, and even more layers of graphite, pushed into the board and burnished, before being cut into with an etching needle. Using thousands of straight lines, placed at minutely different angles, she creates an oscillating effect reminiscent of the surface geography of the region. One work, Wild Honey, for example, represents the seams of the coalmine, the waterways and the main roads. Griffiths sees her work as “an identification of the remarkable work that was done in industrial areas” across the country, and it is important to her to capture something of the “gravity and splendour” of the working-class engineering.
.jpg)
Mary Griffiths, Sweet Briar (Yates & Thom Ltd), 2018. Inscribed graphite on gesso on plywood, 49 x 2.5 x 69 cm. Photo courtesy Alan Cristea Gallery.
Protest and Remembrance
Miriam de Búrca | Joy Gerrard | Mary Griffiths | Barbara Walker
Alan Cristea Gallery, London
28 February – 30 March 2019
Interview by ANNA McNAY
Filmed by MARTIN KENNEDY
Click on the pictures below to enlarge
Markus Lüpertz – Pierre Puvis de Chavannes
A beguiling exhibition at Michael Werner Gallery places two distinctive artists, Markus Lüpertz and...
Brasil Brasil! The Birth of Modernism
The RA turns over its grand halls to an erudite, even academic look at half a century of Brazilian p...
Margherita Manzelli interview – ‘I developed a way of denying being a ...
As a major survey opens at Centro Pecci, Italian artist Margherita Manzelli discusses her lifelong s...
There: a Feeling | Gregg Bordowitz
In his first institutional solo exhibition in the UK, American artist and activist Gregg Bordowitz s...
-300.jpg)
Yulia Mahr – interview: ‘My work is more akin to poetry. It’s a mome...
Yulia Mahr’s work incorporates film, photography and installation with a rich language of layering...
With 15 paintings and five works on paper, this show takes on a journey spanning 20 years of Dana Sc...
Tirzah Garwood: Beyond Ravilious
This delightful if dark exhibition brings ‘Mrs Eric Ravilious’ out of the shadow of her husband,...
-Pallant-House-Gallery,-Barney-Hindle-300.jpg)
Maggi Hambling: Nightingale Night
In response to hearing the increasingly rare sound of a nightingale singing, Maggi Hambling has prod...
PST ART: Art & Science Collide – Part 2
Well into its fourth month, the sprawling PST ART festival themed to explore the intersection of art...
Parmigianino: The Vision of Saint Jerome
The towering canvas is stupefying – not for nothing is it said that soldiers invading his studio d...
This compact but rich show delves into the many facets and meanings of water as represented in the p...
Hamad Butt’s first major retrospective, 30 years after his death, reveals a powerful talent, a pio...
This innovative, elegantly assembled show of the South Korean artist Do Ho Sun gives us a glimpse in...
White Cube presents a generously portioned survey of the trailblazing conceptual photographer Jeff W...
Dora Carrington: Beyond Bloomsbury
For the first time, the “unpindownable” Dora Carrington is defined in terms of her own person an...
Stephen Dean – interview: ‘A ladder fitted perfectly into a place that...
Stephen Dean discusses Crescendo, his installation of a 15-metre ladder decorated with his signature...
Louise Giovanelli: A Song of Ascents
Manchester-based painter Louise Giovanelli’s first institutional show lifts the curtain on altered...
Maud Sulter: You Are My Kindred Spirit
This show focuses on Maud Sulter’s moving-image and spoken-word archives, in which warmth, familia...
Electric Dreams: Art and Technology Before the Internet
From a dress made from 200 lightbulbs to works made by computer, the Tate takes us on a dizzying, de...
María Berrío: The End of Ritual
Through her colourful and theatrical characters, Maria Berrío draws on folklore and mythology as sh...
Jill Smith – interview: ‘It was just me doing my thing, emerging from ...
Rituals inspired by ancient rites, pagan myths and respect for landscape and place underpin the work...
The Salvage Agency: TULCA Festival of Visual Arts
This year’s festival, which explored the role of art in contemporary ecology and environmental act...
-300.jpg)
Laurie Anderson: ARK: United States V
The septuagenarian artist Laurie Anderson’s world premiere of Ark: United States V, at Manchester...
Vive l’impressionnisme! Masterpieces from Dutch Collections
A new exhibition celebrates the 150th anniversary of the birth of impressionism, specifically musing...
Giorgio Griffa — interview: ‘Rhythm is the first instrument of man’s...
As a busy year draws to a close, Turin-based abstract painter Giorgio Griffa discusses his numinous ...
Digging in Another Time: Derek Jarman’s Modern Nature
Works by Derek Jarman are complemented by commissioned responses from six contemporary artists, lead...
Lygia Clark: The I and the You
Co-curated by Sonia Boyce, this concise exhibition shows how Lygia Clark’s geometric abstraction i...
Medieval Women: In Their Own Words
While medieval texts may best be understood as a collaborative production, not deriving from a singl...
Lindsey Mendick – interview: ‘My brain is not my best friend’
What is it to be a woman who doesn’t have all her shit together and to be making work that is quit...
Erica Rutherford: The Human Comedy
This small show is important in showing the shifts that took place between the early and late work o...
Copyright © 1893–2025 Studio International Foundation.
The title Studio International is the property of the Studio International Foundation and, together with the content, are bound by copyright. All rights reserved.
 |
 |
 |
|---|
Beth Fisher: Grisaille Legacy
Artists’ Laboratory 02: Stephen Farthing RA – interview
ARC: I Draw for You
The 43 Uses of Drawing
Book review: One Thousand Drawings by Tracey Emin