Mythology in London

PRESS RELEASE: MYTHOLOGY IN LONDON. An Exhi­bi­tion of Etch­ings by Anna Alcock at Tokarska Gallery

163 For­est Rd., Waltham­stow,
Lon­don E17 6HE
Tel: +44 (0) 20 8531 5419

www.tokarskagallery.co.uk

15 March – 31 March 2012

Pri­vate View: 15 March 6-9pm

Open­ing Hours: 12-7pm

 

Anna Alcock is delighted to be show­cas­ing a suite of etch­ings based on Clas­si­cal Greek and Roman mythol­ogy at Tokarska Gallery. Tokarska Gallery in For­est Road is a few min­utes from Inky Cut­tle­fish Stu­dios where Alcock works and does her fine art printmaking.

 

Alcock’s love of sto­ries and mythol­ogy started when she was young and con­tin­ued to grow through her stud­ies in South Africa when she majored in Clas­si­cal Civil­i­sa­tions as part of her BA Fine Art (Hons) degree. She com­pleted a MA Print­mak­ing in Lon­don in 2004. Alcock exhibits reg­u­larly and her art are in pri­vate and pub­lic col­lec­tions around the world.

 

The word ‘myth’ comes from the Greek word mythos which means speech, mes­sage or word. Myths are sto­ries that would have orig­i­nally been handed down from one gen­er­a­tion to another orally. Most  cul­tures have myths, which explained nat­ural phe­nom­e­non or things that were of col­lec­tive impor­tance to cul­ture and the human expe­ri­ence. Carl Jung and Sig­mund Freud used mythol­ogy to iden­tify arche­types of sig­nif­i­cance in human psy­chol­ogy. The Renais­sance was marked by a rebirth of inter­est in Greek and Roman mytholo­gies with their alle­gor­i­cal and moral lessons.

 

Alcock uses Greek and Roman mytho­log­i­cal images and pop­u­lates them with mod­ern day nar­ra­tives that are of sig­nif­i­cance to her liv­ing in Lon­don now. The exhi­bi­tion will also include an exclu­sive bound suite of 15 etch­ings, which will be exhib­ited along­side etch­ing col­lages and tabloids of myths with per­sonal mod­ern day sto­ries that Alcock imbues with her unique style and bold colours.

 

By using Alcock’s expe­ri­ence in  Lon­don and apply­ing ancient Greek and Roman cul­tural think­ing the theme of mythol­ogy is applied to every­day events for exam­ple the loss of sta­tus of bankers is illus­trated by the myth of ‘Icarus’. Arche­types are found in our uncon­scious daily lives as shown in ‘Deme­ter’, the story of a mother’s search for her daugh­ter ‘Perse­phone’ and the result­ing win­ter of her grief.

 

For more infor­ma­tion or images about the exhi­bi­tion please email or call anna@annaalcock.com 07753686331.

 

IMAGES — these are my proof images in prepar­ing for the pieces that would be exhib­ited (some have changed dra­mat­i­cally in-between Janaury when I did my first proofs and the final ver­sions that were exhibited):

Icarus 2012 (Etch­ing  A/P  20x20cm plate size)

Perse­phone 2012 (Etch­ing A/P 20x20cm plate size)

Spring 2012 (Etch­ing A/P 20x20cm plates size)