Arusha Gallery to present ‘Beasts’ by Helen Flockhart with work from Beth Carter

Arusha Gallery is excited to welcome back award-winning Scottish artist Helen Flockhart this November as she returns to the Edinburgh gallery with sculptor Beth Carter for their new exhibition ‘Beasts’. Running from the 26 November until 20 December 2020 both artists will be unveiling new works in their first joint exhibition.

Evoking a mythological realm, featuring characters plucked from Genesis, legend, and the Greek myths, Beasts comprises a total of 27 pieces including 21 new oil paintings by Flockhart and 6 sculptures courtesy of Carter. From labyrinths and minotaurs to fauns, fowl and centaurs, the legendary iconography present in both artist’s work encourages the viewer to confront the chaos of the human condition.

Having received huge acclaim for Linger Awhile, her sold out 2018 exhibition at Arusha Gallery, Helen Flockhart (b.1963) is one of the finest and most distinctive Scottish artists of her generation. Her work breaks with established convention, comprising a blend of portrait and landscape and her unique style combines intricate patterns, backdrops of lush foliage, and surreal scenes that appear suspended in time. Her paintings are verdant, fantastical paeans to that particularist genre of British myth making centred on pastures, mountains and divinity.

Flockhart often draws creative inspiration from esoteric and mythical sources and in Beasts, characters imbued with cultural and mythological connotations, such as swans, snakes, leopards, lions, centaurs and stags, roam across canvases contrasting in colour palette, from dark and mystical, to light and almost divine.

Sculptor Beth Carter (b.1968) has a fascination with the humanness, something that audiences viewing her work will immediately appreciate. The universality of mythic narratives, and the symbols, characters and exploits that are thrown up by it, are prominent features of a body of work that is as stunning visually as it is conceptually and technically.

Carter’s work often morphs the human figure with animal creating mythological creatures and extraordinary fictional compositions. Beasts features 6 of Carter’s sculptures, 4 in her favoured medium of bronze, 1 in bronze resin and the remaining piece made from a mix of plaster, wood, acrylic and fabric.

Agnieszka Prendota, Creative Director at Arusha Gallery said: “I am excited to present the accomplished oil paintings and bronze sculptures, realised with such amazing skill and betraying of rich internal worlds and imaginations of two coveted female artists – Helen Flockhart and Beth Carter. They promise a visual feast but also encourage a still contemplation and I am thrilled they will revisit the gallery to be enjoyed by the public again.”

Helen Flockhart said: “I am delighted to be returning to the beautiful Arusha Gallery with these new paintings, and to have them showing alongside Beth Carter’s sculptures which I admire so much. Being immersed in the focus of producing these works has enabled me to escape from the constraints imposed on us all in this past year by allowing my imagination to fly free.”

Exhibition Dates: 26th November – 20th December 2020
Opening Hours: Monday to Saturday 10am to 5pm, Sunday 1pm to 5pm.
Beasts is also presented online via www.arushagallery.com

Arusha Gallery has measures in place to ensure social distancing is maintained to ensure our visitors and staff are protected and a high level of hygiene is maintained.