Major New Installation from School of Saatchi Finalist Opens at Leighton House

Matt Clark : a difficult pancake
5 – 30 August at Leighton House, Holland Park, W14 (PRESS PREVIEW 4 August)

• Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea artist-in-residence
• Site specific installation transforms the gallery of Leighton House
• Artist Matt Clark a finalist on BBC’s ‘School of Saatchi’

The gallery of the newly renovated Leighton House – former home of the Victorian artist Lord Leighton - will be transformed in a new solo exhibition by installationist and School of Saatchi finalist Matt Clark (5 August – 29 August).

This site-specific work is the culmination of a year and half spent working in the borough as part of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and Chelsea Arts Club Trust’s Studio Bursary Programme.  This was awarded in recognition of his success in the BBC’s School of Saatchi competition, judged by artist Tracey Emin, art dealer Frank Cohen and the infamous ‘brit-art’ impresario Charles Saatchi himself.

Clark’s work uses a combination of text shown alongside sculpture and paintings to communicate a narrative and influence a viewer’s perception of a space.  Drawing ideas from popular culture and current affairs, such as fables and folk tales, religious texts or political rhetoric, he reinterprets the original sources to create fantastical and whimsical stories.   Using sculpture and paint as a medium Clark then creates distorted reflections of his story that are often psychologically charged and mysterious. 

His exhibition at Leighton House, entitled ‘a difficult pancake’ explores Clark’s interest in realising a text in physically expressed forms.  The title is an oblique reference to the Flann O’Brien novel The Third Policeman. In O’Brien’s vernacular ‘a difficult pancake’ simply means an unusual or peculiar thing, adding another layer of mystery to this enigmatic installation.

The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and Chelsea Arts Club Trust Studio Bursary is a unique support programme for artists which includes use of one of the 30 studios owned by the Royal Borough, an annual bursary fee, honorary membership of Chelsea Arts Club and assistance towards the cost of materials. Three artists have so far been involved in the programme including Jodie Carey, who has held solo shows in New York and London and whose work is in the permanent collections of the Saatchi Gallery and Hauser and Wirth and sculptor Julian Wild.

Originally from Oxford, Matt Clark studied Fine Art at Central St Martins, graduating in 2007 and currently lives and works in London. His work has been widely exhibited in both group and solo exhibitions, and in 2009 he was a finalist in the BBC’s School of Saatchi competition, judged by Tracy Emin, Frank Cohen and Charles Saatchi.

Matt Clark say: “My ideas often find their beginnings in various and diverse forms from everyday life which are then transformed and reinterpreted in order to illustrate playful stories of the uncertain or fantastic: a time machine; a ship of fools; an alien signal broadcaster; a shrine to the Devil’s Tower.  Through the Studio Bursary Programme I’ve been able to express these narratives through a range of mediums, both sculptural and painterly.”

Cllr Nick Paget-Brown, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Transportation, Environment and Leisure, says: “The Studio Bursary Programme has proved to be a hugely successful initiative, bringing new artists into the Borough and providing opportunities for them at key stages in their careers. Kensington and Chelsea has a distinguished artistic heritage and a reputation for nurturing creative talent of which the Studio Bursary Programme – and events such as the InTRANSIT Festival – are part. We are delighted that by supporting Matt we have helped provide the platform for new work and commissions, including this new installation at Leighton House.”

PRESS PREVIEW 4 August – RSVP susannah.glynn@kallaway.com

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Press Contacts
Susannah Glynn – e: susannah.glynn@kallaway.com  t: 0207 221 7883
Maxim Bendall – e: maxim.bendall@kallaway.com  t: 0207 221 7883

About The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea Artist Studio Bursary Programme
The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea is committed to supporting artists in the early stages of their career. In partnership with Chelsea Arts Club Trust, which has similar ambitions, the Royal Borough set up a series of three-year bursaries for emerging artists. Each bursary comprises of one of the 30 artist studios owned by the Royal Borough, an annual bursary fee, honorary membership of Chelsea Arts Club and assistance towards materials costs. Jodie Carey, whose work now forms part of the collection at the Saatchi Gallery and Hauser and Wirth, was the first artist to be awarded a bursary and she completed her three years in September 2010. The Royal Borough is developing the Bursary programme to include 15 studios over the next ten years. Leading arts and cultural institutions including the Saatchi Gallery, The Delfina Foundation, The Slade, Royal College of Art, The Rose Issa Gallery and the Pump House Gallery are working with the Royal Borough on developing the programme.

About the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea’s Culture Service
www.rbkc.gov.uk/culture; Twitter: @RBKCculture
The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea is home to a vibrant community of creative people; from large cultural institutions to independent producers, performers, artists and creative businesses. The Royal Borough believes that excellence in culture helps build neighbourhoods and communities, provides economic benefit and enhances people’s wellbeing. Through its dedicated Culture Service the Borough is building on the uniqueness and identity of the area to drive major creative ventures, promote fresh ideas and talent and nurture networks that benefit all that visit, live and work in the Royal Borough.

Culture Service initiatives include investment in Opera Holland Park and the recently-restored Leighton House, the Artists Studios Bursary Programme, Future Cities, putting culture at the heart of planning and regeneration, the two-week InTRANSIT festival which animates the area through contemporary performance art, and On the Map, a dedicated shopping website created to promote and support diversity on the high street.

About Leighton House
Located on the edge of Holland Park in Kensington, the house is one of the most remarkable buildings of the 19th century. The house was the former home and studio of the leading Victorian artist, Frederic, Lord Leighton (1830-1896). Built to designs by George Aitchison, it was extended and embellished over a period of 30 years to create a private palace of art. The Arab Hall is the centerpiece of the house. Designed to display Leighton's priceless collection of over a thousand Islamic tiles, mostly brought back from Damascus in Syria, the interior evokes a compelling vision of the Orient. The opulence continues through the other richly decorated interiors, with gilded ceilings and walls lined with peacock blue tiles by the ceramic artist William De Morgan. On the first floor is Leighton's grand painting studio with its great north window, dome and apse.

Since 1900 the house has been a museum is widely acknowledged as the best example of a late nineteenth century artist's home open to the public in the UK. Today is one of four Museums and galleries administered by the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea.