Dream Homes is an exhibition of prints, paintings and sculpture by British artist Richard Woods.
The woodblock and screen print series Dream Homes features mini cartoon homes, designed to look like traditional British bungalows that play on the idea of sought-after locations. Each print is layered with Woods’ classic brick, tile, wood and stone patterns and designs and take as their titles phrases from estate agents promotional material such as ‘Outstanding Sea View’ or ‘Mature Garden’.
These prints will be shown together with paintings, which depict houses that are half-built or renovated, These densely inked compositions will be shown together with small framed paintings from a series entitled Hand Held Landscapes, 2017. These works reveal an interest in portable medieval panel paintings that were folded up and carried by worshippers in their pockets for private devotion as well as referencing the generic greenbelt ‘land for sale’ images offered in estate agent windows.
The exhibition also features a miniature version of the Holiday Home sculpture by Woods, which is currently installed at Tremenheere Sculpture Gardens. Unlike a normal home, Holiday Home has no functioning doors or windows – it is all surface; you cannot enter and find shelter there, even temporarily.
Woods comments, “I hope my work has always reflected my interests in home renovation, DIY culture and notions of taste; and in turn how all those things reflect our national obsession with class and status. Maybe housing, or the lack of it, has become a sharper issue. It’s a subject that permeates almost every part of our lives.”
This exhibition is curated by Helen Waters, Director of Alan Cristea Gallery, London
