Carte de Visite

Abstract

Hollybush Gardens presents Carte de Visite an exhibition curated by Lubaina Himid, featuring new work by Helen Cammock, Claudette Johnson and Ingrid Pollard. This project has unfolded over the space of a year in different locations including the print room in the School of Art, Design & Fashion at the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) where Lubaina Himid is Professor of Contemporary Art, leading the Making Histories Visible Project – an exploration of the contribution of black visual arts to the cultural landscape.
The gallery’s desire to showcase work mostly unseen, and spend time with it, inspired this curatorial invitation. Himid’s answer was informed by life-long knowledge of the artists Claudette Johnson and Ingrid Pollard, choosing to expand on this duo with the more recent voice of Helen Cammock. Forebears and successors, a dialogue that must be continued.

Carte de Visite is a show, a meeting point, a conversation. Himid notes ‘It has been deeply intriguing to observe what happened when each artist encountered questions about the past and how this will impact upon what they hope may develop in years to come. I now have a better understanding of how these artists work between and beyond an exhibition; they navigate the silences between our histories, either by pinning coloured markers to a three-dimensional map, or by leaving exquisite cards on a silver tray’.