Shimmering colours lighten the Hannah Barry Gallery

Young, cross-cultural and inspired. These are the main characteristics of the artists who exhibit at the Hannah Barry Gallery, an interesting and vital space within a former industrial estate in Peckham. Anna Maria Di Brina meets Hanna Barry.

You’ll never find it by chance. And even if you know where to look in Peckham, you’ll be surprised by its unusual location.
The Hannah Barry Gallery is indicated by a neat black-on-white sign hanging apart on a spoiled warehouse’s wall amidst a run-down industrial estate.
“When we first came in, it was all cluttered with rubbish” says Sven Muendner, one of the Gallery’s curators.
Beneath a high vault two white-painted open rooms host the current exhibitions. This space is the result of the hard work and the perseverance of the small group of people who surround Hannah Barry.

“We grew out of the Lyndhurst Way collective, a former squat.” continues Sven “Our aim is to exhibit young, up-and-coming artists preferably from South London. Together we come up with an idea and work on it and keep it going. Their works develop and evolve”.

The first exhibition of the year features three different artists.
“Oliver Eales’s art has its roots in graffiti art. In his drawings there are many links with his personal life.” Sven introduces me to a series of little sketches on paper, on the theme “Welcome Joy!”. “He has a Japanese wife, so many Japanese elements are visible, here and there..” I appreciate these paintings, that recall the freshness of expression of childish coloured exercises.

Hannah Barry is an intense young woman and she shows me around the Victor Timofeev exhibition “With Limited means”. “He is the first American artist we are taking on.” she says. His work spans from architectural drawings to “enamely” gouaches. The Rubik cube is a recurrent subject, stressing his interest in child play and mathematics. “The way young artists look at the world is powerful, without any cynicism” Hannah comments, inspiringly “They have a very intense experience of the world”.

Tom Barnett’s “Windows”, the third exhibition, displays triptychs of painted slates and plaster sculptures. “I’m really addicted to slate” confesses the artist. Luminescent and unnatural colours are sprayed, slashed and clotted over the sheets’ dark and uneven surfaces, while energetic knife-made scratches draw nature-like grey rhythms and express the artist’s concept of his work as a truly physical and emotional experience.
“They are more like sculptures” Tom explains. “Scratching the stone is like digging into the past. It is a sort of first access to history”.

For more info
Hannah Barry Gallery, Unit 9i, Copeland Industrial Park, 133 Copeland Road, London SE15 3SN until 4 February
Tel: +44 7929 60 88 27