Thursday night saw the launch of Plight of the Bumblebee, Union Gallery's new mixed exhibition from which 20 percent of the takings will go to the Bumblebee Conservation Trust.
The brainchild of Alison Auldjo, Jenny Matthews and Janet Melrose, the brief for the show was that works could take any form whatsoever, so long as they were bee-themed. Fifteen contemporary Scottish artists rose spectacularly to the challenge, from whose offerings a few favourites are reviewed here.
As you might expect, Jenny Matthews was in her element. Her delicately rendered flowers and insects – their erotic encounters and fumbled embraces – combine delicate accuracy with a lightly worn interest in more abstract, painterly questions of tone, texture and composition. Shown above is her 'Sunny Intervals', and below a detail from the same.
[img_assist|nid=2128|title=|desc=|link=node|align=middle|width=640|height=618]
Janet Melrose spent much of the summer studying and drawing bees in Italy, and her 'Postcards from Assisi' are the result. On the one shown here, realistically painted bees appear drawn to more sketchy flowers foregrounding even more sketchily outlined Renaissance architecture. A bird, like the viewer, looks on.
Here, then, is a witty contemplation of art's technique and process, delivered with great skill and a sense of sunlit optimism. Close inspection reveals a further, small but satisfying pleasantry. Each work adorns the reverse of a postcard whose unseen image on the other side is explained in the printed caption. They each refer to an Italian basilica (the word itself abuzz), an attractive structure for tourists and worshippers alike.
[img_assist|nid=2124|title=|desc=|link=node|align=middle|width=640|height=443]
Dylan Lyle's previous work shown in the Union Gallery has been characterised by extraordinary realism, dramatically lit female forms, vivid red fabric set against black backgrounds, and a preoccupation with death. There is a kind of serious religiosity about them which, even in sexually charged portraits of young women, recalls gruesomely reverent depictions of martyrdom. That gravity is repeated here, but then complicated by the suggestive title: 'That Is the Question' (see below).
Viewed at eye-level, as though the bee were an adult-sized human standing before the viewer, Lyle's splendidly observed, three-dimensional and rather shaggy protagonist is reconfigured through the title as an angst-ridden prince or impassioned actor. It is simultaneously a memento mori for an endangered species, a joke and a brilliantly realised coup de théâtre. I loved it.
[img_assist|nid=2130|title=|desc=|link=node|align=middle|width=640|height=636]
Imogen Alabaster's approach is also complex. The titles of her works are anthropomorphically carefree and romantic – 'I Think I Want to Kiss You Soon', 'I'm Dancing on My Way Home' – but nevertheless suggest an effort to imagine the bee world from the inside out.
Her images, too, attempt to visualise that bee perspective and bee aesthetic – the micro world of an insect becomes vast, colour and form are perceived in ways alien to humans but nonetheless fascinating. My pick was 'All Because of You' which, despite its small scale, has something of the space epic about it. Four of her works here are priced at under £100: bargains.
[img_assist|nid=2129|title=|desc=|link=node|align=middle|width=640|height=640]
This reviewer knows precious little about ceramics, but was particularly struck by two exquisite 'Bee Bowls' by Jessica Irena Smith. In fact, I admired them so much, and had so little confidence in my ability not to knock one of them over and break it, that I imposed a 3-foot exclusion zone on myself and so have few first-hand impressions to impart. Here instead is a photograph taken by Union Gallery staff: judge for yourself.
[img_assist|nid=2125|title=|desc=|link=node|align=middle|width=640|height=506]
In case you should think this exhibition all sunbeams and sweet clover, I'll mention Derek McGuire's wonderfully contrary 'The Bear, The Bees, The Trees and Yellow Elephant'.
Painted in sludgy browns and greens against a pink sky, a bear which has recently broken open a bee nest is distracted from the honey as it fights off the avenging swarm. For no obvious reason, a yellow elephant emerges over the brow of a hill. I have no idea what this painting is about, unless it expresses a generalised philosophical dyspepsia. However, I enjoyed its evocation of Classical battle scenes, and its memorable horridness reminiscent of the dead lion on a bottle of Lyle's Golden Syrup.
Finally, take a look at 'Happy Bee' below. The subject, fat as an airship, floats towards us through a summer sky. The dizzying perspective, the curious mismatch of size and expectation, the childishly simple flowers and lollypop tree, the minimally effective cloud in the background – all drew appreciative sighs from those who studied them. If you haven't heard of the artist Daisy May before, you're not alone. The granddaughter of landscapist Hazel Cashmore, she is 7 years old. AM
Plight of the Bumblebee continues at the Union Gallery (45 Broughton Street) until 10 October: http://www.uniongallery.co.uk
[img_assist|nid=2127|title=|desc=|link=node|align=middle|width=640|height=522]