IN ROUGH SEAS

2018

Oil and pencil on wood
2018
14.8 x 10.5 cm

IN ROUGH SEAS makes reference to Théodore Géricault‘s famous Romantic painting ‘The Raft of the Medusa’, playfully turning his monumental masterwork into a postage stamp for a postcard. Géricault’s original from 1818, based on true events, depicts the tragic aftermath of the wrecking of a naval ship where nearly 200 people were set adrift. A makeshift raft was created, all but 15 died. The event became a national scandal, and the blame was widely attributed to the incompetence of the captain of the ship.

IN ROUGH SEAS is intended as an over-the-top apocalyptic commentary on the underlying problem that drives the exhibition’s goal to raise funds for a school: the precarious situation in Education (and especially Arts Education) in which many state schools find themselves stripped of their resources, left naked and adrift, and with just a very few pupils expected to strive and survive.

The postcard-sized painting IN ROUGH SEAS featured in the Secret Charter Online Auction as well as in the ‘Lucky Dip’ Postcard exhibition in the Dulwich Picture Gallery. Both raised about £20,000 in support of the Arts at the Charter School North Dulwich

The Secret Charter Online Auction The Online Auction ran for three weeks in October 2018 and consisted of framed, fragile and larger-than-postcard-sized works, and of pieces artists had specially donated to the auction to help raise more funds for the Arts at the Charter School North Dulwich.
Other artists in the auction included: Tracey Emin, Norman Ackroyd, Maggi Hambling, Jerry Dammers, John Keane, Gary Hume, Alessandro Raho, Edmund de Waal, Ishbel Myerscough, John Stark and Richard Deacon.

https://www.32auctions.com/organizations/45459/auctions/55739?t=category&v=Art
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-45464280