Time and Tide – Key works by Simon Read
7 October – 3 December 2000
The Room Upstairs, Christchurch Mansion

Simon Read was born in Bristol in 1949. After studying at Somerset College of Art, Read went to Leeds University (1969-1973) and then Chelsea School of Art (1973-75). He has works in major collections around the world including the Arts Council of Great Britain, the British Council and the Guggenheim Museum, New York.

Upon leaving Chelsea, Read helped form an important group of artists studios at Butler’s Wharf on the South Bank of the Thames near Tower Bridge. Although this location proved to be the very basis of much of Read’s work and instigated some important friendships, financial concerns and legal harassment meant that the studios were never assumed to be a permanent base. Indeed, Read’s work Sweet Thames Run Softly Till I End My Song paid direct homage to the space and dealt specifically with the artists forthcoming eviction. Fate, however, brought such work to a premature end when, on 15 August 1979, the studios burnt down.

Read begins all his projects by exploring his initial ideas through massive calculated drawings. Whilst these drawings operate as both artistic feasibility studies and as working drawings to help plot the times and dimensions of the subsequent photographic process, their sheer scale and display of virtuosity ensure they remain autonomous works in their own right. Many of these, including such works as the massive Land from the Sea (76 x 792cm) drawings were shown in the main gallery.

With the availability of Ektachrome colour reversal paper - which required significantly shorter exposure times - in the mid-1970s, Read was able to explore what until that point had been unfeasible: working with portraiture and the figure. This exhibition contained many of the more significant works from this period including Uncertain Portrait, a circular, multiple image, anamorphic portrait of Derek Jarman and Neither to Hunt with the Hare or Hunt with the Hounds which includes photographs including Sandy Nairne and Derek Jarman.

The very nature of Read’s work means that it can simultaneously be addressed through a number of processes: drawing, mathematics, sculpture, chemistry, performance, installation and photography are all evident. Although each stage presents its own individual rewards, when viewed as a whole the appeal of Read’s work and the precision with which it is made is as obvious as it is intriguing and compelling.

Click here to find out more about Simon's views on the exhibition

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