I went along to London Souls last week, an exhibition of prints by Ed Gray in The Crypt Gallery under St Pancras Church opposite Euston Station. Gray, who was recently interviewed on the Robert Elms show on BBC London, mainly paints London street scenes.
I had a quick chat with Gray - in fact he made me a cup of tea - and it transpires that he lives in Rotherhithe, worked for several years as an art teacher at St Thomas Apostle secondary school (Nunhead/Peckham) and is represented by GX Gallery in Camberwell. So unsurprisingly there are plenty of South London settings - Camberwell Green (pictured below), a nightbus in Old Kent Road, a Paddy Power bookies on Walworth Road, Brockwell Park Lido, London Bridge, Electric Avenue, Salsa dancing at The Loughborough Hotel (Brixton) etc.
Really though it's London people rather than buildings that are at the centre of the paintings, walking about, working, snogging, commuting, eating, drinking... all kind of Hogarthian but without a sense of any moral judgement.
London Souls is open until 22 December 2011, 10am-6pm, admission free (great space by the way, proper old crypt with piled up gravestones etc.)
I had a quick chat with Gray - in fact he made me a cup of tea - and it transpires that he lives in Rotherhithe, worked for several years as an art teacher at St Thomas Apostle secondary school (Nunhead/Peckham) and is represented by GX Gallery in Camberwell. So unsurprisingly there are plenty of South London settings - Camberwell Green (pictured below), a nightbus in Old Kent Road, a Paddy Power bookies on Walworth Road, Brockwell Park Lido, London Bridge, Electric Avenue, Salsa dancing at The Loughborough Hotel (Brixton) etc.
Really though it's London people rather than buildings that are at the centre of the paintings, walking about, working, snogging, commuting, eating, drinking... all kind of Hogarthian but without a sense of any moral judgement.
London Souls is open until 22 December 2011, 10am-6pm, admission free (great space by the way, proper old crypt with piled up gravestones etc.)
He has also exhibited at the GX gallery in Camberwell. A non-art friend of mine saw 4-5 of his paintings and said: "He really loves people". Spot-on comment.
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