Missed us at Collect 2024? : Our presentation is available to view and purchase online

28 February - 31 March 2024

Overview

Missed us at Collect? See the collection and installation images here.

For Collect 2024 at Somerset House Cavaliero Finn presented The Alchemy of Nature at the fair featuring work by 16 artists including ceramicists Annie Turner, Björk Haraldsdóttir, Frances Priest, Ikuko Iwamoto, Jaejun Lee, Matthew Chambers, Mimi Joung, Sarah Purvey and Soledad Christie; metal sculptors Cecilia Moore, Juliette Bigley and Simon Gaiger; textile artists, Dalia James and Katharine Swailes; wood sculptor Robert George and SHY Design Studio.

The Alchemy of Nature

You are an alchemist: make gold of that

(Timon of Athens by William Shakespeare)

Cavaliero Finn's presentation explored the four elements: AIR, FIRE, EARTH and WATER looking at how craft is rooted organically to the world around us.

Preserving our environment is crucial as we strive to cut down on the mass produced and look at ways to address sustainability through slow craft, using natural materials and found objects, recycling to present sculpture and objects with a new life and identity. Like alchemists, our artists transform the natural materials they work with, many of them making new from old through a process that utilizes the principles of alchemy, experimentation and observation.

All of the artists in Cavaliero Finn's curated presentation use slow craft to create, meditative, organic works, that either draw inspiration from the elements or use the physical components of the elements in their art work.

Installation Views

Works

Press

Fine contemporary ceramics: artists you need to know and how to collect them

Effect Magazine November 21 2023
Dominic Luytens, Effect Magazine, November 23, 2023

Press release

20 at 20

As part of its 20th year exhibition programme, Cavaliero Finn presents The Alchemy of Nature at the 20th anniversary edition of Collect

1-3 March 2024

(previews 28 - 29 February)

Online from 5th March to 1st April

Room W17 West Wing, Somerset House, London

As Cavaliero Finn hits its 20th anniversary in 2024, it seems fitting that the contemporary gallery takes part in Collect at Somerset House at the end of February for the fair's 20th anniversary edition.

Founders Juliana Cavaliero and Debra Finn will present The Alchemy of Nature at the fair featuring work by 16 artists including ceramicists Annie Turner, Björk Haraldsdóttir, Frances Priest, Ikuko Iwamoto, Jaejun Lee, Matthew Chambers, Mimi Joung, Sarah Purvey and Soledad Christie; metal sculptors Cecilia Moore, Juliette Bigley and Simon Gaiger; textile artists, Dalia James and Katharine Swailes; wood sculptor Robert George and SHY Design Studio.

The Alchemy of Nature

You are an alchemist: make gold of that

(Timon of Athens by William Shakespeare)

At Collect Cavaliero Finn's presentation will explore the four elements: AIR FIRE, EARTH and WATER looking at how craft is rooted organically to the world around us. Preserving our environment is crucial as we strive to cut down on the mass produced and look at ways to address sustainability through slow craft, using natural materials and found objects, recycling to present sculpture and objects with a new life and identity. Like alchemists, our artists transform the natural materials they work with, many of them making new from old through a process that utilizes the principles of alchemy, experimentation and observation.

WATER

Loewe Craft Prize finalist Annie Turner's sculpture is closely linked with the river Deben and its surrounding environment where she has lived for most of her life. The work is rich in narrative of the river's past and present, the cycles of nature and human interaction.

Annie's work is much sought after and collected worldwide. It can be seen in the following public collections, the Shiply Art Gallery, National Museum of Wales, Fitzwilliam Museum, V&A Museum, York Museum, Gardiner Museum in Canada and Loewe Foundation.

Chilean artist Soledad Christie's installation for Collect, 'Vasijas para sembrar agua' looks at the symbolic and ritual sense of a vessel. "Sembrar agua" is an ancient ritual of the Andes to pray for the abundance of water. It speaks of an intimate, tender and respectful relationship with water and nature. Each piece symbolises a small moving droplet making up a continuous movement of water, with each piece relating to one another.

Soledad Christie was born in 1962 in Viña del Mar, Chile. She has lived in San Pedro de Atacama for almost 30 years. Through an ongoing relationship with clay, Soledad's work explores intuitions and sensations that are constantly present when inhabiting the vast Atacama Desert and Altiplano territory and its outstanding atmosphere. The territory has become a part of her identity; silence, solitude and vastness have shaped her and strongly influenced her work.

Soledad has received the Craft Seal of Excellence from the Ministry of Culture, Arts and Heritage in 2013, 2015 and 2020 and she has work in the collection of MAPS the Museo de Arte Popular American, Santiago, Chile.

Growing up on the coast in Japan, London based artist Ikuko Iwamoto's latest sculptural work explores environmental concerns about the damage caused to deep-sea ecosystems through current fishing practices.

Ikuko's work can be found in public collections in the V&A Museum, Touchstone Rochdale, Manchester Art Gallery and Holburne Museum.

Ikuko is one of Cavaliero Finn's longest exhibiting artists having first shown with the gallery in 2008.

UK based Korean ceramicist Jaejun Lee, will present a series of new drip moon jars created in Korean porcelain with a celadon glaze. The soft blues created from the celadon drips imbue the quality of air and water.

Jaejun's ceramic process is truly a labour of love as the artist strives to achieve his own sense of perfection in each work, be it in the smoothness of form or the weight of each poised droplet he creates.

Jaejun has exhibited extensively across Korea as well as exhibiting across Europe (UK, Germany, Switzerland, Ireland), gaining international acclaim for his work. He moved to the UK from South Korea in 2018 on an 'Exceptional Talent' visa and is currently living in Cardiff.

Cavaliero Finn is delighted to have Glasgow based designers SHY Design Studio at Collect who have created a series of shelves and a console table especially for the Jaejun Lee installation, using handcrafted scagliola.

Scagliola is traditionally used as a surface decoration and SHY give a nod to the material's origins, first building their pieces into strong simple architectural forms, before unexpectedly carving into and destructing the surfaces to create new sculptural forms and reveal the patterns laced below. Their technique allows the juxtaposition of the uniform, polished outer surfaces with the open rock like surfaces, again referencing the materials it’s made from. The chippings from one piece are imbedded into consecutive editions, creating a narrative and connection between objects and collectors.

Combining 'raising' - an ancient hammering technique used by silversmiths, with patination, Dublin based artist, Cecilia Moore creates colourful, playful sculptures in a range of metals including copper, bronze, copper-based alloys and silver often working with found objects and used metal parts. As part of her work for Collect Cavaliero Finn will showcase 'Orbacious Toll and Many Other Stories' a sculptural work which highlights depleting water supplies around the globe.

Cecilia's work has been selected for numerous national and international exhibitions, and is in public and private collections, including the National Museum of Ireland, the State Collection of Ireland, the National Irish Visual Arts Library and the Ulster Museum. She has completed several public art commissions and been selected for Design and Crafts Council of Ireland's "Critical Selection" from 2017- 2023.

Ceramic sculptor Matthew Chambers has shown with Cavaliero Finn since its inception in 2004. This year for Collect he is creating a series of circular sculptures that echo the hues and rhythms of flowing water.

Matthew's work can be found in public collections in the V&A Museum, Fitzwilliam Museum, National Museum, Scotland, Ulster Museum, Musée Ariana, Geneva and Musee National de Ceramique de Sevres, France and private collections worldwide.

AIR

Sculptor Simon Gaiger will be creating new pieces for Collect including a sculpture designed to hang from a tree relying on air to gently turn it. Simon uses found objects, renewing and reusing the materials in his work while ensuring each piece is connected to the objects' former life.

Simon's work can be found in private collections worldwide.

London based Korean artist, Mimi Joung spent last summer working en plein air in Italy researching 17th century Italian and European Landscape painting, architecture and gardens during an artist's residency. For Collect this year, Mimi has created a series of poetic vessels inspired by the language and landscapes of this period which question our sense of place, home and identity.

In 2023, a significant number of Mimi's ceramic sculptures were acquired by the Stadtmuseum Siegburg in Germany for its permanent collection, following her exhibition with the artist Regina Heinz "Rule Breaking, Reflecting pasts - imagining futures".

FIRE

Juliette Bigley, seeks to understand how the world fits together: how our internal experiences interact with the physical world. Fire is used to make these sculptures and the resulting patinations are caused by the effects of fire and heat. For Collect the artist will be creating a new series of sculptures for the wall and table.

Juliette's work can be found in the Goldsmiths' Company Collection, the V&A Museum and the Irish State Collection.

Inspired by her recent artist residency at Marchmont House in Scotland, Frances Priest is exploring new forms for the wall for Collect exploiting decorative motifs, using drawings as her starting point.

Frances' work can be found in the National Museums of Scotland, Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge, V&A Museum, McManus Galleries, Shipley Art Gallery, International Museum of Ceramics, Italy, and International Museum of Contemporary Ceramics, Korea.

EARTH

Working with natural yarns such as silk, bamboo and SeaCell using a dip-dye technique, textile artist Dalia James creates weavings featuring strong colours, rectilinear forms and patterns inspired by architecture, geometry, early 20th century art and design movements like Dada, De Stijl and the Bauhaus school.

In 2022, Dalia was commissioned to make work for The Ruskin Library & Museum for their permanent collection. She was also one of TOAST's New Makers for 2022, and she collaborated with eyewear makers Cubitts, on their charity Lens cloth initiative.

Katharine Swailes, has woven a new large abstract wall hanging specially for Collect 2024, using hand dyed yarns inspired by the landscape. Katharine mixes and creates her own colours instinctively, feeling rather than recreating a colour that is already prescribed. Katharine abandons traditional structural weaving techniques. Passing the weft through warp over the span of her hand, the path becomes an intuitive almost meditative process that builds a subtle moving image.

Katharine's work has been shortlisted for the Cordis prize twice, once in 2016 and then again in 2019. She was also shortlisted for the Kate Derum Award in 2019 and was recipient of the Theo Moorman Award in 2016. Katharine’s work was recently included in the exhibition Sussex Landscape, Chalk, Wood and Water at Pallant House Gallery, Chichester.

After receiving attention from his presentation at Collect Open 2023, Robert George utilises a material that surrounds him - wood. With timber sourced from his own carefully considered arboricultural practices and sustainable small-scale forestry operations, all from within a 30mile radius of his workshop in rural Northamptonshire, he seeks to create forms and furniture that reflect on his experiences and knowledge of trees. Using traditional hand tools, Robert will be creating a series of wooden vessels and a table which will take centre stage in our presentation for Collect this year.

Dorset based, Icelandic artist, Björk Haradsdóttir is making a new series of work inspired by the mythological ideas of the earth and its sounds. Collectively the series is called 'Jörð'- referring to the personification of earth as a goddess in Norse Mythology. Individually the pieces take their names from nature. Dyngja, Skófir, Glymur and Lyng are Nordic names for types of lava, lychen, water and moss.

These new earth pieces incorporate both sound and movement. When rocked, clay stones inside each piece move, creating distinct sounds. These evoke personal memories of nature such as the crumble of lava underfoot, the crackle of moss or the tumble of river pebbles.

Bjork has won two consecutive Marshwood Arts Awards for her ceramic sculptures (2017 Applied Arts Prize, selected by John Makepeace OBE & 2019 for the John Hubbard Prize) and in 2023, Peter Barber, one of Britain's most acclaimed architects and curator of the architecture room at the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, approached Bjork to create a 17-piece ceramic installation for his room.

Sarah Purvey is creating a series of new hand-built sculptural vessels which incorporate her expressionistic drawings on clay capturing the sense of raw power from the earth.

Sarah's work can be found in the permanent collections of; Pallant House, Chippenham Museum, Swindon Museum & Art Gallery and Bath Spa University Corsham Court Collection.

Ends

Contact for more information: 07941200300

Debra@cavalierofinn.com Juliana@cavalierofinn.com

About Cavaliero Finn

Established in 2004, contemporary gallery Cavaliero Finn is renowned for its carefully curated portfolio of expertly crafted, museum-quality contemporary objects and award-winning fine art.

As well showcasing and selling a portfolio of over 50 artists' work online at www.cavalierofinn.com, the gallery curates regular exhibitions in London and participates in numerous contemporary art fairs including the London Art Fair, Collect and the British Art Fair. Cavaliero Finn works with some of the UK's leading museums and institutions and provides consultative services to corporate and private clients, commissioning bespoke artworks for their collections. The gallery is a selected member of Cromwell Place and part of the Crafting a Difference collaboration.

Cavaliero Finn is still passionately run by the founders Juliana Cavaliero and Debra Finn who first met studying at Warwick University.