Sarah Gillespie – Grey Arches

Special Publication price for the first five of the edition only.

This beautiful mezzotint print is the newest and most delicate moth by Sarah Gillespie. It is available to pre-order now and will be launched at the British Art Fair on 28th September.

‘Grey Arches’ has a soft marble pattern detailing the wings. The copperplate from which this print is made is cut in an arch, and perfectly counter balances the distal scalloped and hairy wing edge. It is so finely drawn and engraved that is sculpted in light as if it has gently landed on the rich black velvet ground. This is a black that only the old and difficult printmaking process of mezzotint can achieve.

Grey Arches is common throughout much of the British Isles. Emerging in June and July it is often drawn to the light. But rarely do we stop to admire its quiet beauty. Occupying a mainly woodland habitat, the larvae feed in the autumn on low herbaceous plants, and then after hibernation in the spring on buds and leaves of trees such as birch and willow.

British Art Fair

Saatchi Gallery, King’s Rd, London SW3 4RY

RABLEY GALLERY

Booth Solo 17

SARAH GILLESPIE – Moths and Habitats in Mezzotint

28 September – 1 October 2023

“We have done enormous damage to those we share the Earth with. The work of the artist is to pay attention – to refuse not to notice.”

British printmaker Sarah Gillespie was drawn to moths because they’re ‘overlooked and under-loved’. She then found out they are in catastrophic decline: 50-60 species have become extinct in the past 80 years. Their plight has become an obsessionfor the artists as her concerns are entwined with the threat to natural habitats. In particular the watery world of Slapton Ley, near her home in Devon, where the sea threatens to encroach on a unique freshwater ecosystem.

The triumph of moths is in their diversity, beauty and importance as pollinators. The triumph of Gillespie is to draw us close to her subjects, absorbing us in the unloved and overlooked. Where the global awareness of climatic extremes shouts out as todays news, Gillespie whispers to us to pay attention to signifiers, in fragile environments nearby.

For the first time Sarah Gillespie’s beautiful mezzotints will be installed with their corresponding copper printing plates to echo and reflect the limited edition prints.

About Sarah Gillespie

Sarah Gillespie was born in Winchester in 1963. She studied 16th & 17th century methods and materials at the Atelier Neo-Medici in Paris and then read Fine Art at Pembroke College, Oxford (BFA Ruskin School of Drawing & Fine Art). On leaving She was awarded the Elizabeth Greenshield Foundation International Award for figurative art and has had a successful career as a painter. In 2016 she was elected a member of the Royal West of England Academy. Sarah Gillespie makes mezzotint prints, an old, slow and painstaking method that produces unique velvet blacks and soft tones. Her work encourages us to refocus our gaze toward the everyday and the overlooked; moths, blackbirds and winter-suns.

Her work is held in public and private collections including: Victoria and Albert Museum, London; National Portrait Gallery; LondonVictoria Gallery Bath; Government Offices for the South West, UK; Royal West of England Academy; Sharpham Trust; Chatsworth House; Museum of Fine Arts, Yekaterinburg, Russia.