Sam Haynes is a London-based artist whose works are an aesthetic blend of opposites captured in a photograph. One of the artist's artworks was displayed at Tarpey Gallery in Castle Donnington, the U.K. We had the opportunity to talk to her about her experience at the gallery.
Please tell us about the work you’re displaying for the exhibition.
I’ve displayed one of the assemblage sculptures I made this year called ‘Stellar’. it’s a piece that resembles all of my work at the moment. I use found objects and materials and bring them together and photograph them so rather than displaying the 3D form, I exhibit the photograph printed onto an aluminium dibond. This piece was on the front cover of Collect Art Magazine earlier this year. It’s one of my favourites and I was thrilled when it got selected.
What process did you undergo for the selection of your artwork? Were there any other works that you were hoping were going to get selected?
I could only put forward two for this exhibition and I had to send the photograph and the photograph of the picture hanging on a wall as well. The other work that I put forward is called ‘Mirror Mirror’ which is another one of my favourites from this year. It wasn’t selected but it’s a fairly small space and I think 88 artists were presenting there so generally, it was one work per person.
Can you tell us about your experience at the gallery?
Tarpey Gallery is a very beautiful gallery. I came across it on Instagram a year ago when they did it last year and I noticed how it has a really lovely ambience. The curator is Luke Tarpey who is also an artist and he’s also exhibiting at the gallery at the moment. He has a very good eye for the sort of work I love. The place was a converted barn and the interior was a gorgeous space to have your art exhibited in. There were a lot of artists who were there to get selected so there was a really big turnout last week. It's lovely to be out in the midlands and artists all over the UK come together and have that meeting point as well so it was lovely seeing my work from that aspect.
How did the visitors perceive your work?
The gallery had a very good reception and people always came and asked questions about my process and I respond about how it has energy and character. There was also a work by Katherine Cooper that Luke decided to place underneath mine and it just went so perfectly together because mine has energy with the netting going in one direction and hers below was a wonderful energy of birds going in the other direction so we connected. The artist wasn’t at the opening unfortunately but she
connected with me then. I also spoke to a few artists, photographers, painters and printmakers. It was lovely to talk to all these people and see your work from their perspectives. It's an important part of being an artist and learning from everyone around you connecting and sharing and supporting one another.
What interesting conversations did you have with the people in the gallery?
I talked to some really interesting artists from Manchester and we were talking about studio spaces because we were looking at the guy who had a Tudor house nearby with a painter's hut in his garden. I thought it was really lovely and thought about my small studio space where working small and photographing things works quite well for me and an artist spoke about having a huge space in Manchester. I mean she is a painter and the piece that she had exhibited in the open with a view of driving down a dark road. so I appreciated that technical, emotional and mysterious aspect of it and I think mine conveyed the same feelings. It's just fascinating to connect with different artists.