This solo exhibition of new works by Ed will showcase his thoughtful response to Chapel Arts' annual curatorial theme of remembrance, and his inspired reawakening of his own long standing interest in the work of British painter Sir Stanley Spencer.
Ed's recollections of the artist began with a copy he made in 1991 of Spencer's 1991 1951 self-portrait - one of Ed's first paintings. He has revisited Spencer's celebrated painting cycle at the Sandham Memorial Chapel in Burghclere near Newbury, drawing inspiration from Spencer’s dedication to the depiction of everyday routine and his stated desire to 'express the peaceful life that I visualised people could live if there was no war'.
The large-scale panels painted by Spencer between 1927-1932 were painted from memory and draw on his lived experience during the First World War as a soldier on the Salonika Front in Greece, and his time in Bristol as a hospital orderly. The murals have been described as ‘Britain’s answer to the Sistine Chapel’.
