The current exhibition at Abingdon Museum is ‘Alphabet Quilts’, a quilting exhibition inspired by the alphabet in its many forms. Quilters from three local groups have risen to the creative challenge of interpreting alphabets and letters using many techniques.
These range from depicting a single modern letter, medieval forms on silk to whole alphabets in books and quilts and a tactile version devised for blind children. There is also a joint project of an Abingdon Alphabet portraying the history, people, and places of our town.
The second Oxfordshire based artist presenting artworks in the Attic Gallery case is Gabrielle Venus, a site-specific multimedia artist working with found objects. A Goldsmiths graduate, Gabrielle has exhibited across London and the south-east, most recently at Ovada in Oxford with ‘Hatched’. She is exhibiting two shelf-based installations – ‘Exposure’ and ‘The Quality of Being True’. This site-specific installation responds to the surrounding historical artefacts of Abingdon Museum, the concept of display and the material of the cabinet.
“As a site-specific artist”, explains Gabrielle, “I take inspiration from the location, nature and material of the exhibition space. I’ve shown throughout London and the south-east, in disused buildings, leafy parks, urban streets and domestic interiors. Having graduated from Goldsmiths, my work often incorporates text and always uses as its material found objects, scenes or sounds.
I always carry a camera and sound-recording device with me as I know that there’s a story around every corner, waiting to be witnessed and shared.
So, my work can present as photography, film, sculpture, or installation – again, depending on the nature of the surrounding space. Most recently, as part of the women-artists group ‘Hatched’, I showed ‘Cathy, Can You Hear Me?’ at Ovada in Oxford. Digitally printed on three panels of 1 metre square silk sheets, the triptych of photographs of an abandoned tent took its title from Ken Loach’s 1966 film about homelessness: ‘Cathy Come Home’.
Currently I’m exhibiting at Abingdon Museum with two shelf-based installations - ‘Exposure’ and ‘The Quality Of Being True’ - occupying the artists’ pop-up cabinet on the top floor, until June 4th. My next piece is a film piece as I’m curating an evening of films by women artist-filmmakers at The Abbey Cinema in Abingdon for International Women’s Day, 8 March 2024.
In 2025, I’m curating an outdoor art event; any offers of open spaces, from fields to parks to gardens would be gratefully received. For any more information please email gcvenus1@gmail.com”
We are pleased to announce our next exhibition ‘Lost Monuments of Abingdon’ in association with Abingdon Area Archaeology and History Society, from 1 July-1 October.
The word ‘monument’ can mean many different things. In this exhibition, we take it to mean major buildings and other structures which served public purposes, and which were deliberately designed to be impressive – to make an impact. All the Abingdon monuments in this exhibition were once very impressive constructions but have now vanished completely. The aim of the exhibition is to bring them back into the light.
This is year the Festival of Archaeology runs from 15-30 July, and we’ll be offering guided tours, handling sessions and archaeology trails at the Museum.
Please visit the Museum’s website for more information about these events at abingdonmuseum.com
