Guy Denning “The Idea of her”

Guy Denning
„The Idea of Her“
Exhibition fromn 14 February – 30 March

or over ten years, we have been working with Guy Denning, presenting his work in numerous group and thematic exhibitions and closely accompanying the development of his artistic practice. “The Idea of Her” marks his first solo exhibition at Pretty Portal.

The artist

Guy Denning’s work has long existed at the intersection of traditional painting and contemporary urban art, drawing equally from European pictorial history and political urgency.

His paintings and drawings are defined by an expressive, often fragmented figuration, combined with stencilled and collaged text, abrasion, overpainting and deliberate disruption. In Denning’s work, identity is never presented as fixed or resolved, but as something fragile, provisional and constantly in flux.

The exhibition

The works shown in this exhibition represent a particularly focused and intimate phase of his practice. Drawings and paintings revolve around memory, imagination and projection. They deliberately reject the conventions of portraiture, approaching their subjects instead through suggestion, movement and emotional density. Here, proximity is not created through likeness, but through attitude.

The image held in mind

“The Idea of Her” is an exhibition about the image held in the mind – about what remains when representation and certainty are no longer sufficient. It presents the beginning of a body of work that consciously positions itself between personal experience and artistic openness.

The following text by Guy Denning offers insight into the origin of these works. It is intended as a personal dedication and is reproduced here without alteration.

“This exhibition is dedicated to my partner, comrade, defender and lover of thirty two years who passed away just before Christmas.
Colleen was the most beautiful, strongest, funniest woman I have ever had the privilege of knowing.
I had been trying to convince her to let me make a formal portrait of her since we met, but not even liking the idea of being photographed she always laughingly refused.
Last year I asked her again and finally she agreed, but it was conditional… The portrait must be about ‘the idea’ of her, and inspired by the artists she most admired. It was very specifically not to be a traditional ‘likeness’ portrait.

She also liked my previous set of work based on the idea of ‘imaginary’ portraits and self-portraits. Where, like an autobiographer, we all construct the comforting fictions we would like others to believe of us.
So she was giving me her ideas for this portrait over the last year before she died.
The life stories of the strengths, the frailties, the heroes, the villains, the desires and the dreams.
Much of the start of that work is here, shown with Pretty Portal.

Colleen found me and rescued me; saved me from the world and frequently from myself too.
She will always be my captain, compass and ship. I will forever miss her being alongside me on this mad journey.“
(Guy Denning)

We are deeply honoured to present this exhibition and to share these works – acrylic and oil paintings on canvas, as well as charcoal and chalk drawings – in this particularly personal and meaningful context.