A new gallery on London City Island opened its doors this week, with a group exhibition curated and managed by local artist Ian Felton
Trinity Art Gallery is the second new gallery on the ‘island’ following the opening of arebyte last year.
For its inaugural show, the gallery joined forces with the Pontone Gallery, which has brought ten of its artists to the space with a variety of work including sculpture, oils and painted copper ranging in price from £700 to over £10,000.
Ian is a well-known figure in the area having set up Trinity Art Studios on Trinity Buoy Wharf in 2005. It was there he first met Ballymore’s UK MD John Mulryan who visited one of the studio’s regular group shows last autumn.
“John commissioned an art piece from me and then invited me to do a group show on London City Island combining artists from Trinity Buoy Wharf Studios and local residents.”
The result was what Ian describes as a ‘unity show’ bringing artists from the Studios alongside amateur artists from London City Island and it was at that point Ian had the idea for Trinity Art Gallery.
“The gallery will continue to link the two sites together, explains Ian, “and our aim is to support the local arts community. We also want to become a reputable gallery and make genuine art accessible at all price points”.
Among the artists on show is Iain Faulkner, a Scottish artist whose work appears in many private and corporate collections while very different in style is the work of Jamal Naqsh, one of Pakistan’s best-known contemporary artists. The series of paintings on show are bold, colourful abstract representations of the Arabic script.
As Ian explains, he has selected artists who he believes cater for a range of tastes and pockets from a large gold Buddha by British artist Sukhi Barber to American Dina Brodsky’s delicate circular paintings on copper discs.
“Thanks to Ballymore we have this great space and with it the opportunity to test out different artists and engage the reaction”.