Doppelgänger

Catalogue and invitation card for Exhibition at Eagle Gallery, London. 16 June – 16 July 2016 “My paintings are like ghost schema, assemblages of images and surfaces that generate spectral encounters.” James Fisher’s paintings are carefully calibrated. They explore dualities and employ complex visual palimpsests to construct images that are rich with association. Abstract and figurative motifs are laid on different layers of their surfaces, covered over, and re-discovered through sanding back the paint. As a former British School at Rome Scholar, Fisher’s early work was influenced by the study of fresco painting and he retains an approach that allows for time and chance to enter the process of painting. Fabrication – in the sense both of making things and making things up – produces enigmatic and mysterious results. Many of Fisher’s recent paintings are titled after notable, now forgotten women, or after characters from folklore and comic books. The range of subject matter allows him to conflate biography with fiction, and to borrow from a wide range of visual sources for patterned elements that formally hold in place the more fugitive suggestions of the images. Fisher’s fourth solo exhibition at the Eagle Gallery coincides with the selection of two works in this year’s Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, and his inclusion in Towards Night – a forthcoming exhibition at the Towner, Eastbourne.

Encountering the Spectre of Painting

When thinking what paintings are, I am continually brought back to my memory of a short sequence in Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo. In the scene, Kim Novak’s Madeleine is seated on a bench in an art gallery. She is apparently transfixed by a painting, Portrait of Carlotta. Alongside James Stewart, we watch her looking intently. Madeleine is pretending to be a ghost. At this stage she does not expect us to believe she is a ghost, but simply to immerse ourselves in the conceit, to delight in the shudder. Madeleine’s back is turned away from us, and as the camera draws near to show that the knot pattern in her hair mirrors the image in the portrait, I imagine Madeleine suppressing a smile. She resolutely shows us her back, though, so her feint is not betrayed. Madeleine’s stillness in this scene makes her appear as an object, a thing in the world, a rock or a pile of logs perhaps. We are not looking at that thing, however, but rather a residual image of something creaturely, a spectre. This after-image is held to the ground both by the gravity suggested by its manifestation and by the fine lie - the camouflage - of pretending to be a ghost. Encountering a painting is like meeting Madeleine. It sits in front of its own picture, gazing at it. Despite being motionless and having its back to us, there is a lurching sensation the painting brings about by pretending to be the ghost of its picture, and, at the same time, never really anticipating your credulity.

Neiland's Choice

Catalogue for an exhibition with works selected exclusively by Brendan Neiland. Neiland, who attended the Birmingham College of Art and the Royal College of Art, London during the 1960s, has selected works from a range of artists including: Val Archer, Sarah Armstrong-Jones, Sir Peter Blake, Simon Burton, Grace Erskine Crum, Brad Faine, James Fisher, Martin Fuller, Christian Furr, Annabel Gault, Jason Gibilaro, Hugh Gilbert, Michael Harrison, David Hepher, Patrick Hughes, Andrzej Jackowski, David Mach, Danny Markey, Terry New, William Packer, Tom Phillips (RA), Donald Smith, Justine Smith, Steve Thomas, John Wilkins