Penny World is an exhibition spanning the last 30 years of work by London artist and poet Penny Goring. This is the artist’s first solo exhibition in a public institution and includes a selection of art works from her expansive practice. Presented here are vividly coloured paintings and sculptures, self-portraits and drawings, and darkly humorous digital collages and videos. Relentlessly direct, the artist’s poetry is entangled throughout – appearing in titles and stitched onto her fabric sculptures.

These works stem from the artist’s personal processing of trauma and experiences of violence, conveying emotions associated with states of grief, fear, loss, panic and powerlessness. Making art compulsively and working freely across mediums, Goring’s repeated images and words detail the artist’s invented mythologies. These drawings and paintings interweave personal experiences with images from history and contemporary culture.

Goring works from her home using modest materials – ballpoint pens, fabric, food dye – and free computer programmes such as Microsoft Paint. Her practice has been shaped by restrictive housing conditions, lack of funds and inadequate therapeutic support. Viewed in the context of the UK’s cost-of-living crisis, Penny World attests to the long-term effects of financial precarity and asserts the power of creativity in the face of austerity.

Large Print Guide
Video Transcripts
Press Release

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