New Ashgate Gallery champions the best of contemporary art and craft providing an unparalleled resource in Farnham, Surrey and beyond
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New season of exhibitions and events
Known for selecting art and craft of the highest quality, the gallery team has handpicked artists from across the UK. Our exhibitions present glass, ceramics, jewellery, sculpture, print and painting.
View our Spring Season Leaflet
New Ashgate Gallery curates a programme of 20-30 annual exhibitions and related events, often working in partnership with local and national organisations. In addition to our lead exhibitions in the Pavilion Gallery, affordable Craft Collection, Maker in Focus and projects in the Balcony Gallery are worth the visit.
While we show work by artists at all stages of their careers, supporting emerging talent in the market place is close to our heart.
Also, explore and enjoy our curated online shop.
Window by Manuela Kagerbauer
11 January to 29 February 2020
Craft Town Public Art Commission: Public Voting to Select the Winning Proposal
We are delighted to invite the local community to vote and select the winning proposal for a new Craft Town Public Art commission.
Proposals were invited during the autumn for a public sculpture / artwork that is inspired by the heritage and tradition of crafts in Farnham. The artwork will celebrate crafts that have been practised in the area during the Roman period: the district was known as a pottery centre due to its supply of gault clay, oak woodland for fuel and good communication links. Kilns dating as far as AD 100 have been found in the area. Today, Farnham hosts a remarkable number of major institutions and makers who dedicate time, resources and creative energies to sustaining craft as one of the great defining features of place here. The sculpture aims to enhance the public knowledge and understanding of the heritage while also bringing pleasure to the community and visitors alike.
The sculpture will be located next to a busy car park in the courtyard of the grade II listed building of the New Ashgate Gallery Trust in Waggon Yard.
The shortlisted artists are Walter Bailey, Manuela Kagerbauer and David Mayne and were selected by a panel with strong public art and sculpture expertise, including Charlotte Hall (Waverley Borough Council), Vikki Leedham (Hannah Peschar Sculpture Garden), Sue Farrow (Farnham Public Art Trust), Sarah Carrington Hubbard (freelance public art consultant) and Dr Outi Remes (New Ashgate Gallery). We would also like to thank our craft town partners, Rebecca Skeels, Alison Clarke (Surrey Hill Arts) and Nicky Lawrence (University for the Creative Arts) for their support and advice.
The proposals will be exhibited at the New Ashgate Gallery from 11 January to 29 February and the public will be invited to vote and select the winning proposal - to be announced on 7 February. Also join us for presentations by the artists on 20 January, 2pm (free but booking is required).
The sculpture will be installed in October 2020 - during the craft month in Farnham.
The public art commission is supported by Arts Council England.
Jacky Paynter, Behind Porthmeor
11 January to 29 February 2020
Jacky Paynter: Returning to Look
Jacky Paynter's work is based on her experiences in St Ives throughout the year: wild weather and stormy seas, sunny days and rugged walks. Jacky finds inspiration in the working history that makes St Ives such a unique place, and in how today's pristine holiday cottages were once home to the poorest fishermen and their families. Information from sketches and the odd photographic reference are often the starting points. Jacky seeks out unusual viewpoints and compositions. Her paintings, in acrylic, oil or mixed media, capture the atmosphere of St Ives and show her love of colour, texture, line and drawing.
Born and educated in East London, Jacky moved to Cornwall at the age of 16. She studied Graphic Design at Redruth School of Art, which is now part of Falmouth University. Returning to London at the age of 20, she worked in small design groups before moving into publishing. Jacky became an Art Director for Walker Books (Children's Books) and enjoyed working with many talented illustrators. Art in some form has always been a significant part of Jacky's life. Now retired, she is able to develop her painting style, attending Morley College in London and various workshops at the St Ives School of Painting. She recently completed the Porthmeor Programme. Although she now lives in Hampshire, Jacky appreciates the deep connection she has to Cornwall, returning as often as possible to look and respond again.
Ruth Taylor, Running Wild, oil
11 January to 29 February 2020
Ruth Taylor: Colouring in the Landscape
Ruth Taylor trained as a textile designer at West Surrey College of Art and Design in the early 80s and after many years working with fabric in many forms she discovered a love of oil painting which has become her main form of artistic expression. The influence of her work with textiles is evident in her work, her love of colour, texture and pattern is as much an inspiration as the English countryside. Ruth loads the surface with paint, moving it around with brushes, combs and even her hands looking to capture a particular light or the effect of the weather and seasons on the land.
This exhibition focuses on Ruth's work on landscapes: the volume of the colours is turned up high, the marks are exaggerated and the views are mystical. However, beneath the volume and marks, there is the framework of the English landscape; whether it is a Sussex marsh, a deserted beach or the South Downs of her childhood. As Ruth says: I paint the images of this land that have imprinted themselves in my mind over the years.
Yo Thom ceramics
11 January to 29 February 2020
Maker in Focus: Yo Thom: Clothes for Food
Yo Thom's work is thrown and hand-built functional stoneware with influence from both UK and Japan, but mostly from Japanese food culture. She creates tableware, which will become clothes for food, as Rosanjin once said. It performs as a background for the food you serve as yet retains strong personality. The harmony of her tableware with food is the essence of Yo's ceramics.
Danniella Wilde, Anemones
18 January to 18 April 2020
Spring Craft Collection: Crafts with the Local Heart
Our specially selected collection of ceramics, jewellery and textiles. All items are beautifully hand-crafted by some of the UK's most talented designer-makers: they are perfect pieces for any home or to give as beautiful gifts if you can bear to part with them!
The makers include: Justine Allison, Debbie Barber, Theo Brooks, Holly Burton, Samantha English, Jaroslav Hrustalenko, Justine Jenner, Silvia K, Bérangère Noyau, Sarah Packington, Alison Proctor, Miranda Peckitt, Jacqui Ramrayka, Tamar Rose, Tiffany Scull, Carolyn Tripp, Clare Underwood and Danniella Wilde.
Mitch Pilkington, Two Pink Point Sculptural Vessels
7 March to 18 April 2020
One Year On: Mitch Pilkington: Winner of Rising Stars 2019
Drawn to the organic, natural forms of coastal forays in her home of North Devon, and the worn, dry spirals of weathered conch shells, gathered on warm Caribbean beaches, Mitch communicates the sculptural qualities of these influences. Her ceramics are instinctively handformed in an emotionally intuitive and mindful process using methods such as coiling and pinching. Each piece, a vessel for her emotional journey. Working in grogged stoneware clay, with a palate of coastal shades, and using various stains, slips and oxides, she enhances the natural stone-like quality of the clay.
For Mitch, hand-building is what drives her passion to create her sculptural ceramics. The rhythmic, meditative and mindful process of coiling, and the many hours scraping and sculpting, provide her with the emotional salve to the stresses of life's everyday challenges. Each piece is an emotional response to the clay, hosting their calming solice.
Within her work, Mitch tries to create a haptic aesthetic that communicates a sense of calm, serenity and connection.
7 March to 18 April 2020
Rising Stars 2020
Rising Stars is a platform for some of the most exciting new crafts by emerging makers in crafts, design and applied arts. This curated, selling exhibition will be showcased at the New Ashgate Gallery and also include a programme of makers' professional development events and a £500 prize. The participants are graduating students, recent graduates or at a pivotal moment in their early career due to changed circumstances.
Many of the graduating makers are at cross roads: they have a full portfolio of fabulous ideas, but are yet to establish their business skills and a network of collectors. Rising Stars offers just the right platform, and for many, it is a starting point for an exceptional career. Rising Stars is an opportunity for both makers as well as art collectors who wish to support and collect work by future stars.
Rising Stars is organised by the New Ashgate Gallery and supported by the Billmeir Charitable Trust. We work in partnership with the University for the Creative Arts, Farnham.
7 March to 18 April 2020
The Pastel Society
We are delighted to present new work by the members of the Pastel Society. Encouraging the use of pastel within the contemporary art world, the Society was founded in 1898. The members are professional artists living and working in this country and overseas. Membership is granted through a strict assessment of technical skill, originality, innovation and enthusiasm.
The exhibition will present new painting by Tony Allen, Victor Ambrus, Liz Bakwill, Matthew Draper, Jill Jeffrey, Jan Munro, Norma Stephenson and Ann Wilkinson.
