Connell, one of The Abbey’s Artists in Residence, is part a group show called “Reconnaissance” at Islington Arts Factory starting today, for one week. The private view is 6pm – 8:30pm Friday 3 November  – and all are welcome.

‘Reconnaissance’ the word contains two contradictory ideas: the English meaning of heroic exploration of the unknown. This is refuted by the French meaning: re-discovery or recognition of what we already know, perhaps our own mirror image. 

This art exhibition features the work of seven figurative artists. Each of them, in their unique artistic language, explores and scrutinises the human form through the process of painting and drawing from observation.

In doing so, these artists are reconnoitring the subject matter in both senses: They discover for themselves what is important and speaks to them in the subject. In their rendering, they also evidence an individual expression of their own subjective feelings and, perhaps unconsciously, show a recognition of what they know, of what it means to be human. In that latter sense, each of these paintings is a kind of mirror into the artists themselves.