A painting by Laura Lancaster of a young woman reciling on a rock in front of a body of water

A Stranger's Light

a painting of a group of young women dressing in a woodland setting

Gathering

a painting of 4 children sitting together in the woods, they are staring out at the viewer

Woods

a pink painting of a woman behind a tree, descending a rocky hillside

Long Gone

a figure wearing a white shirt in a dark and vibrantly colourful setting

Go In Shadows

A painting of youth in a canoe on the water with oar in hand

To Be Waiting

a painting of a group of semi clothed people sat next to water under a rocky cliff face

Visitors

A painting by Laura Lancaster of two women embracing on a rock in front of a body of water

Recalled

Workplace is pleased to announce an upcoming solo exhibition with contemporary British painter Laura Lancaster.


Opening in May 2024 to coincide with a major exhibition of her work at Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, Sunderland, the presentation of 

at Workplace will build upon and reflect Lancaster’s idiosyncratic exploration of collective memory, loss and longing. Embodying a poignant sense of transience and reflection, her paintings navigate an ambiguous territory between abstraction and figuration, shifting between the sentimental and melancholic, the uncanny and strange. 

Lancaster’s recent body of work depicts anonymous women set within pastoral landscapes, as part of her ongoing engagement with archival and discarded ephemera she sources from online auction sites, flea markets and junk shops. While rooted in a longer lineage of artists pushing the psychological boundaries of figurative painting, she is interested in subverting the gendered nature of this art history. Divorced from their specific context and time, Lancaster’s subject matter appears like a dreamlike vision taken from a shared consciousness, where figures reveal themselves to the viewer, both haunting and alluring, creating a sense of connection between the lives of the lost and the nameless - and our own. 


In this new body of work, Lancaster delves further into the physicality of her materials, refocusing and transforming how paint and image interact with one another. The works explore the interplay of liminal space, and the physical aspect of the paint becoming an entry way for illusion. The result of which is work that is transcient, with figures that ebb and flow as if through a distant memory or a fleeting dream. 

a cropped painting by Laura Lancaster of 4 children sitting in the grass in the woods

Installation shots of Laura Lancasters solo exhibition 'In Dreams' at Workplace | London

United Kingdom

London

WORKPLACE

Explore Laura Lancaster's solo exhibition: a blend of abstraction and figuration, investigating collective memory, loss, and longing through her contemporary British paintings.

In Dreams

Related Artists

Laura Lancaster

London

Newcastle