Just paid the Oriel Mostyn a visit in Llandudno. Amongst the few artists that are exhibiting there at the moment there is one particular piece which I absolutely loved. ‘Shelter’ by Gareth Griffiths began with a body of paintings focusing on Gareths childhood memories of camping in a particular blue tent in Jamaica. Gareth then began to construct small maquettes of tents and shelters which then grew into a larger project. He asked his sons (also artists) to construct their own versions of shelters and then began to collaborate with other artists on their ideas of shelters. At the Oriel Mostyn all the small shelter constructions have been laid out on a table top with an index on the wall. Just by looking at the variations of shelter designs and ideas was great, it gave me a lot to think about in terms of how we humans have built the spaces around us, what they mean to us and even what the ‘outside’ means to us. This exhibition is a simple and lovely way of conveying how we have come to perceive the idea of shelter and how we box our selves in and away from the ‘outside’ world almost deliberately differentiating ourselves from the natural world.
