Exhibition News
Previous exhibitions
“Fools In Love”
By Tanya Franks and Elena Sainz
An exhibition featuring the worlds of Tanya Franks and Spanish artist Elena Sainz Moreno.
The exhibition ran from September the 23rd to October 4th 2009 and was located at the Burgh House, Hampstead Museum , New End Square, London NW3 1LT
“There is something more important than being wise, and that is to love freely and unendingly, letting everything grow and flow in its own nature, not trying to impose our nature, but by being alive oneself in such a way as to bring others alive too.” (Cecil Collins, artist/visionary, 1908-1989).
“Fools in Love,” is a celebration of the fool, an individual who has liberated himself from the conventions of society, he is no longer a slave, but a master! His quest is not material, but spiritual. His thirst for knowledge is unquenchable, he longs for the road to enlightenment. He is at the beginning of a spiritual journey that will take him, to who knows where? But the fool is not afraid, he has no fear. He trusts implicitly in the universe, and knows he is protected and taken care of, each step of the way.
The journey can be taken both literally and metaphysically. It is after all, a voyage of discovery into the unknown, and travel is one of the most essential ingredients.
Cecil Collins wrote a book called “Visions of a Fool,” depicting how the very ‘fools,’ of society are actually great musicians, artists, poets, mystics and religious men. They are the wanderers, the gypsies, the mavericks of society. They are ‘the enlightened ones,’, the great philosophers, the sages. Sadly such gifted people are rarely appreciated or taken seriously – they have to work that much harder to prove their worth, in order to be accepted by conventional society. Most of the human race is seeped in materialism, obsessed with money, prestige, power and possessions and loses sight of what really matters in life. The fool however, is truly a free spirit; he converses with the angels, God, nature, the elements. He is the inner child that we often lose touch with as we leave childhood behind and become adults.
Our exhibition depicted the fool within. His passions, his hopes and dreams. Elena’s fools are beautifully illustrated in black pen and ink, they are more apparent, they really do look like fools, mavericks engaged in all sorts of crazy activities, carefree, eccentric, funny and childlike.
Tanya’s fools are painted in vivid bright colours using watercolour, gouache and ink, and are more hidden, they are serious, sensitive, folk-like characters engaged in the pursuit of music, dance, romantic love and spiritual and religious activities. They do not necessarily look like fools. But then who is to say they are?
“The fool in love,” may cause the rest of the human race to scoff with disapproval. But to the fool, love is a very serious matter and so it should be, because when we fall in love we become fools, and we even do foolish things that can only be excused, for they are both lovely and divine.
We hope you enjoyed our interpretation of the fool. “The Fool in Love!”
