Vikkie Patterson

HELL OR HIGH WATER PART III (2025)

14th January - 21st February 2025

Solo show exhibition at Atypical Gallery, Belfast

Recently exhibited at Atypical Gallery in Belfast curated by Zara Lyness, these oil paintings form a new part of my Hell or high water body of work. As with the previous paintings in this series, the work in this new instalment uses recycled coffee bean sacks as an oil paint surface.

The title of the exhibition signifies perseverance and persistence in the face of challenges and the paintings touch on decolonial concerns such as the climate crisis, deforestation, the destruction of biodiversity, the historic displacement of people, and the legacy of racial and sectarian violence. Formal characteristics of the coffee bean sacks, such as the text and the texture, emphasise conceptual links to globalization and colonization, and look at the West through a critical lens, depicting introspective, anthropomorphic land- and streetscapes in portrait format.