Creative Connections Cornwall is a project about people and place in partnership with the National Portrait Gallery, and Mounts Bay Academy in Penzance. The project connects young people from Cornwall with the award-winning artist, Joy Gregory, to explore the National Portrait Gallery’s Collection.
Together with portraits by Joy Gregory of people she has met in Cornwall, the students have made new photographs of people significant to them, to be shown alongside the portraits from the National Portrait Gallery’s Collection, including two new acquisitions showing for the first time.
During an initial visit to Mounts Bay Academy in May 2021, the students selected portraits from the National Portrait Gallery’s Collection. The young people’s choices were based on aesthetic considerations – did they like the portrait image – and whether they felt interested in an individual’s biography, but also addressed issues like representation and language.
The students’ final selection of portraits includes painters, writers, potters, actors, politicians, athletes, musicians and more, and forms the starting point for the exhibition, showing at The Exchange this summer. Sitters include Wilhelmina Barns-Graham, Helen Glover, Gluck, Barbara Hepworth, Roger Hilton, D.H. Lawrence, Daphne du Maurier, and Harold Wilson. The chosen works range from photography to painting and drawing and include portraits by artists such as Terry Frost, Yvonne Gregory, John Hedgecoe, E. O. Hoppé, Ida Kar, Sebastian Kim, Man Ray and Madame Yevonde.
The exhibition also includes work and artefacts from local collections related to the sitters.
EXHIBITION RELATED
Check out the interactive map that accompanies the exhibition. It maps the locations of the sitters featured in the portraits from the National Portrait Gallery, as well as a selection of objects that accompany the work, from postcards between artists, to workshop tools, and books.
We are also keen to hear from you, what anecdotes do you have about any of the sitters featured in our exhibition? Share your stories.
Take a look behind the scenes of Creative Connections Cornwall and join the students of Mounts Bay Academy along with Joy Gregory as they embark on a day out in St Ives. They visited three locations linked to different sitters featured in the exhibition; Leach Pottery, Terry Frost’s studio at Porthmeor Studios, and Barbara Hepworth Sculpture Gallery & Museum.
Listen to our ArtPod as we talk to artist Joy Gregory at The Exchange, and her London studio about her series of portraits featured in Creative Connections Cornwall, the experience working with the students of Mounts Bay Academy to curate the exhibition, and what’s next on the cards for her.
Read additional information about the sitters and artists featured in Creative Connections Cornwall.
For more information on Creative Connections and to watch the project film see Creative Connections
Also see Read More below.
