Lily Hargreaves, Red Fruit, Oil on Canvas, 60 x 70 cm
Lily Hargreaves studied Fine Art at Goldsmiths before moving onto the Royal College of Art for her MA in Painting. In 2022, Hargreaves was awarded the Tooth Travelling Scholarship as well as the BAGT Open Founder's Prize, and has previously been shortlisted for the John Moores Painting Prize (2020), the Hari Art Prize (2023), Studio West's 'Now Introducing' Prize (2023), the Valerie Beston Award (2024), and the ACS Studio Prize (2024).
Hargreaves's paintings are highly stylised, referencing a type of painting that was practised by British artists in between the wars. While the trauma of World War One pushed many artists in other countries towards avant-garde and the future, British makers – in quite British fashion – looked to resurrect life pre-war, as though nothing had changed. To Hargreaves it feels appropriate to revisit this style now, a hundred years on, in another period of war and pandemic as well as climate crisis, applying elements to her images as though trying to find some sense in the unexplainable subject matter.
Her current body of work delves into the early 20th-century wellness industry, looking at the treatment centres and fad diets that became fashionable amongst the upper classes in this era. Hargreaves is exploring how this period possibly relates to a Christian tradition of fasting, tracing it through medieval saints and Victorian teenagers up to trends we see in 21st century food discussions.
Works:
Lily Hargreaves, Red Fruit, Oil on Canvas, 60 x 70 cm
Lily Hargreaves, Appetite is Craving, Oil on Canvas,50 x 50 cm
Lily Hargreaves, Hunger is Desire, Oil on Canvas, 50 x 50 cm
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