Night Flowers and Charity Nightwatch Croydon

August 5, 2024 Matt Bannister

The cover of Nightwatch Croydon’s 2024 Annual Report, featuring a crop of the painting 'Night Flowers' by Matt Bannister. The image shows people walking past and and waiting by a florist's stall at night. — The cover of Nightwatch Croydon’s 2024 Annual Report, featuring a crop of my painting.

My painting ‘Night Flowers’ was recently used on the cover of Nightwatch Croydon’s 2024 annual report. They are a charity founded by members of the community in Croydon who were concerned about homelessness. Still entirely voluntary, they have been running for more than forty years. Amongst their activities is a meeting point, staffed every evening of the year, where there give basic help with food and clothing and address the more profound needs of their clients.

'Night Flowers' by Matt Bannister. The image shows a painting of people walking past and and waiting by a florist's stall at night. — The full uncropped version of my painting.

Royal Academy Summer Exhibition 2024

July 23, 2024 Matt Bannister

My two paintings: ‘East Bridge House (Turn Left)’ and ‘More Than One’ have been selected for the Royal Academy of Art’s Summer Exhibition 2024, coordinated by sculptor Ann Christopher RA and her committee of leading British artists and architects.

Courtyard of the Royal Academy, showing the banner for the Summer Exhibition 2024

Artist Matt Bannister standing in front of his painting 'East Bridge House' at the Royal Academy, London. — Proudly standing in “Concrete Corner” alongside ‘East Bridge House (Turn Left)’. Selected by Anne Desmet RA for her Gallery VII.

Painting by Matt Bannister showing giant raspberries in wooden cages. The title of the work is 'More Than One'. — ‘More Than One’ by Matt Bannister. Selected by Anne Desmet RA for her Gallery VII.

'More Than One' painting by Matt Bannister hanging in the Royal Academy

Both works are in the same room (gallery VII), curated by Anne Desmet RA, look great on the grey walls and have lovely neighbours to keep them company over the Summer. The show opened its doors on Tuesday 18th June, and will be closing on Sunday 18th August 2024.

East Bridge House, Croydon

The story behind the painting.

Buy prints of East Bridge House (Turn Left)

Royal Society of British Artists 2024 Exhibition

March 13, 2024 Matt Bannister

I was very lucky to have been one of the non-members selected for the Royal Society of British Artists 2024 Exhibition.

Here’s my work ‘February’ that Croydonians may also recognise from the banners hanging from lamp posts in and around the town (See previous post). Not surprisingly there were lots of great pieces by the artists at the exhibition at The Mall Galleries. There is now an online catalogue to view the show here.

Art On The Streets Of Croydon

February 7, 2024 Matt Bannister

My paintings have been blown up (onto banners) as part of a town-wide art installation in central Croydon.

Three designs of lamp-post banners - featuring slices of my paintings ‘February’, ‘People’ and ‘Night Flowers’ are now hanging up and repeated on the High Street and elsewhere in Croydon. Alongside them are some other really bright, eye-catching works on banners by local creatives Miguel Sopena, Divya Sharma, Skye Baker and Melanie Russell. The Creative Croydon initiative set up by Croydon BID has returned to Croydon town centre this Winter creating an open-air art gallery for people to enjoy.

Thanks so much to Julia at 31% Wool and the Check Out Croydon team for making this happen. Thanks to Glenn Foster for taking these photographs, too. The whole display of work is up until April 2024.

For more background to the project visit Croydonist.

All the artists’ works appearing in the outdoor ‘exhibition’.

ING Discerning Eye 2023 Exhibition

January 2, 2024 Matt Bannister

A bit of late news but my trio of wood panel drawings ‘Junction’, ’Stafford Road’ and ‘Vauxhall’ and my two Devon paintings ‘Pause (I)’ and ‘Pause (II)’ were all selected for the 2023 ING Discerning Eye Exhibition at the end of last year.

It was held at The Mall Galleries from 17th to 26th November 2023, and online until the 31st December 2023. The ING Discerning Eye annual exhibition is a show of small, domestic scale, works independently selected by six prominent figures from different areas of the art world: two artists, two collectors and two critics. This is the third time I’ve exhibited with the Discerning Eye (I was previously selected in 2020 and 2022).

I had a lively lovely evening at the artists’ opening of the ING Discerning Eye Exhibition. It was great to have five pieces on the large wall curated by Tony Adams. Excuse the double-posed photo composite but I couldn’t get them all in the same frame with me! So good to have four of them hanging together.

The exhibition was curated by a star-studded panel including singer Ian “H” Watkins and former England footballer Tony Adams among other tastemakers. Out of 6,500 entries, 628 artworks by 387 creatives were shortlisted for this prestigious show. The ING Discerning Eye showcases talent in a wide range of media – painting, drawing, sculpture, print, photography, video, textile, ceramic and more. This is the 25th year of the Discerning Eye charity’s partnership with bank ING.