Jack Whitelock
Overview
“My work is a symptom of whatever face I'm wearing in the moment of applying paint to a surface.” - Jack Whitelock
Jack Whitelock’s imagery ranges from what might be described as bucolic - trees, flowers, landscapes - to the disquieting and abstract; natural forms give way to sudden compositional breaks and brightly painted foregrounds tail off into sombre horizons. These painterly interventions allow him to realise and dissect lived experiences into material forms, each composition becoming a vessel to hold certain psychologies - a painting that is initially rooted in doubts, fears and curiosities, oscillates to something that instead embodies notions of growth, disruption, repair, hope and resilience.
Working at a large scale, his process unrestricted by premeditated design, each work is an act of rewiring and discovering new patterns, mysteries, processes and memories. Whitelock considers his work to be a symptom of whatever face he is wearing in the moment of applying paint to a surface, imbuing each work with a sense of immediacy and drama.
Biography
Jack Whitelock (b.1997) lives and works in London. He completed a BA in Painting at Edinburgh College of Art (2020), an MA in Painting at the Royal College of Art (2023), where he was a recipient of the Ali H. Alkazzi Scholarship Award. In 2020 he also received The Freelands Foundation Painting Prize, the Edinburgh University Degree Show Purchase Prize, The George Jackson Hutchison Memorial Prize, the SSA Graduate Award and was selected for the Royal Scottish Academy New Contemporaries.
His work has been featured in group exhibitions by galleries and curatorial projects throughout the UK, including: Thames-Side Studios, London (2023); Hidden Door Festival, Edinburgh (2022); Fruitmarket Gallery, Hull (2022); RSA New Contemporaries at the Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh (2022) and Zembla Gallery, Hawick, Scotland (2020). His work is held in The University of Edinburgh Arts Collection. He has also undertaken the Graduate Residency at Leith School of Art (2021 - 2022) and The New Artist online residency (2021).
Exhibitions
Works
