Flowers Gallery presents august (adj), a group summer exhibition running from 7 to 30 August, 2025. The exhibition brings together paintings and sculpture made between 1960 and 2005 by artists who have exhibited with the gallery over the past fifty years

Featuring thirteen artists—Stephen Chambers RA, Bernard Cohen, Edward Dutkiewicz, Amanda Faulkner, Nicola Hicks, Derek Hirst, Lucy Jones, Michael Kidner RA, John Kirby, Tom Phillips RA, Jack Smith, Richard Smith, and Renny Tait - august (adj) is a vivid and wide-ranging presentation of colour, form, and feeling.

Through the dialogues formed between the artworks, the exhibition at Flowers Gallery explores how artists visualise internal realities, whether emotional, psychological, or social. From Bernard Cohen’s painterly maps of thought to Amanda Faulkner’s layered expressions of identity, and from Jack Smith’s silent musical abstractions to Renny Tait’s dreamlike, geometric structures, each work gives form to the unseen.

Some artists take the self as subject, like Lucy Jones, whose bold colour and brushwork reflect how we see and are seen. John Kirby's quietly surreal figures explore the complexities of gender, religion, and sexuality, while Stephen Chambers’ curious cast of characters hover between worlds, playfully enigmatic yet psychologically charged.

Others, like Michael Kidner and Richard Smith, approach perception through structure and rhythm, using pattern, repetition, and scale to create sensory impact.

Sculptors Nicola Hicks and Edward Dutkiewicz bring two distinct approaches to form and feeling. Hicks draws on the physicality and psychology of the animal world, creating vividly animated figures rendered in straw and plaster, and painstakingly cast into bronze. In contrast, Dutkiewicz’s colourful, abstract shapes radiate joy and movement, underpinned by personal struggle. 

Tom Phillips and Derek Hirst introduce ideas of place and memory through layered symbols and maps, Phillips drawing from urban walks and daily life, Hirst channeling global traditions and Native American art, as seen in Cherokee Paqueno,1973.

august (adj) reflects on how we navigate the space between what is felt and what is seen, and how, across decades and practices, artists have found distinct and powerful ways to make those experiences visible.