Maggi Hambling at Marlborough Fine art

This is a great show. You should really go and see it.

Maggi Hambling Portraits of people and the sea
25 January – 25 February 2006; Private view Tuesday 24 January 2006 6-8pm

The Directors of Marlborough Fine Art are delighted to announce their forthcoming exhibition Maggi Hambling Portraits of people and the sea.

Maggi Hambling’s last exhibition in London five years ago consisted of paintings, drawings and sculpture devoted to a single subject: Henrietta Moraes. Since then the range of her portraits has extended to include Samuel Beckett, the artist’s aging neighbour Giovanna, Sebastian Horsley, street people, David Sylvester and the Dalai Lama. In these compelling images Hambling continues to confront the human condition.

In 2003 Scallop, her controversial sculpture to celebrate Benjamin Britten, was unveiled on Aldburgh beach, Suffolk. In the pause between making the maquette and beginning work on the actual piece, Hambling began her series of North Sea Paintings which were shown as the Aldburgh Festival Exhibition that year. This exhibition will be their inaugural showing in London. The relentless movement of the sea continues to be an obsession. The recent paintings are larger, alive with energy and even more formally inventive.

In both these new series, Hambling distils the action of a human expression or a wave breaking into imagery of rare power.

Also on view will be a selected group of powerful and vibrant portrait drawings from 1995 to the present. These include Amanda Barrie, John Berger, Stephen Fry and Sir Michael Gambon. The close interaction Maggi has with her sitters is conveyed in these striking and intimate images.

This exhibition coincides with the monograph: MAGGI HAMBLING THE WORKS and conversations with Andrew Lambirth to be published by Unicorn Press on

18 January 2006. For further information about the book please contact Alistair Layzell on 0208 855 0320 or acl@lazellpr.com

Fully illustrated catalogues of the paintings and drawings will be available.

For further information please contact John Erle-Drax or Mary Miller on 0207 629 5161 or mmiller@marlboroughfineart.com