| Art Reviews
U.S.A. |
“The artist’s statement Barbara Griffiths has prepared for the nine or 10 paintings she has in a group show at the University of Connecticut Stamford Art Gallery will include these words:“As I approach the end of a lifetime dedicated to art, a problem arises; what will become of my accumulated paintings? … In this pre-death exhibition, the usual optimistic gallery labels (‘Portrait, $5,000’) are accompanied by post-death instructions, which indicate the work’s true value and fate'. Is Griffiths signaling that she is dying? To answer too directly, if there are direct answers to be had, would rob the exhibit of its provoking power. ...”
— Connecticut Post, 8/14/16
“Barbara Griffiths, an Englishwoman who moved from London to a Connecticut suburb a decade ago, says she has purposely tried to view her adopted hometown through an anthropologist's eyes. ‘I’m fascinated by the various tribes that populate my suburb,’ she says, citing, for example, ‘Women Who Like Cats,’ ‘The Episcopalian Flower Committee’ and ‘The British Wives of Canadian Husbands Who Lived in Singapore for a While.’ A painting like Griffiths’ ‘The New Pioneers’ offers a somewhat surreal take on the aspirations of suburban homebuilders in an image of a well-dressed couple whose dream house appears to be taking shape amidst the rubble of old and new civilizations — ancient statuary, a toilet bowl and PVC pipes. To better understand the dynamics of suburban tribes, Griffiths joined one — a local book group. Such groups, she says, are about seeking a sense of community when connections are arbitrary and tenuous in a society where everyone moves on after five years.” — Art & Antiques, 5/07 |
“…a light-hearted but sharp-eyed exploration of suburbia as a state of mind… Barbara Griffiths ‘New Pioneers,’ a surreal view of an elegantly dressed couple posing before the skeletal construction of their country manor, is a wry takeoff on an 18th century painting by Thomas Gainsborough of young marrieds surveying their estate… you can love the burbs or hate them, but they can’t be ignored as this show cleverly makes clear.”
— New York Times, 3/24/06
“Artists in affluent Fairfield County can suffer from an environmental malaise of self satisfaction. If no one bothers to disturb the domestic order of suburbia, then what truly is at stake? Instead of expanded consciousness arising out of creative ferment and risk-taking visions of the Real, we have a pursuit of paintings that look good above someone’s couch….a new Silvermine member is upsetting the domestic order by holding fast to the vision of an outsider. Barbara Griffiths is a recent immigrant from England where she obtained international recognition for her first exhibition upon graduation from the Slade School of Art. As her compelling new series reveals, maintaining a vision of individuality is no small feat amidst the pressures of conformity in the environment that inspired ‘The Stepford Wives’ and ‘The Ice Storm.’ ‘New Canaan Observed: A Field Study’ is a challenging form of social satire, a hilarious send-up of the post-modern practice of the curator’s theory usurping the art it purports to describe. The artist’s wry English wit skewers her ripe human subjects by means of a virtuoso brush that incorporates ego and id in the same stroke….Griffiths superb control of her material speaks volumes about the limitations of feminism in an affluent consumer society.” — The Advocate and Greenwich Times, 3/14/05
|
| Art Reviews
U.S.A. |
“It’s hard to imagine anyone — especially, for some reason a man — getting mad at Barbara Griffiths, who blends in, almost to the point of being invisible, amongst the gathering of affluent suburbanites who have come to the opening reception for “New Canaan Observed: A Field Study” at the prestigious Silvermine Guild Arts Center. Her appearance may be unassuming, but her intelligence and her ability to uproot the naked truth about her subject matter, which comes through in the nine extraordinarily rendered paintings and accompanying texts, are nothing short of intimidating. This, surely, and not Griffiths’ demeanor, is what drove one gentleman to near apoplexy the night of the opening…quite frankly, his reaction wasn’t entirely out of left field. If her expose offends, it’s because it cuts close to the bone. ”
— The Fairfield County Weekly, 3/11/05
|
“Invigorating new blood at Silvermine… Big, bold statements are just what we need to energize an art world reeling fom Sept. 11th, and it is thrilling to find them at Silvermine… Why did we have to wait so long to be treated to a visual commentary on the Stepford Wife syndrome of New Canaan? It would take an outsider, one would suppose, and Griffiths arriving from London has saved the day. In rootless condition, sly alluded to as ‘The Precarious Position of the Global Wife on the Social Stockmarket.’ In doing so, she resurrects herself Ann Sexton-style into a bold and refreshing artistic voice that speaks to all women, regardless of lifestyle choices.”
— The Advocate and Greenwich Times, 1/20/02
|
| Art Reviews
U.K. |
“One hesitate to use the word ‘genius’ to describe this first one-man show, but there is no other word. These drawings betoken a fecund and peculiar imagination in which the dreams and nightmares of childhood are recollected and portrayed with an awesome and disconcerting tranquillity.”
— Max Wykes-Joyce, London critic, International Herald Tribune
“Barbara Griffiths has done a series of drawings in the past two years in a mode which can best be described as surrealist. They are now on show in London. All are prompted by the imagery of her dreams, which, she says, ‘sounds corny.‘ The drawings certainly are not; they’re mainly fairly horrific images of what she calls ‘the entropy and sheer bad taste of life,‘ made curiously appealing by the use of vivid pastels and intricate crayon lines. A beflowered, bespectacled werewolf wearing a design centre madallion; a cinema of life behind fractured glass surmounted by a sunset; a castle topped with a skyscraper in the ocean. Many have to do with sex and women, but Griffiths says her work isn’t about women in particular, only ‘the humiliation of being human.‘” — The Observer Review |
“Though it is fairly rare for an artist to have a first exhibition in a West-End gallery, Barbara Griffiths, whose show of crayon drawings opens at the Lasson Gallery in Jermyn Street tomorrow, has accomplished not just this but a second feat in addition. Almost every single one of her twenty seven works has been sold before the doors are open to the public.”
— The London Daily Telegraph
“Barbara Griffiths of the Slade School honorably upholds the impeccable traditions of this institution in her impeccable Surrealist drawings, delicate alike in line and color.” — Oxford Times
“An unknown artist like Barbara Griffiths can never before have had such a sensational beginning…” — The London Sunday Times |