ST JUST .- The Jackson Foundation, Cornwall, announces two simultaneous solo exhibitions by leading contemporary artists Kurt Jackson and Denzil Forrester opening on 25th May 2018.

Kurt Jackson’s exhibition Seacrows is a series of 35 paintings and handmade etchings, inspired by the birds that live next to his coastal studio and his fascination with the natural world, stemming from his background in zoology. In times of solitude working on the Cornish coast, cormorants or “seacrows” are some of the only creatures he sees.

In working on the project ‘Seacrows’ Jackson shows these birds [cormorants and shags] as extraordinary and beautiful creatures in contrast to their reputation with the birds’ supposed gluttony and voraciousness for fish.

Jackson is a dedicated environmentalist and has served as Glastonbury Festival’s resident artist over the past 20 years. Since launching The Jackson Foundation with his wife in 2015, the foundation has become closely affiliated with Tate St Ives, with exclusive artist talks with Kurt Jackson scheduled for Tate Members.

Denzil Forrester’s exhibition From Trench Town to Porthtowan, depicting scenes from his early life in Grenada to his new home of Cornwall, has been curated by Peter Doig and Matthew Higgs, and is his first exhibition since moving to Cornwall in 2016.

Since moving to Cornwall in 2016, Forrester has made paintings that focus on past family life in both Grenada and the UK. These include learning to read with his guardian Ma Pets in Hermitage and making bags in the 1970’s with his mother and siblings in Stoke Newington, London. These paintings contrast with Forrester’s earlier works from the 1980’s, paintings made in direct response to the burgeoning dub reggae scene in London’s Afro-Caribbean communities.

Kurt Jackson was born in Blandford, Dorset in 1961. While studying Zoology at Oxford University he spent most of his time painting and attending courses at Ruskin College of Art. He has been awarded an honorary doctorate by Exeter University and made a Fellow of St Peter’s College, Oxford for his work in the Arts. Kurt and his wife Caroline set up the Jackson Foundation in 2015 in the most-westerly town in Britain, St Just-in-Penwith.

Over the past thirty years Jackson has had numerous art publications released to accompany his exhibitions. A collection of his poetry was produced in 2011. Jackson regularly contributes to radio and television and presents environmentally informed art documentaries for the BBC. He was the subject for an award winning BBC documentary, ‘A Picture of Britain’

A dedication to and celebration of the environment is intrinsic to both his politics and his art. Jackson’s focus on the natural world has led to artist-in-residencies on the Greenpeace ship Esperanza, the Eden Project and for nearly 20 years Glastonbury Festival which has become a staple of his annual working calendar.

Born in Grenada in 1956, Denzil Forrester came to England at the age of ten. After completing his BA at the Central School of Art and his MA at the Royal College, he won the Rome Scholarship in 1983, followed by the Harkness Scholarship which took him to New York for eighteen months.

In 2016, Forrester exhibited at Peter Doig’s London Gallery ‘Tramps’ followed by an exhibition in 2016 at ‘White Columns Gallery’ New York. The success of the exhibitions led to the to the acquisition of ‘Three Wicked Men’ for Tate Britain in 2017. After 20 years of living in London, Forrester moved to Truro, Cornwall in 2016, where he now makes paintings that focus on past family life in both Grenada and the UK.