Cathy Lomax

Cathy Lomax is a London artist, curator and owner of the Transition Gallery, where Charles Saatchi first bought a painting by Stella Vine.

Life and career

She graduated with a degree from London Guildhall University in 2000, and with an MA from Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design in 2002. She is a figurative painter and says::Painting has multiplied, subtracted, repeated and revised real life long before photography let alone photoshop was a gleam in the eye of mankind. It is undoubtedly an ancient art but this longevity does not automatically make it reactionary. Painting is something that we can and should utilise to bind together the past and the future in order to create an important revolutionary vision.

She is the director of the Transition Gallery in East London, concentrating on group shows, particularly of emerging artists. She invited Stella Vine to exhibit in a show "Girl on Girl", from which Charles Saatchi bought, and then made famous, Vine's painting of Princess Diana, "Hi Paul can You Come Over".

She also publishes and edits "Arty" magazine, a stapled black and white publication featuring interviews and art news. It was started in April 2001 as a reaction against established art magazines; it is written and illustrated by artists. It was described by her colleague Alex Michon as::an antidote to the kind of dry academic writing about art which was becoming increasingly elitist and out of touch with the kind of riky tiky, hand-made and heartfelt work which was appearing in minuscule galleries throughout the land. [ [http://cathylomax.blogspot.com/2004_02_29_cathylomax_archive.html Alex Michon post on Cathy Lomax blog, March 4, 2004 Retrieved April 1, 2006]

Artist Stella Vine has commented on Lomax::It’s been great to have the support of Cathy Lomax at Transition Gallery, she has been one of the few people to really believe in me ... she’d say, “great do it, just do it all, you shouldn’t censor yourself so much, stop chucking stuff out !” Nice genuine support without any motive. Cathy paints a bit like Peter Blake. I first came across Cathy’s magazine ‘Arty’ a little art fanzine at the Serpentine gallery bookshop ... the energy in her magazine, and the childishness of it, I thought she would be a teenager, she was my age...and she also was running her own gallery ... She’s been a rock...

Since 2003, Lomax has regularly posted her thoughts on a blog. In 2004, under the heading "You're Stuck, Stuck, Stuck", she attacked the Stuckists, who had described a press release from the MOT gallery as "vomit". She said::Charles Thomson should be ashamed of himself, far from promoting painting in the modern world and encouraging young painters he is alienating and if my case is anything to go by making people think twice about painting at all. As long as this terrible attitude continues Stuckists have no place on the contemporary art scene and they will be given the little attention that they deserve.". [ [http://cathylomax.blogspot.com/2004_04_25_cathylomax_archive.html Cathy Lomax blog on the Stuckists, April 25, 2004] Retrieved April 1, 2006]

hows

Exhibitions include "Fanclub" (Rose Wilde), " Girl on Girl" (Transition Gallery 2003), and "She's No Angel" (James Coleman 2004).

ee also

*Transition Gallery
*Alex Michon
*Stella Vine

References

* [http://www.artnews.info/artist.php?i=173 Artnews, Stella Vine interview by Iliana Fokianaki 2004]
* [http://0301.netclime.net/1_5/C/N/X/tangent-04.pdf Interview with Cathy Lomax in Tangent art-zine (pdf)]

Books

* "Arty: Greatest Hits" Transition Editions, ISBN 0-9548954-1-X (an anthology of excerpts from issues 1-16)

External links

* [http://cathylomax.blogspot.com/ Cathy Lomax's blog]
* [http://www.transitiongallery.co.uk/ Cathy Lomax's Transition Gallery]
* [http://www.artymagazine.com Arty Magazine]
* [http://www.commentart.com/artist/Cathy_Lomax Cathy Lomax's commentart entry]