Sottobosco: Tales of the Undergrowth
Photo © Colin Davison
27th July – 20th September 2024
97 Howard Street
Sottobosco: Tales of the Undergrowth showcased Mark Fairnington’s latest series of paintings, offering an intricate exploration of the hidden world beneath the forest floor. Exquisite depictions of tree roots captured nature in motion, highlighting the vibrant and dynamic processes of growth, decay, and regeneration. Through meticulous brushwork and detailed portrayals of varied surfaces, Fairnington generated a restless energy, revealing the transformative power of the natural world.
The concept of the undergrowth, or Sottobosco, drew from 17th-century paintings by Otto Marseus van Schrieck and Rachel Ruysch—historical works that celebrated the cycles of life and death, weaving together themes of putrefaction, rebirth, and the fecundity of nature.
Fairnington’s paintings continued this tradition, invoking figures from folklore such as The Green Man and the Burryman—symbols of regeneration and guardianship of the forest. Sottobosco: Tales of the Undergrowth merged the wildness of nature with the cultivated desires of horticulture and topiary. Created from collaged photographs and referencing the rich histories of landscape and still-life painting, the works blurred the lines between observation and imagination. While the landscapes appeared distinctly English, the plant life depicted was drawn from a wide array of sources, including the glasshouses at Kew, 17th-century Dutch flower paintings, and botanical collections from the Natural History Museums in London and Oxford.
The paintings served as a collection of visual narratives—a network connecting diverse worlds and moments in time.
Fairnington’s landscape paintings originated as a series of miniatures commissioned for Cherryburn in Northumberland, the birthplace of printmaker Thomas Bewick. Their reflection on the history of landscape painting and its relevance today found continuation and culmination in the six large-scale works exhibited at the Globe.
His past exhibitions included Fabulous Beasts at the Natural History Museum (2004), A Duck for Mr Darwin at Baltic Centre for Contemporary Art (2009), Collected and Possessed at the Horniman Museum, London (2015), Walking Looking and Telling Tales at Cherryburn, Northumberland (2018), Relics at Ushaw Museum, Durham (2020), The Landscape Room at Handel Street Projects, London (2020), and Wild World at Galerie Peter Zimmermann, Mannheim, Germany.
Fairnington’s work has been showcased in numerous prestigious exhibitions. His art continually explored themes of belief, scientific knowledge, and the authenticity of visual representation—challenging viewers to reflect on the truths these depictions convey.
