16 – 27 February 2015
(closed Tuesday 24th)
10am -5.30pm Mon-Sat, Sundays 2.30– 5pm
Free
Evening Openings on 17, 19 and 25 February, 6-8pm
Liverpool Cathedral is excited to host an exhibition of painting and sculpture by artist Paul Hobbs.
Wooden blocks coloured like liquorice all sorts and coated with news headlines, a machete in a box, a cloth woven with names, a circle of shoes arranged around a tree – there is plenty to amuse, challenge and disturb here. What is compassion? Where is God in suffering? How do we value ourselves and others? Are the Ten Commandments relevant today?
This show wrestles with questions of faith in relation to contemporary life. It is a mixture of painting and sculpture, and includes figurative, abstract and conceptual images, news articles and ready-made objects. Variously vibrant, playful, disturbing and heart-warming, the artwork challenges us about issues of faith in God, justice and human dignity.
The artist said “My work considers contemporary social issues in the light of Biblical values,” Hobbs’ work is challenging and he wants the viewers to ask questions of themselves; “So at a glance, you’re drawn to it; you maybe get the general idea. But it’s the subplots and the hidden things that give richness and excitement,”
The artwork is stylistically varied and will be of interest to art students for its concepts, techniques and processes. The themes cover all kinds of social and religious issues, and have proved most engaging and challenging with every kind of audience, young or old, religious or atheist, artistic or not. The exhibits include work on famine, old age, fatherhood, our capacity for violence, suffering, the Beatitudes and the Trinity.
