The Blue and White Show - Exhibition at the Victoria Art Gallery January 19 through March 30, 2008 Bath, England

Hundreds of pieces of blue and white china and textiles create a vast mosaic of pattern and colour at the Victoria Art Gallery in the New Year. The exhibition, the first of its kind on such a large scale, will be opened by Sir Peter Blake and runs from 19 January to 30 March 2008 at the Council-run Gallery in Bridge Street, Bath.

Candace Bahouth, Table Mosaic
The inspiration behind the exhibition is a collection of over 2,000 early 19th-century pottery pieces. The best of these will form the centrepiece of the show, displayed on a giant Georgian-style dresser.
Three major contemporary artists - Kaffe Fassett (textiles, paintings), Candace Bahouth (mosaic-covered shoes), and Carole Waller (paintings on silk) have been invited to display new work inspired by this most British of traditions. The show promises to be a riot of colour, and the whole building, upstairs and down, will be transformed.

Jon Benington, Gallery Manager states that: "the show is perfect for this venue as blue and white used to be imported via the docks in nearby Bristol. Our own collection of Delftware pottery forms a fitting compliment to the show. The choice of artists reinforces these links, for Kaffe Fassett started his career in Bath, whilst Carole Waller and Candace Bahouth live on our doorstep."
The show is guest-curated by former editor of Cosmopolitan and Country Living magazines, Deirdre Mc Sharry. Deirdre comments: "Blue and White means blue and white transferware, a particularly British preoccupation with blue and white pottery, that fills our shelves and dominates our dressers."
"One of the most eye catching elements in the new show are Candace Bahouth's surreal high heel "Prada" shoes embellished with blue and white pottery shards, tiny fragments of Spode's Italian Gardens, Willow Pattern etc - a tapestry of British life - with lots of reference to display, style and fashion, and all from the common fragments found at the bottom of a country garden."
Kaffe Fassett, Blue & White Complexity

Kaffe Fassett is widely regarded as one of the world's leading textile artists and is, undoubtedly, one of the world's most original colourists. Bath is a continuing source of inspiration, as his brilliant reactions in textile and paint to the collection of blue and white pottery on show at the Victoria Art Gallery demonstrate.
Carole Waller is a Bath based painter who uses her eye for colour and texture to paint lengths of silk. She calls her work 'collaborations of print with painting'.
Deirdre says: "In this show the brilliance of the blue and white collection of  'china' appeals to Carole's eye for filling domestic as well as public space. Her response is to echo the blues with layers of  painted silk, several glass freestanding pieces and one of her famously lavish silk coats - in effect a Chinese Robe, in colour and form echoing the influence of the China trade on British life and design".
All new work is for sale and there will be gallery talks by the artists and workshops for schools. For more information on the show and the Victoria Art Gallery visit www.victoriagal.org.uk