Robbie von Kampen is pleased to present Saltwater Rain, Will Maddrell’s debut solo exhibition. This show encompasses selected portraits from the past year, ideas for which began 13 April 2022, the date of their move to London, and culminating, poignantly, 13 April 2023 in this exhibition.
Maddrell, a self-taught painter, creates portraits coded with Celtic knots, alter egos, and
references to late 1990s and early 2000s pop and dance music, with each component aiding
Maddrell in their examination of mutable identity.
In Ray of Light, Maddrell renders their flatmate, Franny, in a pose recalling Madonna’s 1998 Ray of Light music video. Inspired both by Franny’s feminine strength and Madonna’s jubilant sense of freedom, the painting becomes a talisman of characteristics that Maddrell wishes to explore or embody.
In Skinny Dip, the artist renders their friend Joe alongside a double self portrait: Will Maddrell as they may exist in the world, and Will Maddrell’s feminine alter ego Lillian, who exists
predominantly through Instagram. Rendering an image in paint enables Maddrell to take
whatever form they wish, in this case simultaneously.
But nowhere is mutability more aptly represented than by the presence of water throughout thepaintings. Maddrell employs water as both a physical entity and a medium of encoding; it rushes from a waterfall in Saltwater Rain and ripples with Celtic knots in On a Night Like This. InMaddrell’s paintings water can both encode and embody. It is at once a mode of expression and the artist’s greatest muse.
Will Maddrell (b. 1997 Isle of Man) lives and works in London and is a graduate of the University
of Bristol.
Special thanks to Harry Engall
