A weird and wonderful world is created in Peter Lewis’ collaged works on exhibition at Mint Gallery.
In the vein of surrealist collagists such as Max Ernst, Lewis pieces together images and icons to form an alternate reality that is dreamlike with a sense of familiarity among the absurd.
Lewis takes clippings from pop culture detritus and historic ephemera to create new images.
There is a sense of cultural nostalgia as elements are sourced from different locales and eras.
The works on show have a particular sense of movement and it is as if the characters within them have been ”caught in the act”.
Babylon Don shows cartoon characters in a strange ritual as lines of stars, birds and arrows and lines suggest momentum through the work.
It is amazing to see the precision with which Lewis creates his collages.
One Night in Portland, for example, is made entirely out of 19th-century illustrative materials to create a seamless picture of a town overrun with large hybrid beasts.
The present exhibition follows Lewis’ recent trip to the United States.
Despite the collage medium’s ”lowbrow” status, the movement has found marked popularity in recent years and Lewis himself has been in group shows around the world.