“Unknown Variant” by Sheila Naughton (who is a member of the AGA group) was exhibited in the 15th November - 3rd December 2022 solo show entitled “The Darkest Night.” This exhibition was the first opening I was present for at the gallery after I started volunteering, so it is especially meaningful to me.

I remember being impressed by how passionate the artist and guest speaker, Valeria Ceregini, were about the presented works and their ability to hold a public conversation about such personalised and sombre themes. The exhibition was accompanied by an essay by Ceregini, who is a visual arts curator and art historian. “The Darkest Night” was themed around visually manifesting the emotions provoked by harrowing current events, particularly the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, and the War in Ukraine. The deep purple and black shades of “Unknown Variant” are echoed in the exhibition’s titular works, “The Darkest Night I-III.” These colours, traditionally associated with darkness and gloom, invite the audience to “openly experience the drama of loss and the sinister attraction for certain things… represent[ing] and embody[ing] the human reactions to these pains and cultures that afflict our culture and planet” (Valeria Ceregini). The cool, dark colours and abstracted forms establish a certain standard of pensiveness and reflection relating to the exhibition’s overall subject matter.

Naughton, in her October 2022 artists’ statement, describes how she is “interested in the nature of human experience. Through abstract painting and drawing, I try to convey meaning and sensation.” This abstraction of experience is made evident through her 2022 piece “Unknown Variant,” inspired by the introduction of clinical words such as “variant” and “strain” into the canon of daily use. The irregular purple forms seen arranged vertically in the work are reminiscent of medical imagery, harkening back to the word “variant” in the piece’s title. The shapes’ amorphism and ambiguity of form, meanwhile, more closely reflect the “unknown” aspect. By not being able to specifically define Naughton’s subject, the audience is reminded of the feelings of fear and mystery associated with the outbreak of a new COVID-19 variant, as well as the pervasiveness of medical imagery in the press coverage of the disease. This examination and presentation of microbiological medical imagery is carried into her series “Under the Microscope 1-8 (Contagion)”, which was also exhibited as part of “The Darkest Night.” 

Valeria Ceregini describes Naughton’s visual process as “revealing through the fluidity of her medium of watercolour and gouache on papers the fluidity of invisible contagion and the spreading of a war.” The physicality of Naughton’s work, both through her own mark-making and the malleability of her medium, communicates intimate attention to the human processes involved in creating visual art. Naughton’s method perfectly reflects her disease-focused subject matter – sickness is something that impacts the human body above all else, and the human body is necessary for the creation of art. “Unknown Variant” entwines ideological themes with practical methods, creating a comprehensive work that reflects the unique anxieties of the ever-changing COVID-19 pandemic.