INTRO (project space) Current Forthcoming Archive   EXHIBITIONS (main gallery) Current Forthcoming Archive

Chris Biddlecombe, Ether Receiver

INTRO - archive Situated next to the cafe, the intro space showcases the work of emerging artists and designer/makers, and the results of off-site or education projects. With regularly changing exhibitions and special events, intro gives you something new to see or do each time you visit us. Between Worlds Chris Biddlecombe 28 April - 31 May 2009 This installation within the intro space has been devised in response to the Arthur Conan Doyle Richard Lancelyn Green Bequest, left to Portsmouth City Council in 2004. Chris Biddlecombe is a Scottish-based artist who researches historical and contemporary truths, listens to curious logic and lateral whispers, to then create believable fictions.  The process is about collecting – the collecting of information, objects and ideas – and then creating images and narratives that exist through a series of thoughtful associations. Between Worlds collects together multiple fragments from the archive to combine both Conan Doyle the mystery writer, and Conan Doyle the Spiritualist investigator of psychic phenomena – fictional cold calculation meets a belief in the unknown.  These works question our perception of accepted knowledge.  What remains are fragments of a new story - a collection of photoworks, drawings and objects that  form an eclectic group of ‘possible portraits’ and ‘lost apparatus’. This new collection delights in illusion and trickery.  But remember, in trickery there is truth. Portsmouth is extremely proud to have been chosen as the host city for Richard’s extraordinary collection of Conan Doyle and Sherlock Holmes related material and is continuing to develop the collection as an accessible resource to all.