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Above: ‘Home Panorama - Towards Spring’, 2021, graphite on paper, 59.4 x 336.4cm.

Photo credit: John Howard Davies

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With thanks to Dr Rachel Sloan for her eloquent catalogue essay, John Howard Davies for the beautiful photography and to Rachel Thorlby for her skilful photographic retouching.

“At the heart of this exhibition [‘Alexandra Blum, Wayfaring’, Fitzrovia Gallery, London, 2023] are two monumental panoramas composed of four large sheets. The integrity of the compositions means that each sheet can be viewed individually. Taken together however, they unspool into something greater than the sum of its parts. ‘Studio Panorama – Gull’s Journey’ gives wings to the notion of wayfaring, allowing us to fly, like the gull at the centre of the composition, over the curve of the earth, watching the world remake itself before our eyes. ‘Home Panorama – Towards Spring’ , on the other hand, was made when the COVID-19 pandemic barred Blum from her studio. Much like Josef Sudek’s Studio Window series, it embraces the challenge of being suddenly immobilised. A windowsill still life frames a view that at first glance feels boxed in but in which the boundary between interior and exterior is less fixed than it initially appears. A seemingly limited vista reveals subtle seasonal changes and a freedom tantalisingly just out of reach. Even in a world brought to a grinding halt, ‘Home Panorama’ hints at how our imaginations float free of physical constraints – and how time goes on weaving its rich tapestry. “

- Dr Rachel Sloan, Associate Curator for Works on Paper, The Courtauld Gallery, extract from ‘Woven time’, catalogue essay accompanying the exhibition ‘Alexandra Blum, Wayfaring’, Fitzrovia Gallery, London, Oct 2023.