Tiwani Contemporary is delighted to announce the dual presentation With Tenderness, featuring gallery artist Emma Prempeh and introducing Haitian-American artist Abigail Lucien, in their first UK show. The exhibition probes how, in painting and sculptural installations, both artists render compelling explorations of time, in all its tenses: as archival matter, quotidian event and speculative futurity

Emma Prempeh’s latest paintings are portraits that cast an intimate glance over her loved ones and her own sense of self. Exploring expressions of pictorial and emotional depth, these new paintings question the frailty and fallibility of memory. 

In the painting, If I Love Myself Will I Let go of Fear, Prempeh portrays the emotions that arise when her health affects her ability to sleep peacefully: the constant fear that she won’t wake up and the realisation that we are all inevitably alone. On these occasions she finds herself  revisiting Orson Welles’ aphorism, “We’re born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion - for the moment - that we are not alone.” Gazing upon herself in the portrait, she imagines whispering to herself, “If I love myself, will I let go of fear?” 

In Another Limb, Prempeh’s gaze is directed at her partner, and filled with the love she observes in his relationship with his dog as well as the realisation that he perceives his pet to be an extension of himself. In turn, by containing them both in her gaze, the painting becomes a way for both figures to become an extension of herself. Also contemplating the bonds that can exist between humans and animals, Soft Underbelly is a portrayal of comfort and trust. When a cat exposes its belly it means that they are relaxed, comfortable and don’t feel threatened. In the painting the kitten exposes its belly between two hands, a bond between three.

Friendship is the artist’s subject in Adorn and Sunday, manifestations of Prempeh’s  connection to a close friend, shown through a caring gesture and a close, life-long friend in the middle of rest, relaxation and recovery, respectively.