Nottingham artist Mik Godley gave a talk on my BA course and I was influenced by his dedicated investigation into his past as well as his exploration of new technologies to create his work – through iPad drawing and integration of digital information. This exhibition in Leicester was a retrospective from Mik about his homeland of Silesia and combined large watercolour paintings, iPad drawings and small sketches. I really enjoy how Mik captures the essence of people and place using a combination of techniques that beautifully knit together. The large watercolours were simply fantastic, intentionally blurred and pixelated which hinted at people and places that had long since passed. Mik excels at iPad drawing and some of his drawings had been printed at scale which offered a romantic view of the landscape of Silesia but with a dark edge when one realised that some of the relics were left by the Nazis.
This exhibition taught me a lot about how to represent the history of a place through time and in a range of media. Mik has skillfully combined traditional and contemporary mark making techniques which offer us different angles from which to understand the nature of Silesia and what it means to the artist.
