Shannon Ribbons and Benji Lowsley-Williams Exhibition 28 Mar-11 April
This collaborative installation brings together two local artists — Benji Lowsley-Williams and Shannon Ribbons— in an exploration of form, material, and process through the interplay of natural and artistic transformation. The work merges a three-dimensional installation of sculptural organic material with two-dimensional charcoal drawings, creating a conversation between matter and mark-making, nature and gesture, permanence and decay.
The 3D installation will be constructed primarily from natural materials gathered from local woodland, with particular focus on the gnarled, twisted branches of oak trees. These worn and contorted forms speak to endurance, adaptation, and time’s shaping influence on the natural world. Their surfaces bear the memory of growth and weathering, while their shapes embody a sense of quiet resilience and organic rhythm. Embedded in this sculptural form is the historical practice of charcoal making, once a vital element of traditional woodland management. This process not only connects the work to an ancient, almost forgotten craft, but also serves as a literal and conceptual bridge between Benji’s use of raw wood and Shannon’s medium of charcoal. The ends of the oak branches in the installation will be charred, symbolically linking the two practices — transforming wood into the very material Shannon uses for his automatic drawings.
A Dialogue with the Woods
The woods are a place of solace — a space of protection and quiet contemplation, a refuge from the pressures of the outside world. To enter the forest is to cross a threshold into
another realm: one of stillness, texture, and layered time. In this project, the woodland is both material source and emotional landscape. The installation draws from this sense of
retreat and belonging, evoking what might be called the spirit of place — the living presence that exists between the trees, within the earth, and through the forms themselves.
“The forest is not only where materials are found, but where meaning is gathered — a place to return to, to listen, and to make from.”
Through this, the collaboration becomes more than a joining of materials; it becomes a meditation on what it means to dwell within a landscape, to be shaped by it, and to respond
creatively to its quiet persistence.
Shannon’s automatic charcoal drawings emerge from instinctive gesture and subconscious response, the rich environment of local woodland being a perennial inspiration for his work. These works will be displayed alongside or in proximity to the sculptural installation, allowing a visual and spatial dialogue to develop between the dense, tactile tangle of branches and the gestural immediacy of charcoal on paper. Although abstract and ambiguous, the interplay between these elements evokes the cyclical relationship between nature, transformation, and artistic creation. The installation invites viewers to move between the drawn and the constructed, the burnt and the living, the delicate and the monumental — revealing how each material and practice informs and reflects the other.
To see more of their work :
https://www.moorwoodart.com/artists/benjamin-lowsleywilliams
