Helen Frik
The Hell Club

5th September - 5th October, 2008
4th September – Private View

The Entrance
A gallery is a place where people come to look, to use their eyes and their intellect. They may also come to be seen, to be talked to, perhaps to be pampered, bullied and cajoled. There is an Art Club, at least there used to be. A reasonably elite club. Over the decades it has grown to become Popular, low is high, and then it really started to be a money spinner, which increased membership to the point where the club rules became unclear. Everyone now thinks that art is, and should be for everyone. The problem being that Culture is used as a euphemism for anything vaguely creative, and that Art has been taken to mean a new market commodity. Boxes, cardboard tubes and bags piled up to the left of the doorway bear delivery labels to the David Risley Gallery. The Hell Club is the David Risley Gallery after all. Possibly art has been thrown away here by mistake. A bell is integrated in the ‘Hell Club’ plaque: Ring to get in. Galleries are ring to get ins.

Hell
You are let in: you belong. You are a member. Welcome to the Hell Club.
The drawings chosen from the Frik Collection to be shown here in the low lit intimacy of the club room are themed around Hell or God, the soul, or bad character but it’s the ins and outs which are important. These are works which no-one will ever own. They belong to a foundation. They are examples in a long dynasty of propositions. Hell is usually considered final, but here there are other opportunities…..

Purgatory
From Hell there is a door through to a much larger space - this is Purgatory. And why is this Purgatory? Purgatory, a space in time where things are reviewed. The artist thought purgatory should absolutely resemble a gallery for contemporary art. Here recent works are hung and happily these are for sale. You are invited to stay a while, relax, sip a portwine and nibble at an almond cookie: in purgatory time stays still. The theme if you will of these drawings, is the theme which Frik has been concerned with for the past quarter of a century: interaction. She wants to point out some things to you, to make you hang around for a while and consider things as they are, as they might be.

Heaven
When the artist first met David Risley, she voiced her sympathy with the demanding, networking, never-miss-an-opportunity life of a dedicated gallerist: no, said David, It’s not hard work, it’s the best thing I can imagine: working with my friends, surrounded by their work, it’s great. Is this his idea of heaven? Is the office really a wonderful place? It is certainly a place where, if you are a believer, you can buy a dream. If you are an investor, you can perhaps buy an investment, bear in mind however that it is not just you who makes sure the investment comes true.

Helen Frik was born in 1960 in Worcester, UK. She moved to Holland at the age of 21 to work at the prestigious international institute the Ateliers and has lived and worked in Amsterdam ever since. Her work is widely known and well represented in private, corporate and museum collections in Holland. The David Risley Gallery has been actively introducing her work comprising drawings, sculptures and installations, to a wider audience since 2005.

The Frik Collection founded in 1996 in Amsterdam, Holland, now comprises over 170 drawings made in a period spanning 27 years. The drawings are all by Frik herself, and were brought under the care of the Hovy Frik Foundation after the collection was first launched to the general public in 2005 at the Gemeentemuseum The Hague in the Netherlands. Drawings from the Frik Collection will also be on loan to the Pump House in Battersea, London, for the exhibition ‘Smoke’ from 7 October – 14 December 2008.