Canopy Collections | Art

NOW OPEN | Discover Isabelle Young’s solo show, “Venice As I Was” at Canopy Collections HQ. « In Lord Byron’s poem Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1818), his disillusioned flaneur reflects on Venice in a tone that oscillates between romance and ruin, writing of a city whose beauty is inseparable from its slow dissolution: “I stood in Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs; / A palace and a prison on each hand.” The line contains a tension that resonates strongly within Isabelle Young’s photographic series Venice As I Was. Her images exist within this same unstable space - between splendour and erosion, memory and disappearance, violence and serene surrender. Venice appears not as a spectacle but as a fragile albeit sinister surface of signs, fragments quietly registering the weight of ecological and emotional time. Young’s photographs rarely present the monumental Venice of postcards. Instead, they are populated with terrazzo floors bathed in liquid light, weathered porticos, shards of light piercing a monumental door, over-grown salt-swept garden walls, the subdued quiet of Campo Santa Maria Formosa in winter, or the faint residue of water across stone. These scenes echo the seasonal violence of the aqua alta, the tidal flooding that increasingly marks the rhythms of the lagoon. Water stains creep across architectural surfaces like slow handwriting, tracing the environmental precarity of a city defended by barriers yet perpetually threatened by the sea and over-tourism. The recently erected flood defences appear in the series as ambiguous presences - structures of protection that simultaneously acknowledge inevitable loss. Venice is both shielded and already defeated. » — Alona Pardo, Director of the Arts Council Collection

PHOTO LONDON | We’re looking forward to welcoming you at @photolondonfair next week. Come and find us at Booth I03 to discover the work of @baudpostma . In his latest series, titled “Death of the Author”, Baud Postma (b. 1982, UK) uses AI as a tool for conceptual enquiry, generating images through text-to-image platforms and then subjecting them to analogue interventions. These works open a dialogue between the past, present and future of photography, inviting viewers to consider how new technologies might coexist with traditional practices. The choice of the Cowboy as subject matter provides a potent metaphor for the AI revolution: on one hand representing ideals of freedom, opportunity and self-determination; on the other, invoking histories of exploitation and extreme cultural upheaval. Photo London is the UK’s leading international fair for photography and image-based art. Each year it brings together the world’s most acclaimed photographers, galleries and curators alongside a new generation of emerging talent.

PHOTO LONDON | Join us this week at Photo London to discover the work of Baud Postma, who has been shortlisted for the Nikon Emerging Photographer Award 2026. Our presentation at the fair includes new works from the artists iconic ‘Death of the Author’ series, which was first unveiled as part of the artist’s solo show at Canopy Collections HQ in July 2025. These works open a dialogue between the past, present and future of photography, inviting viewers to consider how new technologies might coexist with traditional practices. Canopy Collections | Booth I03 Olympia Hammersmith Road London W14 8UX

PHOTO LONDON | Join us this week at Photo London, Booth I03, to discover the latest work of @baudpostma . In his series “Death of the Author”, Postma uses AI as a tool for conceptual enquiry, generating images through text-to-image platforms and then subjecting them to analogue interventions. These works open a dialogue between the past, present and future of photography, inviting viewers to consider how new technologies might coexist with traditional practices. The choice of the Cowboy as subject matter provides a potent metaphor for the AI revolution: on one hand representing ideals of freedom, opportunity and self-determination; on the other, invoking histories of exploitation and extreme cultural upheaval. Blurring the boundaries between human intention and machine interpretation, he invites viewers to reconsider what it means today to “take a photograph.”

OPENING TOMORROW | Join us tomorrow for the opening of “Venice As I Was” by @isabellelyoung at Canopy Collections HQ. In this body of work, which spans six years of her practice, Young disrupts our received image of Venice, offering fragments in place of panorama, and silence where spectacle is expected. The exhibition is accompanied by an essay written by @alona_pardo , Director of the Arts Council Collection. « The title “Venice As I Was” carries a quiet autobiographical resonance. It suggests not only the memory of a place, but the memory of a self once situated within it. Beneath the ecological and cultural reflections lies a more intimate narrative: the artist’s own personal relationship with the city, shaped by a traumatic ending as turbulent as the lagoon’s tides. » Isabelle Young | Venice As I Was Private View: Tuesday 12 May, 6—8pm 12 May—3 July 2026 Canopy Collections HQ 3 Bloomsbury Place London WC1A 2QA

PHOTO LONDON | From 13—17 May, Canopy Collections will be exhibiting at @photolondonfair for the first time, with new works from Baud Postma’s acclaimed “Death of the Author” series. Conceptually rich and visually captivating, these new pieces continue Postma’s ongoing interrogation of authorship, image-making, and the meaning of photography in relation to new AI-driven technologies. Postma’s work is held in international private collections. He has exhibited at Photo London; Paris Photo; The Royal Academy of Arts, London; The National Portrait Gallery, London. He has also collaborated with numerous fashion brands including JW Anderson, Burberry, Dries Van Noten, Chanel, Erdem and Paul Smith. In 2025, Canopy Collections curated his first solo exhibition, titled “Baud Postma: Cowboys & Flowers”. #baudpostma #photolondon #photography #artandai #nikonemergingphotographeraward

OPENING NEXT WEEK | As the art world descends on Venice this week for the inauguration of the 61st @labiennale , we are looking forward to opening “Venice As I Was”, a solo exhibition of photographic works by Isabelle Young and the artist’s first show at Canopy Collections HQ. Opening on Tuesday 12 May, the exhibition is accompanied by a beautiful essay written by @alona_pardo , Director of the Arts Council Collection, which can be read on our website. “In Lord Byron’s poem Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage (1818), his disillusioned flaneur reflects on Venice in a tone that oscillates between romance and ruin, writing of a city whose beauty is inseparable from its slow dissolution: “I stood in Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs; / A palace and a prison on each hand.” The line contains a tension that resonates strongly within Isabelle Young’s photographic series Venice As I Was. Her images exist within this same unstable space - between splendour and erosion, memory and disappearance, violence and serene surrender. Venice appears not as a spectacle but as a fragile albeit sinister surface of signs, fragments quietly registering the weight of ecological and emotional time. Young’s photographs rarely present the monumental Venice of postcards. Instead, they are populated with terrazzo floors bathed in liquid light, weathered porticos, shards of light piercing a monumental door, over-grown salt-swept garden walls, the subdued quiet of Campo Santa Maria Formosa in winter, or the faint residue of water across stone. These scenes echo the seasonal violence of the aqua alta, the tidal flooding that increasingly marks the rhythms of the lagoon.” Isabelle Young | Venice As I Was 12 May—3 July 2026 Private View: Tuesday 12 May, 6—8pm Canopy Collections HQ 3 Bloomsbury Place London WC1A 2QA

MUSEUM SHOW | Final weekend to visit William Cobbing’s exhibition at @bmoca in Boulder, Colorado. Rooted in sculpture, William Cobbing’s practice encompasses a diverse range of media, including video, performance and installation. Clay, both in its raw and fired forms, is central to his work, as is the idea of entropy. The figures that emerge from his sculptures and performances often appear suspended in a state of metamorphosis, blurring the boundary between body and earth. Cobbing’s work is held in international private and public collections, including NOMAS Foundation, Rome; MONA Museum of Old and New Art, Tasmania; Corpus Christi College, Cambridge University; Bouwfonds Art Collection, The Netherlands; Wellcome Trust, London. He has exhibited at the Whitechapel Gallery, London; UMOCA, Utah; The Art Block at Selfridges, London; Hayward Gallery, London; Tate Liverpool; Camden Arts Centre, London; TENT, Rotterdam; Studio Voltaire, London; The Issey Miyake Foundation, Tokyo; Canopy Collections, London; Cooke Latham Gallery, London; Sid Motion Gallery, London; Flowers Gallery, London; Messums West, Salisbury. In 2025, Canopy Collections curated his first retrospective, titled “William Cobbing: Sculptures, 2014–2024”.

SOHO HOUSE MEXICO CITY | Celeste is an artist duo formed by María Fernanda Camarena and Gabriel Rosas Alemán. Hospitality is central to their shared practice, often taking shape through collaborative public projects. Working across materials and disciplines—from textile installations and copper sculptures to works on paper—their work reflects a meeting of their individual aesthetic sensibilities. Drawing on an abstract vocabulary inspired by landscape, architecture, and bodies both celestial and human, they create compositions that radiate harmony and warmth. In parallel with these larger spatial and sculptural interventions, Celeste also produce monotype prints, translating their interest in texture and materiality into a more intimate format. These prints often feature fluid forms and layered colour fields, echoing the natural palette and organic shapes that run throughout their practice. Celeste’s work is held in international private and public collections. Their inaugural exhibition took place in 2020 at the Zapopan Museum in Mexico. They have exhibited at Jumex Foundation, Mexico City; The Contemporary Austin, Texas; The Royal Society of Sculptors, London; Museo Amparo, Mexico; The Shepherd Art Center, Detroit; Pangée Pangée, Montreal; Art Paris; JO-HS, Mexico City; The Bentway, Toronto; Museo Cabañas, Guadalajara; Soho House, Mexico City. In 2023, Canopy Collections curated their first solo exhibition in Europe, titled “Celeste: A Portable Landscape”. Photo by Maureen Evans for @sohohouse in Mexico City.

MUSEUM SHOW | Congratulations to Philip Eglin for his inclusion in the exhibition “Useful/Beautiful” which marks 25 years of contemporary craft at @blackwellartsandcrafts . This group show celebrates the makers, ideas and objects that have shaped the museum collection since opening their doors to the public in 2001. Set throughout the house, the exhibition brings together much-loved works from Blackwell’s nationally significant collection, alongside more recent additions. Visitors can rediscover standout pieces by artists including Magdalene Odundo, Kate Malone, Edmund de Waal and Philip Eglin, and explore how craft can tell stories about materials, making and everyday life.

SAVE THE DATE | We are delighted to present “Venice As I Was”, a solo exhibition of photographic works by @isabellelyoung and the artist’s first show at Canopy Collections HQ, opening on Tuesday 12 May. Isabelle Young (b. 1989, London) is a British photographer whose work explores architectural spaces and unresolved narratives. Her subjects are architectural interiors, still lives and quiet moments often devoid of people, yet with a sense they have only just departed. Young’s photographs are distinguished by their unique compositions, sculptural use of light and colour, alongside an acute attention to the textures and atmosphere of her subjects. All her work is analogue and is deeply informed by the slowness of painting. Her work eschews the documentary but is instead defined by her ability to transform familiar settings into contemplative scenes, which often hold an uncanny feeling. By privileging nuance, restraint, and the unspoken over the overt, Young’s images explore the emotional resonance of the everyday to reveal their heightened narratives. Young has exhibited internationally, including solo exhibitions at Galerie Fabian Lang, Zürich; Canopy Collections, London; SOCO Gallery, Charlotte NC, USA and Cedric Bardawil Gallery, London. Her work is held in notable collections including the Credit Suisse Collection; Museo Casa Mollino, and private collections in Europe and the UK. Isabelle Young | Venice As I Was 12 May—3 July 2026 Private View: Tuesday 12 May, 6—8pm Canopy Collections HQ 3 Bloomsbury Place London WC1A 2QA

MUSEUM SHOW | Congratulations to @afreemanbentley for her inclusion in the beautiful exhibition « Handpicked: Painting Flowers from 1900 to Today » which opened last week at @kettlesyard in Cambridge. When Jim and Helen Ede opened Kettle’s Yard in 1957, one of the key elements of their interior displays was fresh cut flowers. Their flower arrangements created visual correspondences with the forms and colours of artworks in the Edes’ remarkable collection. « Handpicked: Painting Flowers » features artists for whom painting flowers was a lifelong preoccupation, as well as those for whom it represented a brief but intense period of making. Alongside works by significant figures of the 20th century, including Vanessa Bell, Henri Rousseau, Winifred Nicholson and Christopher Wood, contemporary artists such as Lubaina Himid, Jennifer Packer, Chris Ofili, Caroline Walker, Cassi Namoda and Alison Watt, breathe new life into a much-loved subject. An exhibition not to be missed!