Walking into the “June-July-Summer-2026 Exhibition” at Creek Creative as an artist and painter myself, I was immediately struck by the sheer volume of creative energy filling the room. Salon-style group shows are always a beautiful challenge to digest. With such a massive, diverse collection of local talent on display, it is genuinely hard to mention everyone. Every single corner of the gallery holds something absolutely wonderful, reflecting the deep dedication and unique voice of its maker.
As a painter, my eyes naturally hunt for technical skill, color harmony, and emotional resonance. While the entire show is a triumph, a handful of specific artists and pieces completely stole my attention and demanded a closer look.
The Unapologetic Vitality of Brian Summers and Sioux Peto Watercolour
For any painter who loves the visceral power of composition, the work of Brian Summers on the main sage feature wall is an absolute standout. His paintings inject an incredibly bold, electrical energy into the gallery. What caught my eye immediately was his exceptionally vibrant, saturated color palette and a confident handling of form.
Sioux Peto’s two companion watercolor pieces, War and Destruction. What makes this diptych so successful from a painter’s point of view is the incredible balance of spontaneity and restraint. Watercolor can easily get muddy or run away from the artist, especially when dealing with heavy saturation. Peto manages to keep the colors luminous and pure.
The paintings don’t depict war and destruction with literal violence; instead, they translate the feeling of those concepts through the natural world—using shattered spaces, fleeing wildlife, and overwhelming washes of color to leave a powerful, poetic impression.
Exquisite Line Work and Material Mastery
Stepping away from raw color into the world of texture and graphic line, the show offers some incredible highlights that stopped me in my tracks:
- Catherine Deeson: Contributes a series of remarkable, beautifully executed linocuts. As a painter, I always appreciate artists who master the clean precision of relief printing. Deeson’s graphic prints display a fantastic control over form and tone, providing a wonderful, grounding contrast to the more fluid paintings nearby.
- Ruth Dalzell: Delivers a beautiful lesson in high-contrast composition. Her monochrome linocut The Stream by the Bridge is mesmerizing in how it plays with negative space to replicate light fracturing across moving water, while her mixed-media piece The Mysterious River Costa Rica shifts gears entirely into lush, shadowy jungle tones.
- Josephine Baly: Brings a fascinating texture to the room with Scrap Fashionista, using a clever mix of silk, cotton, and polyester to create a whimsical silhouette full of movement alongside her landscape textile, On the Beach.
Captivating Landscapes and Human Observation
The narrative depth of the show continues to unfold through two other artists whose distinctive styles immediately locked my gaze:
- Cheryl Culver: Elevates the landscape genre with her breathtaking, deeply atmospheric paintings. Her expertise in rendering light is something to behold. The fluid textures of her skies and the sweeping horizons of the British countryside feel alive, capturing the quiet, ever-changing moods of the terrain beautifully.
- Helga Picknell-Velkeniers: completely shifts the focus onto the viewer with her wonderfully observational and engaging graphic narrative piece, People watching in Hastings. As a fellow artist, I found myself captivated by her clean, illustrative linework and comic-strip framing, which effortlessly channels the quiet eccentricities of everyday public life. With a sharp and deeply engaging wit, Picknell-Velkeniers documents the subtle postures, fleeting interactions, and candid vulnerabilities of a seaside crowd. It’s a beautifully structured piece that reminds us that sometimes, the most fascinating canvas of all is simply the world passing by.
Final Thoughts
While these specific pieces caught my eye and spoke directly to my painter’s soul, the true magic of this exhibition is that it doesn’t rely on just a few names. Every wall is packed with soulful animal portraits, delicate abstracts, and hidden gems that make the entire collection absolutely wonderful to wander through.
It is a short two-week run, it an essential visit for artists and art lovers alike the Creek Creative Summer Exhibition. Take a stroll down Abbey Street, immerse yourself in the local talent, and be sure to save time for a coffee in the bustling Gallery Kitchen Café afterward.