Tools for Dreamers

Night Café is pleased to introduce ‘Tools for Dreamers’, a solo exhibition of paintings and sculptural works by Ben Edmunds. In this exhibition, Edmunds will present a new body of work exploring if it is possible to still embrace a pursuit in progress even when it is hard to trust in it. In the early 19th century, artists and designers began to embrace a Modernist belief in progress. There was conviction in the idea that moving forward would heal the human condition; that a better society lay ahead if the world could be reimagined through new approaches to art, design, industry, and everyday life. Often utopian, these visions of human progress can now appear as a relentless pursuit of more, where advancement and improvement become inseparable. In our day and age, beneath this pursuit sits a deeper longing: the desire to believe that a better world is still possible. Can there still be hope? Can we hold on to the conviction that a better future lies ahead? Ben Edmunds’ artistic pursuit mirrors this teetering faith in progress. Through the visual languages of adventure sport and design, Edmunds explores abstraction on his own terms, navigating the tension between aspiration and uncertainty.