essays by Alistair Robinson and Andreas Leventis

This monograph, published to accompany Housley’s solo exhibition of paintings at the Reg Vardy Gallery, 2005, is the result of a year-long residency at Durham Cathedral. Painting, for Housley, is a “dumb muse”: a medium which, whilst only able to offer still, silent and hand-made single images, is also able to offer the most complex, nuanced and double-edged forms of visual experience. Working on an intimate scale, Housley’s images elicit an unlikely poignancy and tenderness from subject matter that might initially seem to offer slight returns.