Running and Returning: Jyll Bradley: A major solo retrospective at The Box, Plymouth, UK

Running and Returning is a major survey of the work of English artist and writer Jyll Bradley who has been making work for more than three decades. Her pioneering approach and creativity have resulted in an incredibly broad-ranging practice. Over the years her work has evolved and changed, encompassing drawing, photography, film, poetry and large-scale public artworks. Bradley’s practice combines a minimalist approach with ideas of identity, urbanity, light, cultivation, queerness and community. Whilst it is diverse, there are some themes that she returns to repeatedly, hence the title of this exhibition.

Running and Returning will highlight the diversity of her practice and take visitors on a deeply personal journey. Early photographic self-portraits examine what it was like for Bradley to be a young queer female while Flower Train (2010) focuses on the struggle to make personal, geographic and economic connections through the framework of the flower trade in the south west of England, the region where her adoptive family originate. A selection of lightbox works show how Bradley experimented with ideas of identity in a less prescriptive, more poetic way in the early part of her career, while a series of films explore the search for her birth mother and experience as an adoptee.

Beyond the walls of The Box’s St Luke’s gallery, Bradley’s focus on community and place-making will be brought into focus with large-scale public artwork The Hop (2022). Originally commissioned by the Hayward Gallery, London, this vibrant interactive sculpture connects urban landscapes with rural hop gardens and is set to project a spectrum of colours around The Box’s public square on Tavistock Place throughout the summer months.

Running and Returning will also feature a selection of drawings and maquettes from major public artworks Bradley has created.The exhibition will be accompanied by a major new publication spanning her career to date.