There has been a 25 year gap since the red pillars of the demolished railway bridge across the Thames at Blackfriars were last put to use. Their brief moment of stand-alone glory is over now that the new platforms for Blackfriars station use them for support. Nick Schlee’s large, powerful oil paintings of the bare pillars truly match the strength of the pillars first built in 1864. Their surprising mysterious presence dominate the Thames at that point although many people walking across the road bridge at Blackfriars probably never give them a first, let alone a second, look. This exhibition, called ‘Bridging the gap’, puts them centre stage. Nick Schlee is usually known for his dynamic paintings of the grandeur of the Wiltshire, Oxford, Hampshire and Berkshire landscape. His work is well represented in these Counties’ museums and art galleries as well as in the City’ of London Guildhall Art Gallery’s collection. Now, as Monet’s paintings of the House of Parliament gave us a permanent record of London’s historic fog, these pictures ensure we have a record of the now vanished period when the pillars stood magnificently idle.
