I’m delighted to be showing my painting Dear Moon (2024) in Response.

“An artwork is not complete until it is received by others. Art lives in our response. The spectator, the listener, is as important as the doer.”

Helen Martineau, Prodigal Daughters.

Response is the first exhibition of Split Collective’s 2026 season. Opening in Guernsey on 29th May, it will then travel to London mid-August.

A response is a reply, an answer, a reaction. It implies correspondence, connection, conversation. The nature of a response, be it an affirmation, a question, a defence, rebuttal, or refusal, always carries a seed, a possibility of growth and expansion. A response can be the building block of a meaningful relationship, an opportunity for enlightenment or just the chance to engage in playful banter.

To respond is inherent in the Turps and MASS Correspondence Courses, which link artists and mentors across a wide geographical area and from which the Split Collective emerged in 2025. In a deeper way, to respond is woven into every artist’s practice. Artworks are formed by multiple responses – to materials, to experiences, to peers, to the audience and to the wider community.

Where previous Split Collective shows focused on the response between artist and mentor, now released from the structure of the course, the work presented in Responseexpands to explore that space in which myriad connections create the possibilities for better worlds. We invite you to join the conversation.

Split Collective