It’s 175 years since the Manchester College of Art opened off Oxford Road. Among the year-long programme of events from the influential school, and the huge, but heartening, extension they’re building at All Saints Park, one notable alumna is opening a debut showcase a few blocks down the road. Theresa Reilly-Cooper, a local artist and illustrator based in trademark ramshackle Ancoats loft, is exhibiting a collection of her striking pencil works in Joshua Brooks. The portraits, painstakingly rendered in simple graphite on white paper, take some of the city’s coolest natives, matching ultra-realist detail with stark vacuous space. Reilly-Cooper will often behead her models, or remove a couple of limbs to give her work a unique but bizarre allurement. Sample her work on her website below.

Thu 18 Apr – Thu 30 May, Joshua Brooks, 106 Princess Street, M1 6NG. Tel: 0161 273 7336, 12-8pm, free, www.thelefttwin.tumblr.com

Thu 18 Apr - Thu 30 May
Words:
Sam Levy
Published on:
Wed 17 Apr 2013