Into The Dark Woods by Su Blackwell

‘Into the Dark Woods’ beckons us into the fantastic realms of Su Blackwell’s artistic imagination. Since graduating from the Royal College of Art, Blackwell has become widely known for her fragile and beguiling book sculptures that play on traditions of origami and shadow puppet theatre. Over time, she has perfected a form of rewriting through cutting to conjure a series of enchantments in paper.

This 2021 exhibition ‘Into the Dark Woods’ features more than 30 of Blackwell’s works. Blackwell has chosen seven of the most popular fairy tales in the western world to focus on– “Vasilisa,” “Aschenputtel,” “Beauty and the Beast,” “Donkeyskin,” “The Six Swans,” “The Red Shoes,” and “Bluebeard”. Scenes from these fairytales grow out of books that have been in her possession for a number of years, stories that she has revisited, mulled-over and dissected.