Sophie Barber @ Alison Jacques

‘How Much Love Can a Love Bird Love, Can a Love Bird Love a Love Bird’, is an exhibition of new paintings by Sophie Barber.  The chosen title began life as an otherwise innocuous entry in the artist’s internet search history. (Contrary to popular belief, lovebird parrots do not die when separated, although the strength of their connection is heartening.) But in its repetition, the reconstituted tongue twister touches upon the unseen relationship between each of Barber’s subjects.

Beneath the oil and the presence, these are paintings about affection, attraction, memory, love; the way in which certain images attach themselves to us – and we to them – for reasons more profound than subject matter alone.