The Black Paintings

The Black Paintings

Opening Reception: Thursday 16th July, 6-8pm

James Lomax’s forthcoming exhibition presents fourteen windows cast in dark, unpigmented concrete. The number of works echo the fourteen 'Black Paintings' by Francisco Goya. Painted directly onto the walls of Goya’s country villa on the outskirts of Madrid between 1819 and 1823, the 'Black Paintings' are murals that mark the artist's turn toward psychological intensity and darkness. Their imagery reflects the disillusionment Goya felt toward the end of his life. Drawing from such melancholic historical reference, Lomax's works become self-reflective meditations on cognizance and uncertainty.

Each cast window offers only a sliver of the outside world, the rest of the pane is obscured. What lies beyond the frame is uncertain. While the frames are domestic and recognisable, the landscapes beyond remain unclear, prompting the viewer to question what lies beyond.

Windows traditionally orient us: they tell us the time of day, the weather, the conditions beyond ourselves. Here, however, those certainties are suspended. Through repetition and the use of concrete, Lomax transforms the window into both a barrier and a monument, capturing the unsettling stillness between protection and entrapment. Positioning us firmly inside looking, the viewer experiences an uneasy tension; the windows hold us in place rather than inviting us outward.

Lomax’s reference knowingly nods to the Overton Window (also known as the window of discourse), which is the range of policies and ideas politically acceptable to the mainstream public at any given time. Coined by American policy analyst Joseph Overton, it describes what politicians can safely propose without being viewed as too radical or out of touch.

The domestic associations of a window usually imply shelter, but the solidity of concrete complicates that comfort. By using concrete, a material associated with permanence and weight, Lomax ensures each frame becomes fixed in time - immobilised and fossilised.

Artist Biography

James Lomax (b. 1991, UK) lives and works in London. Lomax graduated from the Royal Academy Schools, London in 2022.

Lomax has undertaken residencies at Ikon Gallery, The New Art Gallery Walsall, The Henry Moore Institute and Studio Block M74 Mexico City. In early 2026, he was awarded funding from the Nordisk Kulturfond, where he will visit Agder Kunstakademi, a public artwork and free-thinking art school within a prison. In 2024, Lomax was the Artist in Residence at HMP Grendon, a Category B men's prison that operates a unique, psychodynamic therapeutic model.

Lomax's selected exhibitions include: 'A Tale of Two Cities', Sid Motion Gallery, London, UK, (2024) , 'Take a Seat', LAMB Gallery, London, UK (2024); 'Chester Contemporary', curated by Ryan Gander, Chester, UK (2023), 'Unbound Material', Sid Motion Gallery, London, UK (2023), 'Unprecedented Times', Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery, Birmingham, UK (2022), 'Absurd', OHSH Projects, London, UK (2022), 'Modern Relics', Fold Gallery, London, UK (2022), and 'Flatten & Collapse', Recent Activity, London, UK (2022).

Lomax's work is in the permanent collection of the Government Art Collection, a national collection of historic, modern and contemporary British art displayed in government buildings across the UK and in over 125 countries worldwide. 

View a short film of James Lomax walking through his East London studio, discussing his latest work. Film by Andy King.