ARTISTS TALKING

At the Applied Arts Agency, a newly-established gallery and shop in Clerkenwell, London, artists/designers Kate Maestri, Andie Scott and Andrew Stafford had been asked to respond to the concept of 'Thirtysomething'. 'Thirtysomething' is the prime of life; you're on the way to achieving the goals that you were beginning to investigate in your twenties and, as an artist, your work has started to reflect the determination and resolution it takes to make a living from artistic practice.

Each artist in the exhibition approached the theme in, on first impressions, contrasting ways. On further examination however, the 'Thirtysomething' brief had triggered the investigation of another theme. The works refer to, or drew from, scientific or mathematical formulae, perhaps reflecting the fact that by the time you're in your thirties, your experimentations are yielding results, the way a chemist may work on a formula in a laboratory for years and eventually come up with a wonder drug. This idea of referencing scientific methods and experimentation reflects the 'applied' nature of the work – retaining attention to process and technique, whilst at the same time producing results which retain a practical function or purpose.

Andie Scott's Paparazzi Portraits is a series of fifteen canvases investigating the way the eye reads an object or, in this case, a face, and transfers information using chemical reactions to the visual cortex of the brain where the image is constructed. Scott translates sensations or moments in time into a visual image using a formula, mimicking this set of reactions in the brain. Each canvas adheres to the same formula of a lush orange-red background on to which blue brush lines trace the shape of a face. The faces have been taken from unsolicited magazine portraits of each of the artists in the 'Sensation' exhibition. Now all in their thirties, these artists have come to represent a certain moment of time in the London art scene. Scott references each artist's individual process of seeing or making by manipulating her formula; when the portrait is of Marc Quinn, Scott uses basic colour theory – tonal variations in the blue line exaggerate the redness of the background – to allude to his Blood Head work and therefore reference him as an individual. Her formula has been applied to construct a unique image in a refreshing way.

In complete contrast, Kate Maestri's coloured glass works explore 'Thirtysomething' in a much more logical fashion. Strips of coloured glass are mounted vertically on Perspex lightbox-like constructions, with mathematically calculated spaces between each strip. Sequences of stripes and spaces play on the number thirty, adding up to different combinations of the number in the same way that a bar code adds up to coincide with a product.

Andrew Stafford's furniture works appear to move away from the theme, though a reference to science in an academic sense still plays a strong part in the works. Sharing suggestions of academia and achievement, like Scott's, they loosely represent a moment in time. His Olympic Podium, constructed from ply sheets, functions as a seat or bench. The piece is shaped literally as the title suggests, with chemical formulae for each of the medals in bold type in the place where the winners should stand. A leather-covered table humorously references classroom furniture, and, like the podium, achievement or academia. Perhaps by the time you're thirty you've stopped worrying about school honours and accolades and have changed your priorities.

Each artist explored 'Thirtysomething' in an interestingly lateral way, avoiding the potential traps of taking the theme too literally and producing heavily autobiographical works. The exhibition deserved more space and a location that didn't also function as a commercial applied arts shop, albeit it an extremely good one, as the work and curation is conceptually very strong. Hopefully the artists will continue to make work that reflects the prime of life and that avoids becoming stale and middle-aged.