MF Collective, 7 artists creating new work inspired by the gift of a ‘meanwhile space’ at Castle Quay; connecting with people, a sense of place, history and memories of Banbury.

Clare Crombie, Gabriele Kern, Gill White, Juliet Banks, Lisa Bates, Louise Shaw, Marina Price.

This pop-up shop show, with a ‘pop-in and create’ element offers a space of community reflection within the shopping hub of this town.

Retail spaces have become especially loaded over this past year; they are one of the visible signs of what has been happening to our communities.. at times available to us all and then withdrawn, carrying uncertainty and raising questions about how we might shape our futures.

We are a group of 7 women artists who bonded whilst at OVADA, living and working throughout Oxfordshire. During the past year, when much that was physically present has had to take to the virtual realm, we have managed to keep our artistic connection alive, in spite of the usual ways of collaborating being largely unavailable to us.

Our project at Castle Quay will be the first element of a larger project ‘Memory Banks’, which we will create and exhibit at points along the River Cherwell to the Thames at Henley. These waterways weave through the landscape connecting each of our homes.